Spell Shock
By Pouncer
Rain slicked the window, turning the garden into amorphous masses of green and brown. He stared outside, sitting in his comfortable chair, trying to focus on the bed of hydrangeas. The bushes drooped down to the ground, branches heavy with blue mop head flowers and water.
He watched a raindrop land on the glass, then another, then another, until the water gathered enough weight and rolled down, down, down to the windowsill. Another drop hit the pane, smearing his view further. He watched to see when it would fall.
"Harry?"
Another raindrop landed. The wind was picking up now, driving a sheet of water against the building.
"Harry? How have you been?"
The woman's voice sounded familiar, long ago exhortations to study harder whispering through his mind. He couldn't make sense of her words.
"They tell me you've been doing better, Harry. I'm glad to see you sitting up and not in bed."
A tree rocked in the wind, whipping water and dead leaves into the glass panes with great force. They landed with near-explosive cracks, rat-tat-tat. He flinched back, then cringed as another gust of wind heightened the storm's fury.
He felt a hand on his shoulder.
"Harry? Are you okay? Should I get the nurse?"
He curled up in his chair, back to the window, and trembled.
Tears welled up in his eyes. He waited for them to fall down his cheeks. Spots occluded his glasses when he blinked.
"Nurse? He's upset about something."
Cheery tones intruded, stalling the tears for an instant. "Now, now, Mr. Potter, you don't want to hurt Miss Granger's feelings, do you?"
He knew they were having some low-voiced conversation above his head, but the rain had become rocks pounding against his hiding place. Ron was beside him, wand clutched in his hand.
"Oi, Harry," came a harsh whisper. "How do we get out of this one?" Ron had learned courage over almost seven years of adventures, or at least learned to fake it. His grin cut through the gloom.
The water had reached the top of the window now. Soon its weight would implode the glass, releasing a tidal wave. He'd drown then, buried beneath its depths, no gillyweed to save him.
The liquid pouring down his throat didn't taste like water. A medicinal tang filled his mouth, bearing him up with its power. He floated, weightless, for an eternity.
xxxxxxxx
The view from his bed was cut off, the window framing a garden turned forty-five degrees from normal. Bare tree branches stood against the sky, so sharp they could cut. The air quivered with crystalline stillness. Harry could see the edge of red bows festooning the iron garden gate as they sang carols no one could hear. The packages on his dresser were similarly bedecked, ribbons spilling towards the floor.
The presents had arrived one by one over the past week, owled in from who knows where. Harry didn't want to know. He couldn't bring himself to open them, even with regular encouragement from the nurses. The garden was a better focus for his attention, peaceful and soothing in its chill serenity. He catalogued the minute branchings of one tree, trying to follow each fork from trunk to twig.
A squeaky-wheeled cart moved outside his door, slow footsteps of the nurse syncopating with the high-pitched itch of the wheel. A faster set of footsteps clattered from the end of the hall, pausing just short of his door. He braced himself for a visitor, and kept trying to inventory the trees.
"Happy Christmas, Harry!" Mrs. Weasley's voice held a forced note of cheerfulness. She bustled over to the far side of his bed, blocking his view of the window. He stared at the gift in her hands for a minute before he felt his eyes travel up to her face. She reached out to touch his cheek, fingers tickling like Hedwig's pinions used to. A stiff smile set her features as she asked, "How have you been?"
He searched for words to answer her. None presented themselves, so he shrugged.
"Hermione told me you were a bit more lively when she visited you. She was sorry she couldn't be here today, but her parents really wanted her with them in Menorca."
Harry had hardly been able to meet Hermione's sad eyes during her last visit. He'd listened to her ramble about her research studies into advanced arithmancy, trying to avoid hearing the things she didn't say.
Mrs. Weasley talked more than Hermione. "And I wanted to make sure you didn't spend Christmas entirely alone, my dear. Even if they've tried to decorate a bit, St. Mungo's is still far too cold for my liking." She paused to allow for a reply and when he remained silent decided to carry on unaided. "Bill tells me Gryffindor is ahead in the points race so far. Slytherin is so demoralized that they can barely field a team. Gryffindor won their latest match against Ravenclaw, although their new Seeker isn't up to your standard. Everyone's still talking about your last game."
He had loved to fly. He remembered swooping through the air above the pitch, arrowing towards the first golden glint he saw, Malfoy giving chase behind him, always behind him, a green blur spotted out of the corner of his eye. Malfoy was always too slow, never able to win fair.
The Death Eaters hadn't fought fair either, when they overran Hogwart's. The icy air had made Harry's panicked flight over the countryside into an endurance test more grueling than any Quidditch match. The night was dark, the moon waxing toward full behind a scrim of clouds. Every few minutes, they parted to reveal the Man in the Moon watching Harry's escape with wide eyes and astonished mouth. Wind rushed past Harry's ears, deafening him with its roar and numbing his entire face. His pursuers finally caught him with a web of deception spells, boxing in his flight until he realized that he had circled the same field for long moments.
He was dragged into the Malfoy dungeons, the face of his rival smirking as he heard how The Boy Who Lived had been captured.
"Well, Potter, glad to know that you're so incompetent when it comes to real flying."
Fingers on his hand made him jerk back. "You should hear Bill talk about the first year Charms students, Harry. He says nothing he faced at Gringotts prepared him for all the ways a charm could go wrong. And he's not sure that Ollivander isn't losing his touch with wand matches."
His wand had been torn from him in the struggle preceding his capture, but Malfoy's had been ominous as he raised it with a casual "Crucio". Agony tore through Harry's body, worse than he remembered. Spasms of pain shook every muscle, sharp knives flensing his skin, breaking his bones. And all Harry could do was scream.
"Why don't you open your present?" Mrs. Weasley pressed the box into his hands and he plucked half-heartedly at the wrapping paper. It took him a long time to unveil the contents: a maroon jumper.
She held it up to his shoulders, pressing against his pajamas. "There! It does fit! Arthur told me I was making it too small, but I told him you'd lost weight." She hesitated a moment. "I hope it'll keep you warm while you get better."
He managed to finger the wool and said, "Thank you," his voice barely a whisper.
"Do you need anything? Maybe some help opening your other presents?"
His eyes darted to the bounty on the dresser for only a second before he shook his head. He took his glasses off and lay back down on the pillow, closing his eyes.
There was a long silence.
"All right, my dear, if you want to sleep I'll be getting back to the Burrow." Her lips touched his cheek for an instant before she was off. Harry listened to her footsteps retreat down the hallway. The silence left after her departure followed him into his dreams.
He lay in the cupboard under the stairs, snuggled under his blankets. The Dursleys thought it a punishment, to lock him up at night. They didn't know that night was the only time he felt safe, cocooned beyond their reach.
He waited in the dark, listening to the house on Privet Drive creak, the normal settling noises. The creaks grew ominous, turning to groans as the wood contracted. Harry felt the walls of his cubby-hole press against his feet, and he bent his knees but the stairs followed. He would be crushed. He started to yell, pounded on the walls, crying out for Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon to save him. He heard their voices outside the locked door.
They were laughing. "Who's the scary wizard now, Harry?" Dudley asked.
Harry screamed and screamed until the wood pressed the air from his lungs.
He awoke after dark, when the nurse brought his supper tray and evening potion. "Well, Mr. Potter. We've goose for Christmas dinner. It should go well with the Exhilaro Potion."
The potions always choked him, sliding down his throat like they were infused with ground glass instead of plants. Too many potions, Exhilaro twice a day for energy, the Waters of Lethe before bedtime, Quietonic in the mornings to calm his nerves. The potions were supposed to make him well, but Harry suspected the Healers were holding out false hope.
He ate his goose, drank his pumpkin juice and Quietonic, under the watchful eye of the nurse. They had learned not to leave him alone or he would not eat at all, even with the daily dose of Tantalixer. She took the empty tray from his bed with a reminder that she would be back in a couple of hours with his evening potions. "And why don't you open your presents, Mr. Potter?"
After a while, Harry got out of the bed to use the loo. Once he was done, he wandered around the room, his home the past six months. Such a small place to contain his life, yet he had started out in smaller.
He wanted to return to the cupboard under the stairs and let it grind his bones to powder.
He got too close to the dresser and the package wrapping paper started showing off to attract his attention. His image in the mirror said, "You should open them. I'm tired of looking at fir tree paper all the time."
Harry had told the nurses to stop cutting his hair some weeks ago. They were delighted at this sign of "initiative" and left off approaching him with scissors. His mirror image's face was half-hidden by black hair flopping in his eyes over his glasses. Harry shook his head, narrowing his field of vision. He felt safer seeing the world through a fringe.
Harry picked up the closest box, looking at the way the paper pattern blinked and cavorted. He slid his fingers under the wrapping with the same deliberate care that he had used to disarm the book traps left in the Gryffindor common room. Hermione had spent weeks under Madame Pomfrey's care, and a first-year had died. Not the first (Cedric). Not the last.
The box opened to reveal a book on the Chudley Cannons. "History of the Home Team Favorites!" blared the back cover. Harry stroked the glossy paper, watching the Cannons fly in formation over the pitch.
He unwrapped another package, which contained Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans from Headmistress McGonagall. He worked his way through the rest of the presents: sweets of every variety, books, playing cards from Neville. He heaped them aside, searching for the small mean package he knew had to be there. It would hold a tissue or a single biscuit or a piece of notepaper.
It wasn't there.
He rummaged through the pile of wrapping paper and ribbons under the interested gaze of his mirror image.
"What are you looking for?"
"It should be here," Harry muttered. "Where is it?"
"There's nothing else to open, you know. I inventoried them quite thoroughly while you left them here."
"No. It has to be here."
"You've opened them all," the mirror insisted.
Harry picked up the Cannons book and ruffled the pages.
"There's nothing else," his reflection said.
"There has to be," Harry shouted.
The face in the mirror was shaking his head. "Nothing else, no more presents, and you know why, don't you Harry? You know."
"No!" His hands were trembling around the book cover. He could feel blood pounding through his head.
"You know." The face in the mirror was sad now.
"No!" Harry watched his hands come up in the mirror, book clutched between them. He felt his muscles bunch as the book smashed the mirror.
The sound of the shattered glass cascaded through his ears, the screams of the Dursleys as Malfoy crushed them to crimson smears on the grey stone floor of his dungeon.
Harry searched frantically among the fragments of mirror, ignoring the red dripping onto silver until the nurses came.
xxxxxxxx
St. Mungo's walled garden surrounded Harry and Neville in a riot of color as they walked down graveled paths. Buckets were placed at the tips of the weeping cherry to collect sap for use in potion making. White blossoms perched like butterflies on its limbs, forming puffy clouds. Johnny Jump-ups tumbled over their brethren, happy purple faces smiling up into the sun.
Harry wished he could feel happy again. Even peace was hard to find.
"I've got a cottage of my own now, close to the Nursery. I did so well with the greenhouses over the winter that they've given me an entire field to cultivate. You'd be amazed at how many languorlilies are sold in Diagon Alley." Neville crouched down to finger a crocus blossom. "I really like having my own garden." He kept stroking the petals.
"What do you have there?" Harry finally asked.
"Lots of Muggle flowers. I rented it late last summer, after I got the job with the Nursery, so I was able to plant tulips and daffodils and crocus – all sorts of spring bulbs, really. I have a cold frame where I've started phlox and hollyhocks, the single kind, not those horrid fluffy pompoms." Neville pulled up a sprig of greenery that offended his sense of order. The earth left on his hands from the roots was brown and crumbly. "I put in rose bushes, and all sorts of herbs." He tossed the weed to the back of the flowerbed, close to the brick wall. "They attract less attention from the neighbors." He was combing his fingers through the dirt, feeling its texture.
"It sounds pretty," Harry offered after a while.
"The plants are running wild – not manicured like this."
Looking at the neat groupings of colors in front of him, Harry had to ask, "Don't you think it's soothing, though? Everything with a place to call its own?"
Neville shot Harry a sharp glance as he rose to his feet. "You used to like chaos."
Harry watched another patient, a green-robed nurse overseeing the woman during her afternoon perambulations. His hands started to tremble at the thought of Before, and his breath sped up. He shoved his fists into his dressing gown pockets to hide the shaking. "Things were different then. I was different then." The woman started to cry. "I don't think I can be that Harry again." He was surprised he'd managed to get the words out. He had hidden his fear through months of sessions with his psychwizard.
Neville thought for a minute, watching the nurse try to calm the woman. "Harry." He stopped before forcing himself to continue, "You don't know, you didn't see – we thought you were dead, at the end. Hermione was crying so hard she couldn't talk, Remus was trying to secure the prisoners – if you want to talk about chaos, that was it. None of us thought you could have survived the final exchange. There was so much energy, the air crackled for days. You were so still, your eyes were wide open, and you stayed that way for months, Harry." Neville had to stop to compose himself. "You don't know how happy it makes me to talk to you again," he finished in a rush. "You might not be the same, but you're still here. So many aren't."
The woman broke the silence with piercing screams. Harry shrank back from the noise, alarmed, but Neville had his wand out and was eying the nurse's efforts to subdue her patient with caution. After more staff rushed out to help, he looked ruefully at the slip of wood in his hand. "I can't seem to stop pulling this out when I'm startled."
"At least you still have yours," Harry said. "I get a generic wand for an hour, three times a week, as part of the magic group sessions. And they're never right. It's hard enough relearning first-year charms and transfigurations without doing it using a wand that wants to turn on me."
"I could bring you a wand; I'm sure Ollivander could help me pick one out for you," Neville offered.
Harry snorted. "Hermione tried that already and the nurses didn't let me keep it an hour. They sent it back to his shop right away. They say they've seen enough cases of magic burnout (although they never call it that) to know that I can't have a wand of my own until after I'm released."
Harry started to walk again, trying to make himself enjoy the crunch of the soggy gravel beneath his feet. It had rained last night, and the paths were still a bit mucky. Warm breezes ruffled the hair away from his cheek.
"Do they tell you how long it'll be?" Neville asked.
"No. They won't even give me an estimate." He pulled his hands out of his pockets, defiant for just an instant. "Look at this. I shake worse than that time Fred and George got me with their Quivering Candies." Harry paused before admitting, "I don't think I could face it yet."
"You'll get there. I know you will."
A black garden snake was sunning itself on a flat rock. "Listen to him," it hissed.
Harry looked at the snake and shook his head. They walked a few more paces. Harry felt the usual waves of fatigue wash over him. He headed for a bench, dropping onto the seat. Neville sat down beside him with the same quiet care Harry remembered from their many patrols together.
"That's a gorgeous Magnolia soulangiana," Neville said, gesturing towards a small tree bearing saucer shaped pink flowers. Harry nodded.
"Do you see your parents before you see me?" he asked.
"What? Don't you know? No, I guess you wouldn't." Neville looked down at the crumbs of dirt staining his hands. "They died. As best as we can tell, the same time Voldemort did."
Harry sat in silence for a moment. "Oh. So you've just been visiting me all this time?"
Neville smiled at him, "It wouldn't be my life if I didn't have someone here to visit." The snake slithered by on the path, heading for a warmer spot. "They looked peaceful, when I saw them. All I could think was that their pain had ended. I was almost grateful." He rubbed at his hands.
Harry stared down at his scarred palms: cuts from enchanted mirrors didn't heal easily. "The Dursleys suffered," he said suddenly. Neville looked at Harry, a question on his face. "They screamed and screamed and I couldn't help them." An ache grew above his eyes. Not the scar, that was dead to the touch, skin turned a hoarfrost white. "I hated them, but there was nothing I could do. Draco had me chained and mute." Pain throbbed under his skin.
Neville snorted, "Everyone panicked when we got word from Snape that Draco had you. Totally over the top, with Tonks proposing wild disguises for a rescue mission and Moody bellowing about prudence. But then you showed up at the rendezvous point before they could get anything in motion. How did you do it? You collapsed before we could find out, and then I forgot to ask."
"I don't remember," Harry replied. "One minute Aunt Petunia was screaming and then there was silence and the next thing I knew I was at the Aerie." He clenched his hands into fists to stop the shuddering. "They kept suspecting that I was some sort of sleeper agent, but they could never find anything wrong."
"The ruins of Malfoy Manor should have proven you were fine. And even so, after Hogwarts was lost we needed everyone. Especially the chosen one."
"I wasn't chosen," Harry said. "I was unlucky."
xxxxxxxx
The ride in the taxi was silent. Harry and Remus sat side-by-side looking at the London pavement. Heat mirages waved above the tarmac, turning the ordinary into a fantasy of black and grey and cream.
Harry's psychwizard, Hephaestus Fox, had poked his bushy head into Harry's room as he packed the last of his things that afternoon. "I just wanted you to know that if you ever need to talk to me, I'm still available." During one of their first meetings that Harry remembered, Hephaestus had told Harry that he was a forger of souls, not weapons. "Floo, owl post, house visits, whatever you need. You've come a long, long way since you first arrived, Harry. You should be proud."
Remus had come then to collect Harry, assuring the psychwizard that Harry would be staying with him until a permanent home was found. Remus was wearing jeans and a faded black t-shirt, and had a leather satchel slung over one shoulder. "It's ridiculously hot out there," he had said at Harry's raised brow. "Forget about robes."
Harry had walked in the garden at noon, basking in the full glory of the sun. He always felt cold now, the tips of his fingers blue and half-numb, his bones aching. He had sat on a bench and turned his face towards warmth, glad of the momentary comfort. The plants were sere and dry, crackling around their edges from lack of water. Fire beetles had nibbled on one shrub until only outlines of the leaves remained, a filigree of veins that crumbled into dust when Harry touched one. It was the hottest summer anyone could remember.
Remus had asked if Harry was ready to leave, and he said goodbye to Hephaestus and the nurses, arranging for delivery of Harry's things in the evening. They had walked through the corridors to the main door. Harry didn't remember entering St. Mungo's and he had taken a deep breath before stepping under the lintel; exiting the hospital felt just as important as taking the Hogwart's Express had when he was eleven. The hot air had hit him like a body blow. A new stage of his life was starting in a sauna.
Remus had hailed a taxi, telling Harry, "I thought we'd ease back into the wizarding world," as a black cab came to a stop in front of them.
Harry rested his fingers on the warm plastic of the door. The pedestrians in the street looked wild and unruly, dressed in strange new fashions and holding small devices to their ears as they walked home.
Remus kept casting worried looks toward him. "We don't have to do this now, you know. Would you rather go back to my flat instead?"
Harry didn't bother to answer, asking, "Do you remember when we first met?"
"Of course I do. Lily and James were so proud, and Sirius was fascinated with your wee fingers."
"Not then. On the train."
"Oh. Yes." Remus' eyes tried to conceal sparks of concern.
It took an age, but Harry was finally able to ask, "Do you have any chocolate?" He forced a diffident tone.
"Yes." Remus reached into his satchel and pulled out a silver wrapper. He smiled a sad, slow smile as he handed the chocolate to Harry. "I always will."
Harry let the bittersweet chocolate melt on his tongue for the rest of the trip, waiting to feel better.
The cab drew to a halt in front of a nondescript TV repair shop. "Are you sure this is it?" the driver asked, sending a doubtful look at the shoddy window display.
"Oh yes," Remus said. He handed over a ten pound note, and opened the car door. He and Harry watched the taxi pull away from the kerb, then turned to the shop wall next to the window. The late afternoon sun was turning orange as it lowered towards the skyline. The wall glowed with reflected brilliance. Remus tapped it with his wand, muttering under his breath, and Diagon Alley appeared before their eyes. "Come on." He ruffled Harry's hair, grown down to his shoulders now. "At least you have a built in disguise. Still, shall I cast a glamour to make sure you aren't recognized? I know a rather clever one that lets friends see who you really are."
"Please do," Harry replied. He didn't want to see the avaricious gleam in the faces of strangers, the one that had made his seventh year such a torment.
The streets were crowded with wizards and witches scurrying around, sheened with sweat, hair plastered to their temples and necks. Harry kept his head down, shielding his face. Remus' hand rested on his elbow, guiding him through the oblivious pedestrians. He was breathing fast, almost panting from being in the presence of so many people after a year of solitude.
Ollivander's door beckoned, a cool refuge promised within. The shop looked the same as Harry remembered, small boxes lining the walls from floor to ceiling. Motion in the corner of his eye made his head jerk up and his heart pound.
Mr. Ollivander stepped forward, a delighted smile beaming forth. "Mr. Potter! How wonderful to see you! Miss Granger told me you'd be here soon, but I must say I didn't expect you today."
After taking in Harry's mute panic, Remus said, "You're our first stop, Mr. Ollivander. Harry was determined to have a wand of his own again."
"Yes, yes. I can understand the longing. Well, Mr. Potter, let's see if I can't outfit you more quickly this time."
He handed over box after box, muttering wand composition under his breath. "Holly, yew, willow … phoenix, dragon, unicorn … ten inches, eight and a half inches, eleven and three-quarters …"
Finally, Harry's hand closed around a wand, and for the first time since he woke up in a bare room to meet Hermione's teary eyes and ask, "What happened?" Harry felt right. Complete. He held his new wand, whispering, "Lumos," and watched a spark form and reveal the cobwebs on the ceiling.
"Oh my. Yes, that's the one," Ollivander burbled. "Very different from your first wand, but that's only to be expected. Willow with a unicorn tail hair! So long, too."
Harry stuffed the wand in his pocket, but he couldn't stop touching it, pads of his fingers stroking the wood, feeling the grain.
Remus took care of payment, handing over galleons he'd removed from Gringott's as holder of Harry's Power of Wizarding. Twenty years past Harry's birth, and the only survivor of his parents' friends. Harry sometimes wondered how Remus could live with it all.
"I'm wondering if you can help me with something, Mr. Lupin?" Ollivander's voice was tentative, but he continued at Remus' inquiring look. "We have to keep fires lit in the back room to cure the wands, you know, and we've been battling an infestation of salamanders for weeks. There are too many for me and Ned to get rid of on our own, and I know you taught at Hogwart's that one year . . ."
"I'll be happy to help. Do you want to wait here, Harry?" At Harry's nod, the two wizards disappeared through a door at the back of the shop. Harry drifted to the front window, watching the passers-by. He recognized many of them, students and their families from Platform Nine and three-quarters. Too many faces were missing.
When Remus came back some time later, Harry braced himself to face the street. He still flinched at the sound of Remus' voice asking, "Do you want to get an ice cream while we wait for Hermione?"
The thought of something cool made Harry's mouth water. "Yeah, what's the name of that stand again?"
"Imogene's Ices, if I remember right. It's this way."
Harry stayed close to the building walls as they walked. A group of children raced past, clutching lollipops in their hands. Every time one of them took a lick, the candy trailed colored sparks that transformed into fireflies and ladybugs. The children's laughter reminded Harry of bells.
Harry spotted Hermione waving to them on the street ahead. She was wearing a sundress the color of lemons, and looked radiant. "It's so good to see you here!" she said as they approached. She caught hold of him for a long moment, hugging him as if she were afraid he'd try to escape. But Harry had nowhere to go anymore; he remained still and tense in her arms. Hermione released him, her face crumpling like crepe paper as she looked into his face.
She turned to Remus, trying to collect herself. "Hello, Remus," she said. "Where were the two of you off to?"
"We were going to get ices, try to beat this heat."
"That sounds lovely."
Remus navigated them neatly around a pack of teenagers chattering about their return to Hogwart's. Harry didn't think he'd ever been that young.
"The Weather Witches have been working to repair the energies from the Final Battle site, and the heat is an unfortunate side effect," Remus confided to Hermione. "The Minister for Magic gets Howlers daily, but there's nothing he can do. We'll have a tropical rainforest unless they complete their work."
Harry's clothes were sticking to his skin, runnels of sweat trailing down the small of his back. The ice-cream stand had a crowd of hungry wizards gathered round.
Hermione told Remus about a marvelous cooling charm she'd developed. "I used it sitting in the stands at Viktor's last Quidditch game and never got too hot. I'm trying to get it published in Charms Quarterly, although it'll probably be too late for this summer."
"That sounds like exactly what we need," Harry managed to interject.
Hermione's smile dazzled. "We shouldn't need it for long. I'm sure the weather will be back to normal soon. Next summer we'll be longing for heat and getting day after day of rain instead."
The queue moved past a line of planters, amid the sound of voices calling orders and murmuring appreciation after receiving their treats. The flowers in the planters were in better shape than St. Mungo's garden, but Harry noticed fire beetles dotting the leaves. He shook a nasturtium to dislodge the insects, and they took wing with a shower of sparks. One landed on his hand, and he jerked back with a hiss. Maybe the beetles contributed to the rising temperature; the air grew warmer as they approached the stand.
"Heat has to go somewhere," Remus said off Harry's questioning look. "Plus, I think it improves sales."
Attendants took orders and waved their wands over bunches of fruit, transforming them into sorbet. A large board listed all the flavors. Harry chose redcurrant and Hermione decided on orange, while Remus went for cherry. Paper cups full of flavored ice cooled their hands as they walked away, eating with spoons. The red currant ice crunched in Harry's mouth, making his tongue go numb. Remus' lips were stained red, and Hermione looked like she'd rubbed her mouth with orange peel.
A familiar drift of red hair caught Harry's attention. It had been so long since he'd seen him.
Next to him, Hermione was almost bouncing up and down. "Charlie," she called.
A broad smile split Charlie's face as they met. "Hello, Hermione. Merlin, it's good to see you, Harry. Mum had said you were improving, but I didn't know it was this much." They clustered in a wide spot on the pavement, ignoring the dirty looks as strangers were forced to detour around them.
"I had to be sprung sometime." The pause was awkward, as always. "What are you doing in London?"
"Oh, the Ministry wanted a dragon exhibit at the midsummer Jubilee; I'm up arranging it all."
"Isn't that rather dangerous?" Hermione asked.
"Yes, but it's part of the new focus on promoting understanding and respect of magical creatures." Hermione glanced at Remus, flicker-quick. "I just wish," Charlie continued in an aggrieved tone, "that the Ministry hadn't decided to house the dragons in the midst of Regent's Park. You can't imagine the tumult, even with the zoo to help camouflage the noise."
Dragons roaring flame into the night sky, Norbert breaking out of his shell after incubating in Hagrid's fire, facing the Hungarian Horntail during the Triwizard Tournament – images flashed through Harry's mind.
"That does seem unwise," Remus said. "Do you want me to talk to the Minister and see if we can't find a better location?"
"Could you?"
"Not a problem." Remus' eyes shone red in the waning light. "Harry, do you want to start towards my flat? I know it's been a long day for you."
The ice hadn't provided much energy; all Harry wanted was to go somewhere quiet, someplace he could breathe. "Yeah, let's go. It was good to see you, Charlie." Harry tried to hide his fatigue, but he saw the worried glances exchanged among his friends. Hermione and Remus hurried him towards the Leaky Cauldron, Remus muttering about the Floo Network.
The air had turned a misty grey, blurring the outlines of shops into smudged charcoal. The susurration of robes moving in time with other pedestrians whispered warnings into Harry's head. The crowds surrounded him, pressing in closer and closer, dark figures out of his nightmares. He cringed closer to Remus, trying to hide, but they'd come to a square that Harry didn't remember. Wood was piled in the center amid a large audience, robed wizards of all ages, stooped and aged greybeards mixed with little girls in petticoats. A master of ceremonies held out his wand with a grand gesture, shouting, "Incendio!" A great whoosh of flame shot through the wood, reaching for the waning light of the sun. The crowd cheered and applauded as blue and yellow danced before them, consuming the fuel at a prodigious rate.
The fire illuminated Harry's face and hurt his eyes. Remus and Hermione tried to walk him through the crowd, but the press was too close. People started pointing towards them, and Harry heard his name muttered over and over again.
"Oh no," Remus groaned. "The glamour's worn off. Hurry up!" he hissed at Hermione.
Harry felt as if the air itself was conspiring against them, slowing their progress. Every breath in was a struggle, as his lungs tried to fill with the humid murk of dusk. His feet were mired in quicksand, his head moving round in panicked jerks. He couldn't understand what he was seeing: hands thrust up to the sky, teenagers snaking through tiny gaps, chased by laughing friends. Wands were dancing at the end of outstretched hands, spitting fireworks out to explode over the square. Blue! Yellow! Red! Harry's sight went black with afterimages.
Harry could just make out the red hair of a boy in front of him. "Ron!" he cried out, fighting free of constricting arms. "Ron, be careful!" He rushed forward, trying to protect Ron from the approaching enemy. Green flames shot from the tip of the enemy's wand, and Harry threw himself atop the redheaded boy, staring into a stranger's face.
"Harry! Harry!" He should know the voices calling his name. He should know the touch of hands, grasping at his arms, trying to raise him to his feet, but all he could do was lie there on the cobblestones. He panted and trembled, lost in memory.
All Harry could see was Voldemort's sneering face, the green fire shooting from his wand. The spell racing towards Harry, and then Ron's body diving in front of him and falling, lifeless, to the ground.
An upwelling of rage and despair and horror filled Harry, and he let the magic take control.
end
Notes: Many thanks to The Cuckoo, Anais, and Rivier and for their beta efforts. I also have to thank Serial Karma for encouraging me every time I sent her another three paragraph snippet of this story, since I wrote it at a glacial pace – my enthusiasm would have flagged without her support.
Disclaimer: If they were mine, you'd still be waiting for Chamber of Secrets. Be glad that they belong to JK Rowling. I'm only borrowing them for a bit.
Feedback makes Harry happy. Doesn't Harry deserve to be happy?