A/N: This is inspired by an amazing artist over at deviantart:http:/fav(dot)me/d46r6x3 (just change the dot to a real dot) - really, go over there and have a watch. It's indeed amazing!
The title is just me trying to be clever ….. ignore it is it looks silly or plain wrong, heh. I wrote the first part to this story ages ago and the second part today - I wanted to finish it and I tried to look for mistakes in the text. If there are still some errors - please forgive me, English is my third language.
Warning: Character death. And it's not according to the seventh book - this is a story where I changed how the whole war ended.
Please R&R
Thank you!
- Estimation Error -
The moment when Harry realized that everything Snape had told him was true was when Snape was killed in front of his eyes. So close to him that he could´ve touched him if he had wanted to. Harry hadn´t believed him, he couldn´t have believed him. That he was one of Voldemort´s horcruxes. And he had to die.
He had been closed up. He had been in this darkness since the Death Eaters had caught him at the Ministry. The memories of that day echoed in his head
"HARRY! HARRY! NO! NO! HARRY!"
Harry threw a look over his shoulder as he fought against the Death Eaters and the Ministry workers that surrounded him. He saw his friends´ terrified looks and although it wasn´t the faces he recognized because of the Polyjuice he could still see the fear and horror in their eyes. Harry looked at the people in front and on the sides of him; he knew that they would attack as soon he tried to escape. They had been such fools; he had been an idiot, why hadn´t they prepared more? They should´ve known that it was an impossible idea, such an idiot idea to try to break into the Ministry in these times.
"RUN! FOR MERLIN´S SAKE, RUN!" he yelled back over his shoulder as he glanced at his friends again.
He saw Hermione shake her head in disbelief and Ron stare at him with a shocked look in his face. He gritted his teeth, did they not understand? They had to run before his own fear betrayed him. He knew that they had no chance to escape … if not one of them stayed behind. He threw a couple of hexes and spells at the people in front of him before he threw up his shield again, in the short break he dared to glance back again. And he had the biggest chance to survive of them three, Voldemort needed him and no one else would dare to kill him. But Ron and Hermione would never abandon him. Unless …
He roared one last word at his best friends before he threw a spell that would make the roof cave in
"GO!"
Honestly. He had been planning that he would die when the roof caved in. Ron and Hermione had probably thought the same and thus escaped, he knew that they must be alive or the Death Eaters would´ve enjoyed telling him that they were caught or dead.
But he had been wrong. Then he had guessed that he would be killed when he was thrown down on his knees in front of Voldemort who was full of triumph. Harry had been bleeding, black and blue from the roof collapsing upon him and from when the Death Eaters had caught him. Once again he had been wrong, Voldemort didn´t kill him. Instead he had looked at him with an intrigued and scheming look in his red eyes, none of it something that Harry liked.
Then Voldemort had told the Death Eaters that he was not to be killed or otherwise they would suffer the worst punishment there was but otherwise they got to do whatever they wanted to him. It was in that moment when Harry had lost himself into this darkness. It hurt much lesser if he closed himself up and pretended as if it wasn´t happening to him, that he was somewhere else. They didn´t hurt him physically too badly as they were too afraid of Voldemort but, as Harry had discovered, there were many ways to make someone hurt without leaving tracks on his body.
The defiant fire were still there somewhere inside of him but he was very careful to show it to anyone as he didn´t know if he would survive it if they took it away.
But now it was all over. Now he knew why he was in this Protection orb with Nagini and watched Nagini bite Snape in front of him so close that he could feel the warm blood splash on him. He was a horcrux. That´s why Voldemort hadn´t killed him. The black eyes looked into his green eyes, and Harry remembered the night when Snape had sneaked down to him in his cellar and explained everything. Even about his mother. Harry hadn´t believed him because too many Death Eaters before him had tried to tell him lies.
"Fine, don´t believe me Potter", Snape spat out between gritted teeth as he rose up on his feet. "Dumbledore told me to tell you this when the Dark Lord was protecting Nagini, but now everything has changed. It doesn´t matter if you believe me or not, do you really want to stay here? Because that´s what the Dark Lord will force you to do if this continue. You will be here your whole life!"
Of course not. He would rather die than stay there forever.
"I regret it", said Voldemort coldly and woke up Harry from his thoughts.
Voldemort turned away; Harry knew that there was no sadness in him, no remorse. Voldemort pointed his wand at the starry cage holding them, which drifted upward, off Snape, who fell sideways onto the floor, blood gushing from the wounds in his neck. Voldemort swept from the room without a backward glance, while Harry and Nagini floated after him in its huge protective sphere.
As Harry had been looking at Snape something in those black eyes had disappeared and Snape´s body went slack. Harry sighed and looked away from the body left behind.
"Masster Harry, are you not pleassed?" Nagini´s voice hissed close to him as her long heavily muscled body was resting around him.
Despite that Voldemort disliked it Nagini was stubborn with continuing to call him Master Harry because he could also speak with snakes. Funny, the only thing that was even close to a friend for him was Nagini - another horcrux … Or maybe it wasn´t that funny.
"Yess of coursse", Harry muttered as they in the orb were always close to Voldemort and he wouldn´t be pleased if he ever heard Harry say something else.
.:~¨*¨~:.
Harry couldn´t feel his heart anymore, it was frozen by fear. Voldemort had released him and Nagini from the orb. And he knew that it meant only one thing - that he was confident that no one would or could kill another of his horcruxes. If it meant that Ron or Hermione was dead … h-he didn´t know what to do. As he looked over the people standing in front of Hogwarts as Voldemort made his victory speech he tried to look after his friends, every second he didn´t see them he could feel his heart grow colder.
"You´re wrong!" someone suddenly yelled and everyone else fell quiet. In wonder Harry glanced towards Voldemort and saw Neville stand in front of him, only a couple of feet away from him. Horror rose up inside of him and he remembered thinking - not another friend, not one more, no, no! - before he heard Neville call to everyone behind him
"For Hogwarts, for Dumbledore, for Harry Potter, for our freedom - FIGHT!"
He saw the fire in Neville´s eyes when he glanced at him before the battle broke out once again. The people in Hogwarts hadn´t given up yet. And Harry realized what he had to do. He didn´t know if Ron or Hermione was alive or dead, but that didn´t matter right now - he knew what he had to do.
He was fighting his way through the fighting crowd but still not one single spell hit him. He knew why; Voldemort, that paranoid bastard, had put a sort of spell on him so no spell could harm him - except for Voldemort´s own spells of course. But Harry had seen what Neville had been holding in his hands before the other people hid him from Harry´s sight - the sword of Gryffindor.
"Neville!" Harry called when he saw Neville and he stopped for a couple of seconds when he recognized the long body of a snake. Nagini´s head had been cut off by Neville. For a couple of seconds Harry felt sadness, the snake had been kind of nice to him when she had learned that Harry could speak her language. But Harry shook that off; he had a more important work to do and it was good that another horcrux was dead.
He ran to Neville who looked happily surprised at first but then confused when Harry grasped his arms. Harry glanced at the blood on the sword and shuddered before he yelled at Neville to be heard over the noise from the battle ongoing around them
"Neville, you have to kill me!"
"What..?" Neville stared at Harry as if he couldn´t believe his ears.
"You have to kill me!" Harry yelled again and shook Neville´s arms. "Kill me with this sword!"
When Neville´s bloodied face paled Harry knew that Neville had understood but he shook his head and shouted back at Harry
"No, Harry. I can´t-"
"Listen, Neville. A part of Voldemort is living inside of me. Kill me, now!"
"Wh-..?" Neville started with widened eyes but something exploded behind them so Harry glanced over his shoulder and then pushed Neville back so they stood in the door opening to Hogwarts and out of the way for the others. Then he turned back to Neville who was staring at him with widened eyes
"Neville, a part of Voldemort is inside of me and as long as I´m alive he can´t die!"
As Harry yelled he was pointing towards Voldemort. Neville glanced over to Voldemort and winced when he saw that Voldemort in that moment was dueling McGonagall, Kingsley and Flitwick at the same time.
"Neville!" Harry shook Neville harshly so he looked back at him, Harry could see the growing horror in those familiar eyes but he shouted at him - "Do it Neville! It´s the only way! Kill me and then kill him! Before I´m dead he´s invincible!"
"Harry…" Neville whimpered and Harry could feel the hurt in him. "Don´t ask me to do that…"
"Please Neville", Harry whispered ignoring the alarming noise around them and rested his forehead against Neville´s forehead. "You´re the only one who I trust to do this. It´s for greater good."
"I´m sorry Harry", Neville whispered and Harry could feel the edge of the sword against his chest. He suddenly started to pant harder and he could suddenly feel his heart again. It was pounding so hard in his chest. "I´m so sorry…"
"It´s all right Neville, thank you…-" Harry murmured and was cut off when the sword of Gryffindor suddenly impaled his chest.
Everything didn´t slow down like people said and he didn´t see moments of his life pass by. He could only see Neville´s horrified brown eyes which became wetter for every second. Then Harry coughed up something wet that tasted like iron and grasped Neville´s shoulder - hard. It hurt. It hurt in his whole body.
"Harry, Harry", he could hear Neville murmuring as he was laid down on the stones. When had he lost the strength in his legs? He couldn´t remember. The seconds were ticking by so fast now. He grasped Neville´s shoulder harder and he murmured ignoring the blood that came up in his mouth faster by every second
"Kill him. Kill Voldemort and everything will be all right."
"Yes, yes", Neville whispered with a sobbing noise and caressed Harry´s forehead. Harry realized that Neville´s cold hand felt quite nice. Suddenly he remembered and grasped Neville´s sweater.
"R-ron..? Her-herm…?" Harry murmured and became slightly frustrated and confused that he couldn´t finish Hermione´s name.
"They´re all right", Neville told him in a reassuring tone. Harry could feel relief flow through his body at the same time as he felt grief that they wouldn´t see each other again. "They´re a bit roughed up but they´re fine. They will be fine, I promise."
"Tell them…" Harry murmured as he felt his eyelids become heavier; it didn´t hurt as much as before. He just felt a bit tired … Maybe he should sleep a bit. Yes, that would be nice. Sleep.
"Yes, I know", Neville hushed him softly.
"Ginny…" Harry murmured feeling glad that he could say her name right. Ginny … He wanted to see her again. He wondered if he remembered the exact scent of her hair - he thought it smelled like treacle tart.
"I know", Neville told him again. "I will tell her. I promise Harry."
Harry was going to close his eyes to sleep a bit when he heard Neville sob and he wondered why he seemed so sad. This wasn´t so bad. It hurt but it became lesser and lesser, he just felt a bit sleepy. He had to force his powerless body but slowly he lifted a shaking hand and put it on Neville´s cheek. Neville looked at him in surprise with tears flowing from his friendly warm eyes. Harry smiled a bit at him to reassure him and murmured feeling a bit annoyed at the liquid in his mouth
"It´s all right Nev. It´s going to be okay."
And it was. Because in the moment before the light in Harry´s emerald green eyes disappeared for good, he could see four people behind Neville waving happily at him. They were waiting for him.
The End
