Chapter twenty: return

"You don't understand," Harry protested, as she approached the headless skeleton. "The visitors weren't conquerors, they were teachers."

"They have waited over a thousand years for the one who was lost," said Natasha. "Imagine what they've seen. What they'll be able to tell me, able to teach me," she said pointedly.

"I don't think the power is what you think it is."

"I think you lack belief."

"Oh, I believe. That's why I'm staying put."

Harry said no more. As she reached up to place the skull, it was torn from Natasha's grasp, to click into place upon the skulls, soldiers. She stepped back, apprehensively.

The Death Eaters looked around confused, as the air seemed to fill with electricity, a long humming ringing in their eardrums. Not from an outside source, the sound existed in the mind only.

"They're communicating," she said.

And then the communications branched out to include Harry, a wave of emotion for him to interpret. It was hard to discern, a mixture of gratitude, relief and…ferocity.

"We…they," Harry began, interpreting aloud. "They want to give you a gift."

Natasha looked up into the skull's eyes. "I want power, I want knowledge," she said quietly. "I want to be a wizard. No, better, I want to be one of you, a god."

"It will be done," Harry said, and gasped as the communication left him.

The skeletons began to glow, shining with an inner light. There was a low rumbling. Harry watched, speechless, as a crack etched its way up the side of the dome. A piece of masonry was torn out, but instead of crashing the ground, it fell upward, pulled by an invisible force. The rumbling grew louder, as more of the stone was torn away, revealing nothing but darkness beyond.

Natasha ignored the destruction. She had eyes only for the skull. Her hair twisted about in an invisible wind, as she floated upward, her boots an inch from the floor, the air around her crackling with static electricity. Twin droplets of blood leaked from her tear ducts, tracing red lines down her cheeks Harry felt a knot of fear in his stomach. He wanted nothing more than to run, but he doubted the Death Eater's would allow it. Yet, as more and more of the room was sucked away, he doubted they would survive anyway.

"Expeliarmus!"

Mundungus's spell hit the Death Eater straight on. The man was knocked of his feet, as his wand sailed away and was swallowed by the blackness. The attention of the other two Death Eaters was attracted. One of them attacked Mundungus, and the two began to trade spells.

"Crucio!"

The other Death Eater's curse crumpled Ginny to the floor, writhing in agony. James charged the man, but the Death Eater knocked him away with a forceful blow. Harry tried to reach the man, but was slammed to the stone floor, as the disarmed Death Eater tackled him.

The Death Eater laughed in triumph, but then another person stepped foreward. Neville Longbottom, the madman. Neville reared back, and slugged the Death Eater across the face. The man was thrown backward off the pedestal, and was swallowed up by the darkness.

"I hate Death Eaters," said professor Longbottom.

"Welcome back Neville," James said with a grin, helping Ginny to her feet.

"Run," Harry shouted, a word he had grown accustomed to announcing at regular intervals. Following his advice, the three of them raced out of the room, leaving him and Mundungus to their opponents, and Natasha to her 'gift'.

Harry squirmed out of the Death Eater's grip, and punched the man in the in the face. He got to his feet, and was sent reeling as the Death Eater slammed a chunk of rock into the side of his head. Harry fell back against one of the thrones; he could feel it vibrating, as blood trickled down the side of his head.

He saw a flash of silver, as the Death Eater prepared for another blow. Harry reached out and caught the sword of Gryffindor by the hilt before it could be sucked into the black maw.

The Death Eater charged Harry, brandishing the rock…and impaled himself on the broadsword. They found themselves face to face, blood trickling from the man's mouth as his eyes glazed over. Sickened, Harry let go, allowing both man and blade be pulled into the growing vortex.

He stumbled around the throne, back to the pedestal, fighting against the pull of the black maelstrom. "Hey," he shouted at Mundungus, distracting the man's opponent. This allowed Mundungus to dispatch the Death Eater with a weak stunner. "Let's get out of here."

The two threw themselves down the steps, as the pedestal began to spin, first slowly, then quicker, the glowing skeletons merging into one another. And Natasha floated in the center, oblivious.

As Harry and Mundungus sprinted through the treasure, it was torn apart around them, treasure and stone alike devoured by the blackness. With an especially strong surge, Mundungus himself was lifted off his feet. He would have been sucked backward, had not a strong hold caught him around the wrist.

Try as he might, bracing himself against the doorway, Harry was unable to pull Mundungus to him. He noticed the man's bulging pockets, and remembered the sword. The vortex was especially magnetic.

"You have to empty your pockets," Harry shouted.

"No," Mundungus called back.

"It's just gold."

"You can't pull me up, go, save yourself."

"No," it was Harry's turn to be desperate."

"Your family needs you. Run as fast as you can," Mundungus grinned. "Shouldn't be anything new for you." And the man let go.

Mundungus watched Harry retreat as he was pulled deep into the gaping black maw. He had saved Harry, in the end, he knew that, and his pockets were full of treasure. There were worse ways to go.

And then his atoms were torn apart by the vortex, and he knew no more.

The throne room had long past been destroyed. Stone and living matter had alike been ripped apart by the vacuum. The visitors had themselves retreated into the black, save for one. And then there was Natasha, floating in the void.

The power flooded her veins, energy curling around her fingertips. But it was nothing, nothing, compared to the knowledge. She saw the universe, stars come to be and die again. She saw life, human, animal, and otherworldly, follow its cycle. Conceived, matured, decayed, in the space of milliseconds. More than that, she became it, all of it. She saw, and understood, and her skull seemed fit to burst with the scope of the information.

And across from her, showing her, the visitor. No longer a naked skeleton, its flesh translucent and glowing, its eyes gleaming black orbs. Its skin seemed to flow like water over its bones of crystal.

Natasha looked into those eyes, and she saw beyond our universe, beyond our reality, into the space between spaces. And beyond, into other, parallel worlds, with their own life, their own laws, their own gods. She saw it, and she was lost.

Natasha Lestrange was no more, she ceased to exist, nothing more than a memory, her weak mind sucked from her inadequate body, her minute consciousness and experience were absorbed into that of the visitors. The visitor left only an empty husk, useless. Her body was swallowed in a single jet of white flame, residual energy, the same energy that had been shared with the Ugha so long ago.

Satisfied, the reward fulfilled, the visitor retreated into the darkness. Home was waiting.

Harry watched, eyes wide, as Mundungus disappeared enveloped by darkness. The same gaping mouth sucked at him, it tore at his clothing, at his hair, an intense static thrumming ringing in his ears. But it wouldn't take him. He wouldn't let it. He was the chosen one, the boy who lived. And he was needed.

As the intense gravitational force tore at his flesh, Harry turned. Even as the stone beneath him was torn apart, he took a single step. And then another, and another, and then he was running. Out of its hold, out of the darkness, its grip on him broken.

Harry propelled himself, limbs pumping, out of the virtually non-existent treasure room. The water in the next chamber was rising, whipping around his ankles. The huge stone wheels, the turbines, were torn from their setting, and rolled, crushing through the stone pathway. Harry made no move to stop; he simply dodged in front of one of them, and slipped through a gap, as the second wheel crushed the floor behind him. And then he was running again.

He had outdistanced the vortex; it was still feeding on the temple behind him. Water trickled from the stone above him, running into his eyes.

Harry burst out into the main body of the pyramid, there waiting for him were Ginny, James, and Neville. "What'd I miss?" he asked, panting.

"We can't get up the pillar," said James.

"Then we'll just have to find another way out."

"I'm not sure that's an option."

"Is this Akator?" Neville questioned.

"Yeah," said Harry and James in unison.

"Brilliant, you found it," Neville clapped him on the back.

Ginny was looking past them, in the opposite direction from the vortex, and she was gaping. "Oh, damn," she said.

"What?"

"The dam," she pointed, "bloody thing must have broken." She pointed, and sure enough, a wave of rushing, roiling, water careened toward them, filling the whole passageway.

"Run?" asked Neville optimistically

"I think it's a bit late for that, actually," Harry answered. He had just enough time for a deep breath as the wave hit.