As quickly as I can without looking conspicuous, I hurry for the doors. I don't have much time if I am to reach the Death Eaters before they make it out of the castle.
This must be done carefully. To attack retreating Death Eaters risks Voldemort's anger at the breach of promise, potentially disastrous for Hogwarts and all who defend it. The defenders need this hour, we are all falling apart at the seams fighters and building alike. The castle cannot withstand another attack yet.
But I will not let the oppurtunity pass me by. With any luck, Draco might be with them.
Trying not to think too much about how this could all go disastrously wrong, not assisted by the thoughts of all my previous plans that ended unsuccessfully, I manoeuvre a path through the rubble, whilst also attempting to ignore the long cracks and splashes spattered along wall, floor and remains of both.
I manage to catch up with them as they make their way out of the front doors, simmering with angry confidence at what they perceive as a tactical move that can only lead them to victory.
Like little black clouds, they stride into the Forbidden Forest in small groups, robes swishing on the breeze. Thicknesse is in one of those groups.
I shift slightly, almost unsure of how to begin. I contemplate putting him under the Imperius Curse to lead him away, but I am interrupted by the frustrating fact that he is already under the Imperius Curse- of another. To break the curse and to lead him away would be far too suspicious.
But I will need to get him away from his group; and they are getting closer to the Forest. The further away this takes place from Voldemort, the better.
"What's that light over there?"
"Probably just a Patronus. All these Dementors around gives me the chills."
"I don't trust 'em. I say we treat it as a threat. I say we think them out."
"If you say so."
A small gaggle of Death Eaters make their way over to me, staring in the dark.
I freeze a moment, before doubling back and running, running flat out across the grounds, thanking whoever had the idea that this area should be grass as it cushions the sound of my approach.
Thicknesse is surrounded by just two others as I reach him. In the dark, a curse would be ridiculously foolish- the light would reveal my presence and location immediately. But a knife might be missed, in time for it to hit its mark.
I draw a blade from my coat, covering it with my sleeve to try and hide its glisten. I shouldn't miss at this kind of distance. I couldn't miss.
I stay very still, so that no sound comes from me but the whoosh of the knife. I turn slightly to throw, but when I do I catch someone's eye.
They open their mouth to exclaim their surprise and at that sudden moment I know I cannot do it. My resolve is there, the motivation and oppurtunity- but I have been spotted. To take my shot would be to risk my life with the odd chance that I might be successful and kill him with it. Nobody must know I was here, it risks too much.
No, I shall have to retreat and abandon that path. It is a split second decision as I have minimal time to get out before they raise the alarm. I jerk my hood over my head, enshrouding me in black and run straight back to the castle and out of the grounds.
As I get further and further away from them all, I feel the frustration and the despair coiling in me, colder and sharper than the knife still in my hand. I fling it down before throwing myself onto the grass, head in hands. My hands curl into claws around pieces of grass, I rip and tear at them, pummelling the ground but nothing can stop everything that is tearing me apart from the inside. All of them. Everyone who has died because of my failures, who will surely die because I have failed to kill Thicknesse.
Much of the castle is deserted, everybody is in the Great Hall- living or dead. I head on up the stairs, my knees bending shakily with the effort of each step.
I stop at the bathroom door and nudge it open with my foot, knocking it effortlessly off the wall, damaged and splintered with curses.
Whatever damage the school has suffered, the waterworks are still running and steadily I scratch the dust and blood off my skin, watching drowsily as the dirt and skin and pain is whisked down the drain. The raw skin is tinged pink, like what Adelaide looked like as a baby.
It takes me a minute or two before I can bring myself to look in the mirror.
I would not have thought I was a child.
I would not have thought I was alive at all.
The fire and brimstone of battle reflects dimly off my eyes. A long graze runs a path along the left side of my face. The rest is bruised, bloody and almost unfamiliar to me. It as if the Death Eaters had taken a disliking to my face and put a hammer and chisel to it. My hair has fuzzed into one big dusty knot that would be a battle in itself to comb. It is a trivial thought- I almost wonder how I could have had it, but I wonder if I'll ever live to have a clean face again.
As I lie back against the wall in a corner of the Great Hall in order to try and steal forty winks, I wonder if I will ever know a soft fresh bed again. Then I glance briefly over at the rows and rows of the dead and I wonder if I shall ever have peace again.
I've barely closed my eyes before I am shaken awake again. Now there can be no requesting more time, no putting off until later what can only happen now. Now is the time to get up, brush off the settling dust of omnipresent rubble and return to the war that merely waited while we slept, waiting for us to wake up to despair.
As meek and grudgingly obedient as cattle, we all mill around the front doors. No warning can prepare us for it. We learn of it only when we hear it spoken.
Harry Potter is dead.
I close my eyes with the pain of it, my head ringing, each word ringing, each word a hammer to a nail of my coffin. The beckoning of the hammers of my own demise drown out the sound of everything. I am too entranced by the hammering that has blasted apart the drum roll that sent me into battle to react to anything around me, or even be indignant of the lie Voldemort creates around Harry's murder.
"Anyone who continues to resist, man woman or child, will be slaughtered, as will every member of their family."
Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang bang the hammers go. The reason I fight has now become the reason I am forced to surrender. I cannot let Adelaide toddle her way to an early grave. To do so would be to brand my whole life a conclusion of failure.
But I cannot be submissive; and if I do not die free I certainly do not die content.
I can trust no forgiveness they offer me- why should they forgive? I have done nothing but snub them and do everything in my power to make myself a nuisance to them. There is no room in their new world for me.
How will they kill me, I wonder? Will they do it quickly? Line us up in a queue for slaughter and perform the Killing Curse on us one by one, marked for death next to a pile of bodies? Will they kick my corpse around like a rag doll? Or will they hack off my head with a meat cleaver while I scream and stick it up on a plaque next to house elf heads, as another slave who outlived their benefit?
At the arrival of the Death Eaters, I jump up and down impatiently as I am stuck behind a very tall person, as luck would have it. I can't see what's going on for the life of me. I come up with the wildly rash idea of Stunning the person in front to get a better view and quickly dispel it as attacking my fellow defenders at this time can hardly be called productive.
But as I bounce up again, I catch a rising glimpse of him lying dead and the terrible sight almost sends me crashing to my knees when I land.
The pain which I was silent of is now shouted around me and as soon as I hear it I am happy to add my voice to the cry.
The silencing charms Voldemort places upon us all do not hold, to my curious surprise. Why isn't it working? Why is there still hope, in that? If Voldemort himself cannot even keep us quiet, who is to say that his other spells on us will last?
I watch as the Sorting Hat, our symbol of varied unity blazes alight, a flaming crown for Neville.
But the hat has barely kindled when the flash sparks descent into chaos.
My eyes cannot move quickly enough to take in all that happens. The numbers seem to double every time I blink. Giants, centaurs, elves. The very greatest and the most humble all side by side. I wouldn't be surprised if woodlice carrying splinter spears made an appearance in this catalogue of mayhem.
Even after all he has suffered, Percy has not forgotten his promise to me and I watch as he and Arthur floor Thicknesse, giving a nod of approval.
I'll deal with him later.
At Bellatrix's maniacal cackles I run to attack her until-
"NOT MY DAUGHTER YOU BITCH!"
Tells me that I'm not really needed in that department.
I turn to find Kingsley but he's fighting Voldemort himself and I am not the only one watching his back.
Furious at Bellatrix's death, Voldemort blasts his three opponents backwards and I am so preoccupied with cushioning my master- no, my ally's fall, I completely miss what happens next.
"HE'S ALIVE!"
"Of course he's alive!" I am affronted. "What makes you think my charms are anything less than adequate?!"
"No, not Kingsley, HARRY!"
I don't need to ask who she is talking about.
If Harry stands, we stand. If Harry lives, we live; and if Harry wins the debts of death can at last be paid and the shackles of regret can rust in loss.
My part is played out. I stand back, just another member of the crowd. I learn the truth as Harry tells it (wouldn't want Harry to defeat Voldemort without explaining it all first) just like everybody else; but I learn it differently. The motivations, emotions, pain and suffering and sacrifice behind the words.
For me, it was more than just a story. It was the reshaping of everything I knew. The reshaping of everything I would later know. I watch the end of what Dumbledore began, I watch the beginning of everything that Voldemort tried to end.
I stand back and let the future defeat what was past.
The heady thrill of victory is something exhilarating and relieving, but it does not halt the frown that comes with the absence of the one I wish to punish.
I refer neither to the man bleeding unconscious on the floor or his pink hag of an accomplice.
The sun is glinting over the trees as I leave the castle and spot my father running across the grounds. He has no hope of truly escaping, with a burn where his wand should be. But he will make a run for it anyway.
Maybe he too cannot bear the idea of being trapped again.
I race after him. I cannot kill him of course, but I will make him accountable for all he has done. He murdered my mother, he murdered my sister and he tried to murder me, in more ways than one. I cannot deny him life, but I can deny him mine.
Branches brush my face but I push them aside, forcing my way closer. The hems of my clothes are sodden with the dew and there is nothing more I want to do than have a cup of tea, put my feet up and have the rest of the day asleep, but I am not finished yet.
Like a sheepdog, I run round to him, herding him towards the lake. He wades straight through it, great splashes of water whooshing around him as he plunges deeper into the lake.
I reach for the brooch inside my coat.
He shouts and collapses in the water, drenching himself completely, as two merpeople take hold of his arms and roll him, helpless as a log, to land.
"Not wanting to rub it in." (I'm not sure I really mean that.) "But you and your master have just been defeated and your youngest daughter may have had a slightly-more-than-minor role in it."
He scowls, gritting his teeth, defeat souring his temper. It is the closest thing to a surrender that I shall be able to get out of him.
I take him back to the castle and we have perhaps the longest conversation we have ever had without shouting- although it mainly consists of me doing the talking. I make a point of musing over what I shall do with all the years of my life to come- the average life expectancy for a wizard has just reached 137 and 3/4, so there is much to discuss on the subject. He punctuates every reference to longevity with a rasping, rattling cough, an exaggerated mimic of my own. It infuriates me, it is hard to gloat when I have not won completely, when he in turn can have something to boast of.
I leave him with the other captive Death Eaters awaiting the full force of the law, for I have just one task left. One more kill, that is all I have to do and then I shall be free at last.
Thicknesse is a desolate part of the Hospital Wing, hidden from view. Tweaking the hem of a spare starched apron I pilfered to give the appearance I am here to heal, not harm, I slip behind the curtain and observe my last victim.
He is barely conscious, unable to do more than feebly stir at my presence. A wayward curse has shattered his left arm and faint puffs of black smoke are expelled through the bandages when he tries to move. It will need serious attention at St Mungo's; where he will shortly be going if I am not quick.
The bandages extend from his wrist to above his elbow and clay runes poke out from between the layers, used to contain the curse to his arm- should it spread, he will most surely die.
That is where I come in.
I grip the tweezers, praying that I won't drop them and make a noise. Tentatively and then with more confidence, I loosen the bandages and begin to pull each rune out. More and more of the wound is exposed and my stomach churns at the sight of it: blackened and oozing. Thicknesse whimpers in pain but I must ignore him. It is hard, harder than killing his deputy. This is slow, deliberate and inexcusable. I cannot deny what I am doing.
A hand closes around my wrist, stopping me from removing the last layer of runes. It is Neville.
"Don't do it."
I open my mouth to say something back, but words fail me.
"The war's over," he says simply. "Why d'you need to kill him? Besides, I bet he was Imperiused. He resisted from what I've heard, fought Yaxley all the way. He didn't know what he was doing. It's too easy to put the blame on him. Just let it go."
"You mean forgive him?"
"Maybe. But what's done is done, so no more killing. Let it go, Marion. Free him, free yourself. Otherwise it'll be like- I don't know- like you've flown out of one cage and into another. That's not what you'd want. Let's patch him up and let's leave it."
Obediently, I wind the bandages back around his arm, careful to replace everything exactly as it was. Leaving the hospital wing with the conspicuous lack of blood on my hands feels odd. Liberated, almost. No more killing, at all. Maybe at last this can all be over.
The afternoon is beautiful in summer glory, but the joy behind it has a greater beauty still. I can't See my future yet- but now I find I don't even really want to. The day's unbelievable events have instilled something new in me, in all of us here. My future belongs to me, in all its uncertainty and promise and hope. My future belongs to me. It always did.
Whether this extraordinary feeling lasts for one day or twenty, one year or twenty, I do not know. But for however long it lasts, I can enjoy it. The feeling that I can be glad and proud to be me and who I am; and I couldn't want to be anyone else.
Three more chapters! Ahhh we're nearly at the end!