22; Fighting with Fire
"In position" Amelia Bones announced from her team's place just outside the wards of Lestrange Manor.
"In position" Tonks said.
"In position" The other three team leaders echoed seconds later.
"Wards coming down in five," Moody said, "Four, three, two, one"
BOOM!
Expletives were yelled as the teams heard the explosions and felt the vibrations.
"Get the wards up!" Bones yelled, a call she heard echoed by her fellow team leaders.
Seconds later they were running toward the manor.
They were halfway to the manor when Voldemort stepped out through the front door.
"Voldemort's here!"
"Dumbledore will be there soon. Hold him off as long as you can."
Bones glared at the Dark Lord, "Avada Kedavra!" she yelled and followed up with a string of curses, each of which would usually carry a sentence in Azkaban.
Voldemort shielded of batted the spells aside and looked at her with a snarl. "Minister, a rescue mission for Potter, I assume. Avada Kedavra, Kryopágima."
"Potter is here, Reverto!" She said, raising her shield just behind the AK as she dodged
Her team were engaged in a violent battle with the Death Eater's that were here, the curse-breakers and one of the hit-wizards looked to be enchanting stones and banishing them at the Death Eaters.
"Bellatrix" Voldemort called to the side, "Kill Potter."
She smiled, "Gladly"
"Avada Kedavra!" Bones snarled in a last ditch effort to stop Bellatrix, who simply conjured a bird in the curse's path and pranced into the house.
Bones and Voldemort sent increasingly destructive spells at the other until Voldemort stumbled and a vicious banishing curse sent him flying into the building.
He raised a shield to stop the barrage, "Dumbledore!" Voldemort snarled.
"You defend, I'll attack" Bones ordered, Dumbledore merely nodded and started transfiguring animated defences as the minister sent blasting, cutting and other lethal curses at the Dark Lord.
Harry was halfway up his makeshift stairs, hoping to attack the Death Eaters from behind, when he sensed a Killing Curse flying his way. It seemed someone else was hoping to do the same to him.
He twisted towards it as a dome of butterflies appeared around him.
"Hello Bella" He snarled. "Here to make sure I don't, in fact, manage to get out alive?"
"You'll die here, but wet's see if ickle Potty knows how to pway." She said as they both stepped into the crater.
Harry raised an eyebrow with a sinister smirk, he didn't usually enjoy killing, duelling and fighting sure, but not killing, Bellatrix however, well she might deserve an exception. "Knives only?" he asked as his dagger appeared in his left hand.
"Now we're talking!" Bellatrix smirked as her wand slid into her forearm holster and she pulled out her dagger from a waist holster. "Recognise it?" she asked as they circled each other.
"How could I not?" Harry asked as he willed his dagger to be infused with basilisk venom. "It is a painfully memorable knife, thankfully, bloodlust is an excellent anaesthetic."
The pair rushed toward each other and Harry threw his dagger toward her and she spun out of the way with a laugh and jumped at him. She was very surprised when her dagger's blade caught on the guard of Harry's which had reappeared in his hand.
He tried to punch with his other hand, but she blocked it and pushed backward. They separated and started circling again.
Bellatrix noticed that her blade seemed to have been corroded where it met Harry's. "Basilisk venom?" She spat.
Harry snarled angrily and rushed toward her again. This time she caught his wrist and tried to swipe under his guard. He caught her knife with his quicksilver hand.
"Cheater!" She accused.
"This game has no rules" Harry replied as he strengthened his arm and tore her dagger from her and it flew, burying its blade into the ground.
She grinned, "Ickle Pottey does know how to pway" She tried to knee him in the crotch, but he broke away they both stepped further back, her wand slipped into her hand and she gleefully exclaimed, "Avada Kedavra!"
Harry threw his knife and pulled his blackthorn wand from a waist holster as he dodged.
"Arenae!" He yelled and conjured sand flew towards Bellatrix in a lethal sandstorm.
"Meteolojinx Recanto." Bellatrix replied, causing the sand to stop and then cast "Ventus." To send the sand back at Harry.
"Tempestatis" Harry parried pushing the sand back at Bellatrix with a stronger wind spell, then transfigured the sand into glass shards as it flew toward her.
Bellatrix gave a sharp upward motion with her wand and a wall of earth raised in front of her, the glass shards buried themselves into it.
Harry cast Fluctus Firma just as Bellatrix transfigured the earth wall into obsidian and cast a blasting hex. The, now obsidian, wall shattered, and Bellatrix banished the shards of volcanic glass back at Harry.
A blue-white shield appeared in front of Harry and as the obsidian passed through, it broke down into fine black sand and slowed. Harry transfigured much of the rubble nearby into crude animated feline and canine 'creatures' and they rushed at Bellatrix.
She slammed her wand into the ground and a metre wide pillar of stone erupted from the ground and carried her up two metres and out of reach of Harry's constructs.
"Fiendfyre!" violent flames burst from her wand with a roar and formed a massive basilisk which hissed at Harry and slammed through his constructs and then sprang toward Harry.
Harry's eyes widened comically in panic and he yelled, "Partis Temporus!" the fiery snake split into two smaller snakes just ahead of Harry and he could feel the intense heat and was sweating with the effort of separating the fiendfyre.
When the flames surrounding Harry disappeared, he looked up to see a furious Bellatrix and a fiendfyre snake twice the size of what he just dealt with.
Harry raised his wand and with a circular motion around the crater, incanted, "Protego Diabolica!"
Blue flames surrounded the edge of the crater and with a gesture, flames leapt in a straight line toward Bellatrix. Her fiendfyre serpent got in Harry's flame's way but it seemed to be pushed back slightly. Harry also noticed that part of Bellatrix's snake was made of blue flames for a second, almost as though his flames had 'injured' her fiendfyre.
Harry pulled his redwood wand from its holster and whipped both wands toward each other.
Two torrents of blue fire came rushing in toward Bellatrix and her fiendfyre coiled around her pillar to block Harry's attack, Bellatrix panicked as the edges of her pillar started to melt and sent her Basilisk at Harry again.
He pulled his fire towards him and with a twisting wand motion it turned into a dragon which tackled Bellatrix's basilisk.
Harry's dragon, which had taken the form of a Hungarian Horntail, and Bellatrix's basilisk wrestled as they flew upward, burning through floors, walls and the roof as they went. Three screams of pain followed their ascent, but only parts of two burned bodies fell with the burning debris near the edge of the fiery struggle.
Harry's Horntail and Bella's Basilisk grew larger as they climbed, and just above the house, the dragon started to pull the serpent down. They slammed through the roof of the house and burnt their way back to the ground as each grew weaker.
They dissipated shortly after hitting the ground behind Bellatrix. They had burned a path through the house and connected the crater to the outside.
Both Bellatrix and Harry were exhausted, and each knew they were near their limits. Harry knew he didn't have enough left in him to use two wands for long and holstered his left wand.
Bellatrix seemed tired too, it seemed fiendfyre was more tiring the Protego Diabolica.
"Avada Kedavra!" She snarled, Harry raised his wand and conjured a single butterfly in its path, he needed to conserve energy.
Harry flicked his wand a long whip of lightning cracked toward Bellatrix, it bounced of her shield, but rather than dissipating as expected, it simply bounced off.
With another flick, the lightning whip flew to the side and wrapped itself around a burning wooden beam, the whip cracked toward Bellatrix again, burning beam in tow.
She jumped over the low swipe of the whip and returned fire with three Killing Curses.
Harry's left hand grabbed his end of the whip, which detached from his wand and stepped directly into the path of the third curse, conjuring a single butterfly in his defence again. At the same time, he swung the crackling lightning at Bellatrix, only this time, the lightning sliced through the beam of wood, leaving Bellatrix to defend against two burning projectiles and the lightning.
The burning wood went wide and Bellatrix blocked the whip again, only to be thrown to the ground as a piece of burning wood slammed into the back of her shoulder, flying toward Harry, it fell to the ground partway as he ended his summoning spell.
Bellatrix had to roll to avoid the curses that followed, narrowly avoiding the returning lightning as she stood again. With a furious roar, she yelled "Draconis Incendia!" the Dragonfyre, cast with most of her remaining energy, rushed toward Harry.
She heard a surprised yell of "Partis Temporus!" as the lightning whip disappeared.
Bellatrix took advantage of the opportunity and ran toward the new way out.
Harry gave chase and sent low powered jinxes and hexes after her. Bellatrix dodged and sprinted until Harry knew he couldn't catch her and slowed to a tired walk.
"Potter!" he heard yelled from behind, he turned to see a man in auror robes, "Leave her, there's no way to catch her now. We need to get you out of here, you look like you're about to collapse."
"That would probably be magical exhaustion and the wideye potions and adrenaline wearing off." Harry yawned.
He walked toward the man and as he approached, he heard a scream, he and the auror looked up just in time to see another auror falling from an upper floor.
Harry summoned his last remaining energy and yelled, "Arresto Momentum!" he saw the auror's fall slow substantially and passed out from exhaustion.
Harry blearily opened his eyes to white, and voices, there were a few indiscernible voices, they seemed vaguely familiar.
"He's awake!"
Harry shook his head as his vision came into focus and hearing became clearer.
"Dora?" He rasped.
"It's me." She replied from beside him, "You're in the Hogwarts Hospital, it's been two days since we got you."
"Mr. Potter, don't even think about getting up until we've checked you over." A healer interrupted.
Harry scowled, "I was capable of standing and duelling Bellatrix Lestrange after days at her… tender mercies, I'll manage."
"Lie. Down."
"Fine."
After a few minutes the healer conceded that he was well enough to stand, but only after he dispelled his left quicksilver hand so they could reattach the real one.
"You have severe scars from use of the reparo charm and multiple fiendfyre burns. You also seem to have lung damage from repeated drowning…" The healer kept listing his injuries, much to the horror of the others there, "…somehow, your wounds are healing at an accelerated rate and you have less scarring than would usually be expected."
Harry grimaced at the pitying looks that he received and said, "Conjure a mirror."
Dora granted his request with a silent wave of her wand and asked "Should I put up a barrier?"
"Good idea, Moody, Minister Bones, Sirius and you can stay."
"What's this about Potter?" Moody asked as Harry examined his own scarred visage in the mirror after removing the bandages on his head.
Harry smirked, "I have no intention of staying in the grotesquely scarred club for long."
"Those scars won't heal." Bones pointed out, but was very surprised when Dora snickered.
"Maybe not for a normal witch or wizard."
Harry started healing his cranial fiendfyre burn at the edges near the back of skull and his forehead.
The blackened flesh of Harry's partially healed third degree fiendfyre burns gradually turned into what looked like second degree burns and then into first degree burns with the occasional blister.
Once Harry healed the blisters his skin merely seemed pink and could heal completely naturally from there.
The whole process took roughly half an hour and was watched in awe by all present.
"Damn that was tiring." Harry panted.
"How?!" Moody exclaimed.
Harry laughed, "Take a guess at why Dora wasn't surprised."
"You're a metamorph" Bones stated, "That explains how you became Iapetus Grimm."
"So you know about that…" Harry replied, "What will you do with it?"
"I've thought about it, if I decide to put you on trial it will be after Voldemort is dead and gone."
"Good." Sirius said, trying and failing to surreptitiously holster his wand.
"But as I said, I've thought about this, I want to join your Alliance"
Harry made eye-contact with Moody, who nodded his assent. He turned to Dora, who shrugged and nodded. Sirius nodded slowly after considering for a moment.
"Good enough. We'll introduce you at the next meeting." Moody said.
"Right then!" Harry said, "I think that's it. Now if you don't mind, I want two things; a few minutes to chat with Dora… and a dreamless sleep potion."
As Moody, Bones and Sirius left, with a shake of his head Sirius said, "In a hospital you two" He sighed, "Don't do anything too strenuous, Harry is injured…"
He barely dodged Dora's stinging hex.
Harry sat in his seat at the round table of the Marauder Alliance, and waited for the others to show up. He was drumming his silver fingers on the table absently as he waited. He was slowly shifting the quicksilver that had replaced his hand and feet into his arm and leg bones to make them harder to break. Sure, he could just heal himself and vanish the quicksilver as he went, but as he got used to morphing the quicksilver he got quicker.
Maybe soon he would be able to quickly move it around to reinforce different bones as necessary. He could always vanish it and heal himself later, if needed.
He had just arrived from a meeting with Croaker, who had run a few tests and discovered that while the Horcrux in Harry's scar was gone, there was still some of Voldemort's magic hanging around. He wasn't actually sure what effects it might have, but theorised that the mind-link with Voldemort might still be there, only weaker.
Harry was physically almost completely recovered. But he was having trouble sleeping without dreamless sleep.
He also tended to draw his wand and point it at anything that made a sudden noise. Moody said it was something that he had only seen in some of the most experienced aurors and people who had fought on the front lines in Grindelwald War.
Moody had also said that it was only because of the enchantments on his eye that he didn't seem to have the instinct, after all, he always knew who was nearby and what they were doing.
Harry was snapped out of this line of thought when he heard the door to the room open and found himself with his wand pointing at Remus.
"Harry?"
"Remus" Harry greeted as he put his wand back in its holster.
"You okay?"
Harry raised an eyebrow, "Peachy."
"You look terrible."
Harry rolled his eyes, "Sit down, Remus. You saw what I looked like at the hospital, relatively speaking, I think I look much better."
Remus shook his head and sat down.
Within a few minutes everyone had arrived, Amelia had been introduced and they were ready to start.
"We need a plan." Moody said, "The raids were major victory, we captured or killed over a hundred Death Eaters, rescued Potter and confiscated lots of their supplies. But we need a plan for what to do next."
"Voldemort dosed me with Veritaserum before the raid happened, he didn't get much. Apparently, I have a knack for evading questions under veritaserum. He knows that the Alliance exists, but he doesn't have any idea of our size, he only knows that Andromeda, Dora, Alastor, Sirius, Remus and I are in it."
"If he even thinks that someone is involved he will hunt them down, this Alliance has done more than the Order of the Phoenix and have helped the Ministry to the point that almost everything the Ministry has done against Voldemort has been helped by the Alliance." Bones explained, "If Voldemort thinks you sit at this table, you'll be a very high priority target, just under Potter, Dumbledore and I."
"Maybe we could make something like the coins that the Marauder Club use, so that we can call for help if we're attacked." Fred suggested.
"We could somehow make it communicate our location too." George continued, "It would be a distress beacon of sorts."
"If we could get something similar to some of the people who own shops at Diagon and the surrounding alleys, then they could signal to the DMLE if a Death Eater attack happened." Bill said.
"You three work on that, it's great idea." Harry said.
"We know that He has anti-phoenix wards now, so Umbra can't take us in to his followers houses now. We have no idea what kind of anti-phoenix wards he has up, they could be the ones designed to trap us like Harry got caught by or something else. We can't risk it." Dora said to unanimous agreement.
"Is there any other way we could get in?" Fleur asked, "The house-elf, Dobby, could get into the Malfoy's, could there be another hole in their wards we could exploit?"
"Sometimes people forget to ward against animagi" Sirius replied, "But as far as I'm aware, only Minerva and I are animagi."
"I think you'll find that it is transfiguration in general they forget to ward against." McGonagall corrected, "There was a group of master thieves that used short term human transfiguration to bypass wards fifty years ago, they transfigured each other into rubber balls and banished or summoned each other past the wards. When people caught on, they started using imperiused animals. Only two of them were ever caught. Most old pureblood homes are warded against all creatures and transfigured people for that reason."
"What if we imperiused their house elf?" Katie Bell asked, to general surprise.
"Using the imperius on a house elf is a finicky thing," Moody said, "you can't force them to go against their orders, if they have ever been ordered to ignore everyone unless their master tells them to interact with the person, or any order similar, it just won't work."
"So what you're saying is;" Alicia interrupted, "It's a million to one chance, but it might just work."
"More like ten to one" Angelina muttered.
"Imperio"
Nobby, a house elf belonging to the Lee family, felt his mind become fogged and heard a whisper in his mind.
Carry on as you were.
He continued gathering groceries for the family he served so that they would have food to eat, blissfully unaware that he would later become a way for the Marauder Alliance to break into his masters' home.
Later that night, he apparated to a remote field in the countryside and side-along apparated Bill Weasley, Katie Bell and Aberforth Dumbledore into his home.
"Stupefy"
Nobby dropped to the ground unconscious as the trio stunned the home's inhabitants, who happened to be Azkaban escapees, in their sleep and took everything they could find that was of value.
Aberforth revived the elf and had it take them back to the field it took the group from. A quick obliviate and confundo later, the elf had no idea what it had done.
When the aurors arrived in the morning, thanks to an 'anonymous tip' that Moody had 'received', and broke through the wards, they found two Azkaban escapees, a bare house and the infamous symbol that had accompanied so many burglaries in the last few months.
When Voldemort was told by his latest spy in the aurors, he once again reminded his followers that he was not a believer in the phrase; "Don't kill the messenger".