Harry Potter and the Dark Sigil
Chapter Eleven: Winds of Sorrow
By: Harry's Mum Lily
Disclaimer: I have been terribly remiss in my duty.
I forgot to give credit to the appropriate people for the songs used in the last
two chapters. Well, the songs in the last chapters belong to a Celtic musical
group called Secret Garden and the songs were called Prayer in
Chapter 9 and Dreamcatcher in Chapter 10. I'm sorry for this oversight.
Thanks you all for the reviews…they keep me going. Please continue to enjoy the
story and sorry for the delay but I was ill. HML
If there's one thing Voldemort can't understand, it
is love.
Albus Dumbledore
Chapter
17
Harry
Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
We'll see each other again. You are-truly your father's son, Harry…
Sirius Black
Chapter
21
Harry
Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Harry looked down at the words that were drying on
the page of Sir Godric's journal and suddenly realized how stupid what he'd
written sounded. It was, of course, too late to write something else for the
ink was drying and had already started to set on the page. He only hoped that,
if this book survived the ravages of time, the others would catch the note of
sarcasm in his reference to himself as "The Boy Who Lived" and that they wouldn't
think he was trying to be self-centered. He handed the ink, quill and book back
to Sir Godric and leaned back in his pillows, suddenly wearied from writing and
from all the information that had been forced into his mind in the last hour.
He closed his eyes a moment, trying to make sense of what he'd just been told.
"So you are my ancestor and this is the year 1095?"
he asked as he watched the candlelight flickering behind his closed eyelids. He
wanted to be sure he'd heard correctly and that this was not some
figment created by his overtaxed brain.
"Yes," Godric paused for a moment. "I know this
must be very difficult for you to believe and must be confusing for you as
well."
Harry nodded not opening his eyes, trying to order
his confused thoughts. To say he was confused had to be the understatement of
the year. He was completely baffled and would not have believed it could be
possible except that three of the founders of Hogwarts were standing before him
and were very much alive. He had seen their faces looking down at him for four
year from their portraits so he knew they were exactly who they claimed to be.
He opened his eyes and looked around at the three of them again. There was a sad
and haunted look in them now.
"And I may never be able to return to my own time?"
he quietly asked as his heart contracted painfully at the thought.
"We cannot be sure until we try the Portalus Tempus
Spell…" Lady Rowena began quietly.
"But it is possible that I will have to stay here"
Harry interrupted her, his eyes misting over for a moment as he thought of the
friends he'd left behind. What will happen to them if I am trapped here?
Rowena looked down at her hands and felt tears
sting her eyes.
"It is possible that you trapped here…that the
spell that sent you here has cast you outside of time…if that is true then
nothing will be able to send you back. Try not to think about that now. There
is no way of knowing until we try the Tempus Spell," Lady Helga said
soothingly.
Harry closed his eyes and felt a shuddering sob starting
before he managed to stop it. So, he might be trapped here for his lifetime,
safe from Voldemort's power at last but at what cost to his friends? He felt
tears begin to slip from under his closed eyes but this time he didn't stop
them. The others stood silently, waiting for him to stop. Rowena's hands
blurred as tears splashed onto them, Harry's predicament touching something
inside her and she felt suddenly drawn to this boy who was trying to accept
what had happened bravely but who was also a scared child.
"You must be exhausted. We should leave you to
sleep." Lady Helga said to him.
"Someone save my life at Az… in my own time. Were they transported too?" Harry asked,
opening his eyes again and wiping the tears from his cheeks.
"There was a man with you in robes as dark as the
night. He's been staying in another part of the castle. He says you would not
want to see him. He seems very frightened."
"I want to thank him. Who is he?" Harry knew it was
probably one of Voldemort's own Death Eaters who'd saved his life by the
description of the man's robes but why had this Death Eater risked it all to
save him?
"He refuses to say his name. He says only that he
did what he had to do to save you and that he can now die in peace…"
"What? Die…" Harry's face paled again and he
tried to get up from the bed, his own troubled thoughts and pained body
momentarily forgotten. "Take me to him, please.
"You're still to weak to leave your bed…" Rowena
began but she was cut off.
"He took a curse meant for me! Sir Godric, I must
see him!" Harry's eyes were full of desperation and Sir Godric could almost
read his thoughts. Another life lost because of me…
"I shall take you to him this afternoon but rest
for now please or you may make yourself worse," Sir Godric said, hoping that
the man would survive until then. He was in horrible pain that no spell had yet
been able to abate and it seemed to be spreading throughout his body.
Harry reluctantly agreed to rest until the
afternoon and was soon asleep as fatigue overcame him. He slept and the others
left the room, leaving Fawkes to guard him.
~
He was dreaming again. Dreaming of the past. He saw
his parents surrounded by their friends and they were all sitting around the
lake, talking about graduation and what they wanted to do with their lives.
Harry seemed to be floating above them, but he could hear every thing that was
said. They were all talking about Voldemort and the war against him.
"We have to fight him, " Harry heard his father
say. "His evil must be stopped before
he takes over the whole world as Grindelwald nearly did years ago."
The others nodded in agreement and looked
resolutely at James.
"Let us then make a pact…to always defend one
another and our families…" he looked at each of them in turn. "And to always
remain true to one another and never go over to the Dark side."
The five of them all stood facing the setting sun
and linked hands forming a circle. They all closed their eyes and Harry could
see a faint glowing light around them that seemed to connect them. Then his
mother began to recite an ancient spell:
"Let the five who stand thus joined/holding fast against
the night/May evil ne're us disjoin/five who stand forever in the Light. The
five who in this sacred circle stand/we now swear to ever fight/defending the
very land/we will face his might. Let this circle remain unbroken/on our lives
we now swear/these to be our token/though they may not be spared."
They each nicked their hands and joined them at the
circle's center sealing the Spell of Joining. The light around them grew
stronger and then flared for a moment before it weakened to a faint glow. Then
Harry heard his father say:
"Repeat after me…I solemnly swear to defend all
that I hold dear, to give aid to my friends when called upon, to protect the
innocent and to stand fast against Voldemort's evil, doing all in my power to
end his reign of terror and to never surrender to His darkness."
The others took the oath solemnly. Then Harry
thought he heard a voice say:
"The oath that was broken must now be restored"
Then the world around Harry began to spin and he
found himself staring at Voldemort across a battlefield that seemed almost
familiar though he couldn't quite place it. Voldemort's red eyes glowed in the
darkness and his laughter echoed around Harry. Harry felt a debilitating fear
and he stood unable to move, unable for the first time to make a choice in
battle.
"You come too late, Potter. The battle is over and
I have won. Everything you have known is now gone. You have lost! Surrender to
me now and I might be merciful," his voice was cold and mocking.
"I know what your "mercy" would gain me and I would
rather die then to surrender to you. You shall have neither my power nor me."
"Ah, but I have taken something from you already
that you will never be able to regain. Your courage is now mine; your
spirit is a weak and broken thing. You are nothing and have nothing left.
Surrender now!"
Harry raised his wand, his heart pounding with
fear, pointing it at Voldemort.
"You lie! You have taken nothing from me…" Harry's
voice trembled and he knew that he was lying to himself. He was standing before
his enemy unable to move, trapped in the indecision caused by overwhelming
fear.
Voldemort
grinned maliciously at Harry and laughed, pointing his own wand. There was a
blinding flash; a cry of someone in pain and Harry saw a flash of silver for an
instant before he found himself sitting up in bed. He rubbed the sweat off his
face and tried to go back to sleep. He found he was shivering and he tried to
calm his nerves but they refused to be calmed. He looked down at himself and
saw the bandages that crisscrossed his body and the fear he'd experienced in
his dream assailed him. Not the fear of death but the fear of anyone touching him
or holding him captive again and the fear of knowing he would have to face
Voldemort again someday.
He'd been tortured in more ways then one. He'd
tried to ignore this fact since he'd awakened but he couldn't do it now that he
was alone. He shook more violently and tried to drive the memories away but
they rose up like ghosts before him, taunting him. He tried to turn away but
they were there wherever he looked. He tried closing his eyes but the memories
of all he'd been through was now etched on the insides of his eyelids, burned
into his memory and unable to be removed. He drew his knees up to his chin and
hugged himself. He'd tried to be brave, to put a brave face on for everyone
else's benefit but deep inside he was afraid, more afraid then he'd ever been
before.
"What is wrong with me?" he said as he watched
Fawkes making short practice flights around the room.
The phoenix began to blur and tears slipped silently
down Harry's face. He once thought Voldemort couldn't hurt him any more then he
had last year when Cedric Diggory had been killed right in front of him with
Harry unable to prevent it. Now he knew Voldemort had hurt him far worse. He
damaged Harry were his greatest strength had been, in his spirit.
"Will I ever become whole again? Can I ever truly
recover from this?" he thought as hot tears splashed on his drawn-up knees.
"And now I am trapped in a time not my own…I am truly alone as Voldemort said I
would be."
He laid his head on his knees and wept
uncontrollably, no longer able to deal with the pain in his soul. He had been
deeply wounded by his captivity and not just in body. He was no longer sure of
whom to trust and was now unsure of even himself. How could he be counted on to
stop Voldemort when his fear of Voldemort had grown greater then ever before?
What if he froze the next time they faced one another? His world seemed to be
crashing down around him and he could see nothing but darkness around him.
Everything he touched seemed to be doomed to die. Anyone who befriended him was
a target of Voldemort's wrath. Voldemort could take him from anywhere at
anytime and could put him through Hell on a whim simply because Harry had not
yet died. He was nothing and had nothing. All of his protections were broken,
gone as if they'd never been.
Harry cried harder as he realized this. There was
nothing he or anyone else could do to prevent Voldemort from capturing him
again now that these protections were broken. He had no chance and he was
afraid to let anyone ever touch him again or get close to him. His spirit
huddled in a corner of his mind and he felt himself begin to huddle in the
corner of the bed. Then he felt something land on his bed and he started,
instantly assuming it was an attack of some kind. Looking up found Fawkes
staring at him intently with his bright eyes. Harry reached out a hand and
stroked the phoenix's bright feathers, watching the light rippling in them,
tears still streaming down his face. Fawkes moved closer to Harry until the
later was able to reach him easily and could feel the warmth that came from his
feathers. Suddenly overcome with fear, Harry hugged the bird closer to him.
"Help me, Fawkes…please," he said softly, holding
onto the phoenix as if Fawkes were a lifeline or some kind of anchor in a world
gone mad. "Am I going mad?"
Fawkes remained sitting in Harry's lap for several
minutes and then began to sing softly to him, surrounding him in the healing
song of the phoenix. Harry felt his eyes get heavy and allowed Fawkes' song to
carry him away to a place where he could rest without fear and without dreams.
He relaxed and fell into a deep, healing sleep. Fawkes sat nearby and began to
preen Harry's hair a worried look in his eyes. Over and over he sounded two low,
worried notes. If there had been anyone awake in the room that understood
phoenix-song-speech they would have heard two words within his song: heartsick
and spiritwounded. If someone didn't come to help the boy through
this and soon he might well be broken forever. Fawkes continued to preen
Harry's hair and waited for Sir Godric's return knowing that if anyone could
heal Harry and help him it would be one who knew the horrors if captivity and
the battlefield from personal experience as Sir Godric did.
~
From behind a curtain stepped a very pale and
flushed Peter Pettigrew. He was dying and he knew he should be in bed but he
had to see Harry to make sure he was safe and protected. Peter knew he had only
a few days at most before the curse meant for Harry would kill him. He managed
avoid part of the Killing Curse and most of the rest had been absorbed by the
shield that had formed around them when they had apparated but a part of the
curse had struck him in the arm, where it began to spread throughout his body.
Although the shield had weakened the power of the curse it still could kill.
Instead of killing immediately, it would kill slowly, taking his life an inch
at a time. His arm was already useless and hung limp at his side. Now his legs
were full of pain but he wanted one last look at Harry before he began to slip
into eternal sleep.
Harry lay in bed with one arm thrown over his face
and the other clutching the blankets. At the head of the bed, Fawkes was
perched with his head resting under one wing. Harry was sleeping quietly, with
none of the fitful tossing and turning that Peter had seen back in the tent
when they'd first arrived. Peter looked sadly down at him.
"I'm sorry I couldn't stop Voldemort from sending
you here. I didn't know what he was doing until it was too late," he whispered
so softly that he was barely audible. "Please, forgive me for all my wrongs…for
everything that I've done to you…for betraying your family and Sirius. There
was nothing I could do. I was too scared to stand with your parents and the
others when it began to look as if Voldemort would win and I was too scared to
stand up to my friends years later when I was confronted with what I had done.
Both times I ran straight to the enemy whose promises were lies…"
There was movement on the bed and Harry's eyelids
fluttered a moment. Peter started to flee the room but then stopped. He was
through with running. The time had come to face the son and godson of those
he'd betrayed. Peter would die in peace if Harry could just find it in his
heart to forgive him.
"Please let him be like, James. Please be
forgiving like you father, Harry," he thought as Harry's eyes opened and
they focused on him.
"You!" Harry's eyes flashed as he spat out the
word. "What are you doing here, Wormtail?"
Peter flinched at the cold tone in Harry's voice
and at the use of his nickname. He stood there in silence.
"Come to finish your Master's work have you?" Harry
said, his voice trembling and his eyes glazing over in fear.
Peter reached out a hand and Harry flinched away
from it as if he expected Pettigrew to hit him. Peter's eyes widened. This was not
the Harry Potter he'd come to know. Something was terribly wrong.
"Come on…finish it then…its what He wants!" Harry
yelled, fear lacing his voice and causing his body to tremble, tears falling
from his eyes.
Harry sat up; wincing in pain and Peter saw the
bandages that covered his torso and arms. Peter had never known anyone with
that many wounds to survive yet inexplicable Harry had.
"Take me…I can't stand it anymore! All the waiting
for Him to come for me, knowing that every day could be my last, knowing that
very next time we face each other I could die! I can't stand it anymore! I am
alone! There is nothing left within me! I can't continue to live like this!
Just finish it…let it end now…" Harry face was a mask of pain and then he threw
himself face down on the bed and began to sob brokenly.
Peter looked at him as horror and fear moved
through him. Voldemort had done it after all. He'd completely broken Harry's
spirit. Pettigrew began to move forward but as he did so he felt his legs give
out and he fell crashing to the floor. The room around him began to grow dim.
He could hear a rustling above and a sharp hiss of pain.
"Fawkes, get Sir Godric quick!"
There was the rustle of wings and then Peter saw
Harry's blurred face hovering above his. His tear filled green eyes were full
of concern and worry as well as pain. Peter could see some blood on one of the bandages
around Harry's chest but Harry was ignoring it. Peter opened his mouth, knowing
that the time had come to say what he'd meant to say before Harry's outburst.
"Harry…Please forgive…haven't much time…"
Harry's eyes widened in surprise and for a moment
his eyes turned cold.
"You were the one that saved me?" he asked without
any emotion. "Why?"
Peter nodded. The room was growing dimmer by the
second.
"Had to…James told me…the circle must not fade…must
be renewed…you're the source of balance…Forgive…"
"Why should I forgive you? You've caused me nothing
but grief! Look what He has done to me!" Harry's eyes narrowed and Peter saw
rage and pain in them.
How could he forgive the man who had betrayed his family to Voldemort? He was the reason Harry had no family. He'd betrayed Sirius and his friends. He could not forgive the man. He just couldn't but then he looked into Peter's eyes and saw something different. He couldn't put a name to it; he just knew something was different. Peter's eyes were full of remorse for the things he'd done, for all the betrayals he'd committed.
"Please…forgive me…" Pettigrew whispered, his eyes
becoming glazed over.
Harry felt his resolve waver. It was clear that
Peter was going to die. Harry could see it in his eyes and could see that Peter
had accepted it as punishment for all the evil he had done in the past.
"I forgive you…" Harry said quietly, tears standing
in his eyes.
Peter looked at him and smiled for a moment but
made no move to touch him.
"Thank you…James would be proud…take me back with
you when the time comes…there is one more life I can save…."
"Sirius…" Harry breathed.
"Fidelius Charm…traces…free Sirius…" Peter
shuddered once and then his breathing suddenly stopped.
Harry looked down at him for a moment and then
reached over to close his eyes.
"I promise, Sirius will be freed."
Harry's eyes filled with tears that silently coursed
down his cheeks. Peter had finally found peace. Now if only he could.