Disclaimer: Surprisingly enough hardly any of these characters are mine, they all belong to some woman called J.K. Rowling, no idea who she is…
Chapter Five: Fire Born
Harry ran up the corridor, pain surging through his body as the Blood Circle continued the pain of the Cruciatus curse and made him bleed from his nose, mouth and chest, it was quite disgusting. Every old injury he had even had was causing him pain, the pain from every single broken bone he had sustained from Quidditch was re-running through his body.
Once or twice as he ran he would stop, verging on collapse, but then that little voice at the back of his head screamed at him to continue. He couldn't leave Ginny with Voldemort and the Death Eaters. Voldemort had tortured Medea when she had been a child, he didn't want the same thing to happen to Ginny. He couldn't let Voldemort kill yet another innocent because of him either, his parents had been too many and then Cedric too, he couldn't let another die.
So he kept running and was able to follow the sound of Ginny's screams that cut through him as badly as the relived pain from the Blood Circle. He staggered into a gallery and saw Voldemort standing at the centre, surrounded by his Death Eaters. He was holding his wand out and with an utter of words there was a flash and the wood began to creak and groan.
Harry watched, pain almost forgotten, as the wood spread out and doors crept out of the wall. Voldemort swept through the doors and the Death Eaters followed, dragging a sobbing Ginny behind them. Harry set his jaw and walked down the gallery to stand in the entrance.
"Let her go," he said.
Voldemort spun around from the altar that he had been facing and a smile spread across his white features, "Why, Mr. Potter. I didn't think you would make it – I have underestimated you it seems... Come here then and we will complete this."
Harry stepped down the white steps and looked around the chamber. Death Eaters were everywhere and he could still here others in the castle. Ginny had been laid against a pillar unconscious. Harry resisted the urge to go and check if she was okay and faced Voldemort, though the pain in his scar burnt like nothing he had felt before. As Celea Leone had once pointed out to him, he was ludicrously stubborn when need be.
"You have lost, Harry," hissed Voldemort and raised his wand. "There is no need to stay."
Harry had to thank his reflexes that he saw Voldemort's curse coming and he seized his wand and at the top of his voice, though no sound came out at all, the disarming charm. For a second the universe appeared to stand still and he could hear everything and then suddenly there was a brilliant flash of light that engulfed everything and Harry distantly felt himself hit the floor.
His eyes flickered open and he reached back to his head, which was thankfully not bleeding. As he pulled himself to his feet he felt something drop onto his nose and as he looked around in the gloom he saw that thousand of little sparks were falling from the air. As he reached out to catch a few and a beautiful, burning feather fell into his hand. Then he realised it – the wand cores had exploded.
The spots began to disappear from his vision as the blood stopped rushing around his head and the sparks fell to the ground, still burning faintly. He looked around and saw everyone lying lifeless on the floor, their eyes dull and lifeless through their masks and then he spotted a shock of red in the gloom. He scrambled towards it and collapsed at Ginny's side.
Harry picked up her head in his hands and looked into her dead eyes, without that spark of brilliance they had once had. She was cold and limp in his arms and he knew it was his fault. Voldemort had wanted to lure him here and he had used Ginny to do it for him. If he hadn't been Harry Potter than so many people wouldn't be dead: his mother, Cedric, Ginny.
"Do you know of your mother boy?" asked a cold harsh voice.
Harry turned, still cradling Ginny's head, to see Voldemort standing before the altar. He still looked menacing dangerous and very much alive, he also had a wand in his hand. Harry down at the ash on the floor, the embers of his wand, and felt his heart sink further. After everything this was finally going to happen, so many people had died, and now it was going to be for absolutely nothing.
"Can't you just die!" yelled Harry. "Isn't it enough that you ruined by life, killed my parents, killed Dumbledore…. Ginny."
"Do you know what your mother was, Harry?" insisted Voldemort.
"Yes – I do," growled Harry.
"Do you know that they can break curses naturally," said Voldemort. "That it is a natural instinct to break curses – no matter what curse it is."
"What's the point of this then? Are you going to tell me why you wanted to kill me at last?" snapped Harry.
"No – not yet I don't think," said Voldemort. "This place though, if you at all interested, is the Hall of the Phoenix where the Founding Four left something for their descendants – immortality!," he said, his blood red eyes flashing. "A sacrifice is needed though, this is old magic, and I was going to use Miss. Weasley over there… You will do just as well though. I did have other plans for you, but this will do just as well…"
Harry found that he was getting to his feet now and it was a few moments before he realised he was under an Imperius curse. He shook it off without much effort and it occurred to him that Voldemort was weaker than he had been before. Voldemort glared at him and Harry smiled that manic grin of someone who has nothing left to lose.
"You're weak!" snarled Harry.
"Ah, but I will be powerful again," said Voldemort.
Behind him on the altar the flame flared and then spread around the room until they were surrounded by flame. The fire was a thousand shades at once, but Harry could pick out four in particular and he knew them well from the Quidditch pitch: red, blue, green and yellow. Voldemort raised his wand once more and Harry suddenly remembered that he hadn't taken one from one of the fallen.
"The heir of Gryffindor," snarled Voldemort. "I couldn't have had you or your father stealing this from the Founders… But you were more dangerous, Harry, you were like Dumbledore and I… You were from the third kind of magic and you weren't bound like the rest of us. You had broken the curse thanks to your mother's heritage…"
"There are only two kinds of magic and then the Muggles," said Harry, backing up until the flame scorched his back. "Witches and wizards and the natural magic from the Sidhe… There isn't a third kind – most people don't even know that the second still exists."
"No – you are wrong, Harry… But the third magic powers were bound in curses by the other two because they were stronger than the others were. The Dark Curse was the mistake though, we are an ingenious people and I learnt to draw power from it as others had feared to do in the past."
"You corrupted your power by drawing it from an ancient curse!" gasped Harry.
"And when you were born the curse was not already on your head," said Voldemort with a laugh. "If it hadn't been for that you might have been useful to me, Potter. But as you did… Only one thing awaits you. It will not be long before your power reaches it's height and then it will be too late… But for now I am more powerful and you will fall…"
Harry fell back into the flame and screamed in agony – but then it stopped. Flame swirled around him, but it was perfectly painless and if anything it was making him feel better. He could feel the heat burning away him injuries and something else being burnt onto his back. Distantly he heard Voldemort scream and then he collapsed out of the flame. But the flame swirled around him like a cloak and held him up, making him feeling stronger and more powerful.
At the back of his head he heard the voice more beautiful than words, "One life for eternal life – so the phoenix must rise above and complete the rite of ascension."
Harry reached out his hand to Voldemort as the Dark Lord backed away in terror. But the flame extended from his hand and gripped Voldemort's arm tightly before swirling up around his entire body. Voldemort screamed as so many of his victims had and then both collapsed to the floor.
Harry pulled himself up onto his hands and knees and looked at his hands. Flame was dancing between his fingers and he could still feel the warmth, he knew that he could summon up his power too, power that Voldemort had spoken of. He looked over at Voldemort and crept over to him, but there wasn't much point, he already knew he was dead.
As he sat there, trying to work out what he was to do, things came rushing back to him. He looked over to the pillar which Ginny lay crumpled against and he scrambled across the floor towards her. He knelt beside her and picked up her hand, still just as cold and white as before. Voldemort was dead, but another innocent had been killed because of him and any glory was forfeit.
*****
Ginny sat at the counter in Flourish and Blotts flipping through Witch's Weekly. She was quite impressed this week, Hermione had put in a few new writers and their stories were surprisingly good. Having Hermione as chief editor at I.M.P. for Witch's Weekly as well as just for books had it benefits she had to admit, the magazine was far more coherent and interesting than it had been before. The fact that Hermione was also able to convince one of her best friends to appear in an issue every now and then couldn't be bad either, especially considering that he was Harry Potter.
The bell tinkled as the shop door opened. Ginny looked up to see who entered and was pleasantly surprised. The customer was an attractive man with a medium build, with tousled ash-blonde hair and glinting hazel eyes, Ginny though he looked incredible. She was in for another shock when none other than Harry Potter walked in after him. Ginny ducked her head back down and looked intently at her magazine.
"So how many books?" asked Harry.
"Erm," said the other man with a rustling of paper, Ginny glanced up to see him unfolding a scrap of parchment. "Well I need twenty – that not including the ones I'll need to get at Stellionmere and I'll maybe even need to go to Dracomon for some."
"And you can afford all these, Pag? I know you get paid peanuts when you take away your grant," said Harry. "No offence meant, mind you."
"None taken," said the man named Pag with a shrug. "But I managed to convince my the board to extend my grant to research materials. Just as long as I don't get caught eating at expensive restaurants I can usually always get an extension – now for the books. Hello, miss."
Ginny's head jerked up, suddenly realising he was addressing her, "Yes? Can I help you?" she asked, stopping her eyes veer off to meet Harry's.
"Yeah, I need some books, but I think you might have to order a few of them. Do you stock these?" he asked and gave her the list he had been holding.
Ginny glanced down it and consulted the leather bound book under the counter, marking off the ones they had or could get before looking up, "I can get all of these for you, except The Many Guises Of The Kelpie. I'll have to order that from the publishers, but I can get it for you tomorrow."
"Thanks," said Pag. "Do I get the books myself or –"
"Come with me," said Ginny, smiling.
She led both of the men through the shelves and found all the books Pag was looking for, passing them to him as she found the books. At one point she had to climb up a ladder to get a copy of Racing Through The Ages: Granian Horses, she over heard the conversation going on below.
"Do you know her, Harry?" asked Pag.
"You've met Ron – well that's his little sister," said Harry briefly.
"Oh, but why the cold shoulder then?" asked Pag.
"Why indeed," muttered Ginny under her breath.
"Because," said Harry. "Some things are better left unknown."
"And some aren't," said Pag.
"I'll see you back at the counter."
Harry walked off back to the counter and Ginny climbed down the ladder to give Pag the book. When she had found all of the books Pag had wanted they returned to the counter where she wrote an order form for The Many Guises Of The Kelpie. Harry, she noticed, was leafing through a copy of Annwn and the Otherworlds.
There were hundreds of rumours about Harry's heritage. Some people said he was a descendant of Godric Gryffindor, though he could was a Parselmouth. There had been quite a widely spread rumour a few years ago that his mother's father had been a child of a Sidhe man. Ginny didn't believe either of them, or any of the other ones, but she had to admit it was rather interesting to see him reading about Annwn.
When Harry was gone, carrying half of Pag's books, Ginny crept over to where he had been sitting and opened Annwn and the Otherworlds. It fell open at a page and she wondered if this was the one he had been looking at. It showed a woman in scarlet that matched the colour of her hair exactly and a huge, white hound was sitting at her feet. Ginny closed the book thoughtfully and slipped the book back onto the shelf.
A/N: Shorter than the other chapters, I think, I really don't want to have to go back and check. You found out how Harry killed Voldemort and you got two more puzzles, ain't I cruel :: evil laughter:: So now you'll want to know why Ginny's alive now and who exactly Harry's mum is descended from. Annwn is pronounced "an'oon" if you're at all interested and Sidhe is pronounced "shee". Don't yell at me for mixing mythology here, but I've been through everything I could find and I couldn't find a collective term for people from the Otherworlds in Welsh mythology and there was only the Irish/Scot Sidhe I really liked.
