"You," hissed Voldemort, some of the angry colour draining from his face.

"Professor!" cried Harry. Thank God, he thought.

Dumbledore acknowledged them all with a pleasant nod. "Glad to see you're all… safe," he said. Harry thought he had been about to say 'well', but the Headmaster had obviously taken in the sight of the various injuries the little company had received. Ron's eyes were goggling: it seemed that his definition of the word 'safe' differed quite considerably from Dumbledore's. Harry was inclined to agree with him.

"Well," said Dumbledore, his hand never wavering as it held the wand at Voldemort, "I must say I agree with Sirius on this one. You don't appear to have a very good grip on human emotions, Tom. But then, that's hardly surprising considering your relationship with your parents, I suppose. Well; never mind."

Harry winced at the look of hatred on Voldemort's face. Peter Pettigrew had crawled over to his master, whimpering, and cowered back at the sight of Dumbledore. He had a huge bruise spreading across the top of his balding head where Lupin had apparently decided to fight back.

"Are you going to kill him now?" enquired Ron, hopefully.

"Oh, no, I couldn't do that," replied Dumbledore calmly. "Unfortunately, Ron, that time has not yet come. But, if he knows what is good for him – "

Voldemort, it seemed, did not. He had raised his wand and it pointed at Harry.

"Harry," instructed Dumbledore calmly, "Draw your wand. And then do as I say."

Trembling, Harry groped for his wand and finally withdrew it from inside his robes, waiting for Dumbledore to tell him what to do next and breathing heavily. He had not the faintest idea what was going to happen. Voldemort was concentrating on him so hard that he could almost feel the malevolent glare penetrate him, and he was shivering uncontrollably. Everyone else had their eyes riveted to the three figures stood there: Dumbledore, Voldemort and himself.

"Now," said Dumbledore, "I believe Tom will try the Avada Kevadra curse, Harry: you must be ready for it. With any luck, it should – "

He was interrupted by a flash of blinding blue electric light from Voldemort's wand. Harry gasped, and flung up his wand hand to give a counter-curse: but, to his surprise, it was not directed at him. The blue flew towards the rest of the room: aimed at Ron, and Hermione; at Sirius, Snape, Hagrid and Lupin; at Dumbledore himself – but not at Harry. Voldemort smiled triumphantly as his spell reached out towards Harry's friends, and Harry watched in terror, his mouth open in a silent scream.

And then something odd happened.

Almost as if it had hit a mirror, the blue light suddenly reflected back before it had the chance to reach any of Harry's seven companions. It rebounded like rubber, and fled back to one, central point: Voldemort's wand. The wizard's eyes were widened in some unidentifiable emotion: he shook his hand, trying to free it of his wand; he let out a scream that reached Harry's bones, a scream that contained such incredible pain it was almost unbearable to listen to. Then there was a loud explosion: Harry was knocked from his feet along with all the others. When he looked up, Voldemort and Pettigrew were gone.

Slowly, he picked himself up and watched cautiously as the others did the same. He felt suddenly empty, as though drained of all his energy. It was over.

"Tom miscalculated human feeling far more seriously than I thought," was all Dumbledore said, a twinkle in his eye.

"What happened to him?"

"He didn't pay attention to Sirius's warning," said Dumbledore. "He made the same mistake he made thirteen years ago, Harry, when he murdered your parents and tried to murder you. He failed to take into account the fact that someone could die for someone else – or, in your case, several people would die. Your friends' willingness to give themselves up for you confounded him: he sought to place them under a curse – not a death curse, you understand: not even Voldemort would be foolish enough to do that while he isn't yet in his full power – but it malfunctioned. It reversed. It undid him – for a while."

"You mean, he's not dead?" asked Harry, disappointed. To his vast surprise, Dumbledore threw back his head and laughed.

"Dead! Dear me, no. I'm sorry, Harry, but we have a long way to go before we achieve that goal. But – " he suddenly stopped laughing, and looked seriously at Harry. "But we're getting there. We have people willing to make the ultimate sacrifice to destroy him, and we have you, Harry: and I think that that is an extremely good start, don't you?"

Sirius limped up to put an arm round Harry's shoulders, and Harry smiled, as he pondered Dumbledore's words. Yes, he thought. That was good enough – for now.

"Eh – Mr Dumbledore," boomed Hagrid, his huge frame suddenly appearing beside Harry's godfather and dwarfing him considerably, "Ah don' know about you lot – but ah think ah'd like to be goin' now… an' I think Mr Lupin o'er there's lookin' a mite peaky…"

Remus Lupin did indeed appear to be slightly the worse for wear. His altercation with Peter Pettigrew had left him decidedly the worse off, on top of his transformation, and with a sudden panic Harry wondered if he was even still alive: he ran towards where he was chained, his head drooping onto his chest, and let out a sigh of relief as he saw that he was breathing – albeit shallowly.

Dumbledore clapped his hands together. "I believe Hagrid is right," he said. "We ought to be going. Sirius, if you could assist Hagrid in unchaining Remus, then I think I should be able to see Harry and the others back to – "

Harry swayed. The exhaustion of the last few days finally caught up with him: he caught a glimpse of Ron's face frowning at him in concern as he went dizzy and the room span, and then, almost delirious with relief, Harry Potter fainted.

Only one more to go after this! Whew. I hope you've all enjoyed it so far - review, review, review… J Thanks to everyone who has already. ~M~