Fatalis Liertas
Deadly Freedom
A/N -A quick one shot I wanted to get out. I don't know how good it is, I haven't read it all the way through, just bits (I know, I wrote it, but do you remember everything you wrote in your English class? Even one essay?) Hope you enjoy, let me know in a review. Start one now, so you don't forget :D
Summary;- Harry has been imprisoned in Azkaban. He has been transfered, but will his new accomodation give him the freedom he craves? One-shot, Sirius-Res'd. Not a happy story.
Harry looked up wearily as his cell door clanged. He sat huddled in the corner of his cell where the sun managed to shine through the tiny window and waited for the food to be put on the floor and the guard to leave. Instead someone spoke.
"Get up, Potter," Harry looked up, his eyes unable to focus without his glasses, which had been lost, broken, when he had been arrested.
He struggled to his feet, legs weak from poor food and lack of exercise. He leant heavily against the wall, staring at the doorway, waiting for the guards to come in and have their fun with the great Harry Potter.
"Come on, Potter, we haven't got all day!" the guard snapped. "You're being transferred."
Transferred? To where? Harry pushed himself off the wall and made his way wearily to the door, one hand on the wall at all times. He got a boot in his knee, sending him to the floor amid laughter, before being handcuffed and dragged through the cold, damp stone corridors.
"Here you are, Professor Dumbledore," the lead guard said, throwing Harry to the floor. "One bona-fide Boy-Who-Lived. You sure you know what you're doin'?"
"Thank you, Galvern, I can manage him." Dumbledore! Harry raised his head in hope, seeing the blue clad man. Had he been found innocent? Had he been freed? No. The guard had said a transfer. But why would Dumbledore be here for a transfer?
"Get up," another boot, this time to the stomach. Harry crawled to his knees and then to his feet, swaying alarmingly but managing to stay upright.
Cold attacked him and he fell to his knees again. Laughter attacked his ears from the guards but he blocked them out, repeating his mantra in his head as the Dementor's came closer.
'Innocent, I'm innocent, I didn't kill them, it wasn't me, I didn't, I wouldn't, never, I'm innocent…'
Dry, rotting hands clamped on his arms and he was swamped by cold.
"Stand aside, foolish girl,"
"No, not Harry! Please not Harry!"
Something was being attached to his neck but he was drifting in and out of consciousness, the Dementor's affecting him worse than usual because of their vice like grip.
Cedric, Dead. Sirius, Dead. Seven Muggles, Dead. His aunt, his uncle, his cousin and his friend Piers, Piers' little sister and their parents, all dead in the living room of number four Privet Drive when Harry came home one day.
He was being dragged to a boat, thrown in by those cold hands. He lay shivering in the bottom until Azkaban was out of sight, huddled in on himself.
A lone tear ran down his face.
He awoke in a soft bed, staring at a white ceiling. He sat up slowly, feeling weak. Someone approached him, dressed in white. She seemed to glow. Harry tilted his head on one side.
"Drink this." Harry blinked. Not an angel then. No angel sounded like an angry Madam Pomfrey. He saw something being handed to him and he took it carefully, bringing the beaker to his lips and swallowing the noxious substance.
The Healer left without a word. A while later the door opened again and Harry saw three people enter.
"Mr Potter, on July 18th you were transferred into the care of Albus Dumbledore from Azkaban prison to serve out the rest of your sentence." One man began to rattle, but Harry couldn't understand half of it. All about restrictions and legalities. Harry tried to work out who the other two men were as the man drew to a complex close before rolling up the parchment he had been reading from. "Thank you. Good Afternoon, Professor Dumbledore." The man left, leaving Harry with the two remaining men.
"You will be assigned a room within Hogwarts, Mr Potter." Dumbledore was the one wearing the red robe, taking over now. "You shall be escorted whenever you are not in that room. Meals, if you are in your room, shall be served by a house elf. The collar you now wear is a restriction device. If you attempt to escape, or are disobedient of the restrictions on you, it shall cause you pain, which can be modified up to the level of Cruciatus." Harry shivered. Though not as bad as when V…V…You-know-who had possessed him he never wanted to feel that again. "I advise you not to test me, Mr Potter."
Harry nodded submissively. "Follow me, Mr Potter. I shall take you to your room."
Harry swung his legs off the bed and lowered his weight to them gently. Stronger than he was used to. Swaying only slightly Harry followed the red clad Dumbledore out of the room. He was in the hospital wing, he realised. The other man, who had not been identified, fell in behind Harry. He suspected a wand was trained on his back. Not that he was strong enough to try to escape anyway.
It was only a short walk, for which Harry was grateful. The door swung open and Harry was led into a room. It wasn't too small, and it seemed to hold a bed. Thus far better than Azkaban and Privet Drive put together.
"No window," he croaked, feeling choked. He had always had a window, no matter where he had lived.
"And give you a chance to escape, Mr Potter?" Dumbledore said, sounding angry. "I think not. I shall leave you now." He left without another word, the door slamming behind him.
Harry reached out to the wall and traced his fingers along it. He found a bookcase, to his surprise, filled with books. No use to him without glasses. A corner, then a desk. He nearly fell over the chair. Continuing on there was a spare piece of wall and then another corner. Blank wall and then the bed, feet facing the door. He patted it down, checking for anything untoward before slowly lowering himself on it and pressing his back against the wall, curling into a small ball. He closed his eyes and sighed, wondering when he would wake up from this dream.
"Why did you do it, Harry?" Harry shot upright, staring at the figure by the door. He hadn't realised he was still in the room. The voice sent a memory through him, and he fought hard to remember who it was.
"Do what?" he croaked when the man said nothing more.
"Kill them?" he knew that voice! Why couldn't he remember who it belonged to?
"I didn't," he said shakily, closing his eyes as he saw them once again lying dead. The little girl had been torn to pieces…
"You testified under Veriteserum!" the man exploded, "How can you say your innocent?"
"I am. I don't remember anything. I woke up in Azkaban, they said I had been given a trial but I couldn't remember a thing." He needed the man to speak again…
"You don't remember the trial?"
Click.
"Sirius!" Harry gasped.
"What?"
"Sirius? Are you Sirius?"
"Of course I am, who did you think I was? You've been looking straight at me for ten minutes."
"No glasses." Harry croaked. Sirius? Could it be? He buried his head in his knees and started to cry, his whole body shaking with sobs. "I want to wake up," he cried. "I want to wake up!" he started to hit himself on the head, fighting to wake from this dream, this lying nightmare. Strong hands caught him by the wrist and yanked him upright. He stared in shock at Sirius, his face clearer now. Tears spilled out of his eyes and he moaned, burying his face in his knees. Dry sobs racked through him.
"I thought you were dead," Harry wept. "They made me watch you die, I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry, I didn't mean to kill you. I didn't, I, I, I watched you," Sniff, "I saw you fall through and I couldn't save you, and I knew you were gone but I didn't want to. I should have known it was a trap, I'm so sorry, please Sirius, I'm sorry. I'm sorry." He wrapped his arms around his knees when his wrists were let go and sobbed into them, curled into the ball he had become at the Dursley's when Vernon would hit him.
"Why did you kill your family, Harry?" Sirius asked quietly. He wasn't looking at Harry he knew.
"Because of that stupid prophecy," Harry spat between his teeth, screwing his eyes up as they burned with anger. "Because Dumbledore let someone hear it and they told him. He ruined my life. All my life. They both did. He killed my family and then Dumbledore killed my childhood. All because of a stupid prophecy!" Harry hit the wall beside him, over and over, opening old wounds that never really healed. "I hate Dumbledore, I hate Voldemort, I hate Remus, I hate Ron, I hate Hermione, and I hate Sybil Trelawney for making the prophecy that ruined my life!" He was screaming in Sirius' face, not realising that the man was not a Dementor illusion. "They left me!" he wailed, kicking his feet. "Sirius!" he cried. "I'm sorry!" he screamed, no longer knowing where he was or when or why. "I'm sorry Sirius! Please, Sirius, please! I don't want you to go, Sirius, Siri, Siri, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" his voice was going hoarse, his energy running out. He collapsed on the bed, curling into an exhausted ball and hiding his face.
"I'm sorry, please, uncle, please, I didn't mean to, don't, don't hurt me, please, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, please, no, no, no," he whispered, staring into horrors that he had escaped. "Get off me, no, please." Tears sprang to his face again as he screwed his face up in pain. "Mummy? Mummy? Why won't you get up? Mummy? I want my mum!" he began to toss weakly, unable to distinguish between sleep and wakefulness, nightmare and reality. "So much blood, they tore her apart! I couldn't do that, why did they think I did it? I'm innocent, I didn't do it, I swear, mummy, make them go away. Sirius? Please, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry…" he slid into silence, unconsciousness finally taking over. Tears still tracked down his dirty face however, and his breathing hitched often.
He was pacing the floor. Nervousness coursed through his veins. Even in Azkaban, even at the Dursley's, he had had some kind of vent to assure him that he would not suffocate. But here, in this tiny room, there was nothing, not a keyhole, not a window, not even a loose piece of wall he might breathe fresh air through.
Screaming Harry fell to the floor, anger and frustration winning through finally. He pounded his hands against the stone floor. Automatically he looked up, trying to find his window. Instead he found cold stone walls. He screamed again and hit the floor harder. Something rippled through it, running up the wall where he was looking. His mouth fell open as the wall vanished. He was standing facing the Hogwarts grounds, seven floors below him, and nothing to keep him in the room.
He backed up against the far wall, his mouth agape. Wind pulled at him, trying to yank him from the room, but he gripped the door handle and clung on tight. His bed was yanked from the room, the bookcase and desk following shortly after. Harry hung on grimly, his hands growing sore. He daren't shift his grip however.
Suddenly he felt it turn under his hands. He held on fast, somehow managing to keep his grip on it. When the wind caught the door however and it was yanked open his fingers slipped.
He had one glimpse of a shocked Sirius and Dumbledore before it was yanked off its hinges. He closed his eyes and screamed as he was thrown out into the storm, still clutching grimly onto the door.
His body was found a few hours late. The storm, which had come and gone so quickly, had thrown him and the door that now, broken into a thousand pieces, was more inside him than out, almost to the trees of the forbidden forest. He was bloody, and barely breathing when Professor Snape gave a cry. He heard the voices however, and managed, slowly, to peel an eye open.
It was all fuzzy, and he couldn't quite hear what people were saying. They seemed to be asking him why he had done it.
He spluttered on what could only be his own blood he realised, his voice weak and ragged.
"No… window…" he murmured into someone's ear. "Couldn't… breathe…"
Someone began to talk, their voice soft and soothing. He realised it was some kind of chant, someone healing him? No, it was like a funeral chant. He was dieing? Did that mean… he was finally free? Free from Voldemort, and Azkaban, and the pain?
He sighed as blackness closed in on him, and his last sight was his godfather, wiping blood off his cheek with disgust.
