"For life and death are one, even as the river and the sea are one."

~ Khalil Gibran


Chapter 54 ~ Blood in the Water ~ Part 3


ECOTS


The hot water jetted around her, throwing Tonks in an uncontrolled current upwards. A screaming black mass, like a shadow or a swarm of thousands of black flies swirled beneath her like a vortex, the thing morphing into a face and unleashing a howl not of this earth as it churned with pure malevolence around the ship-

It flickered out as she was thrown headfirst up. Tonks tumultuous tumble did not stop; not until she was quite literally thrown up and above the surface, into the air, Dean Thomas right behind her, arms flailing as he smashed against her, the two tangled in a torment of limbs as they were hurtled several meters up.

They crashed back down into the salty water, Tonks sputtering, air hitting her lips as she caught sight of the floating raft and Tres' stunned expression.

What the hell had just happened?!

Dean groaned alongside her, Tonks grabbing onto his arm as she gasped loudly. "Albus!" Ducking her head beneath the surface, her fingers curling into a vice around Dean's sleeve to make sure he at least didn't go anywhere.

Underwater was a nightmare.

A vicious orange glow radiated from the sea floor, as if everything was burning, the black mass she'd seen explode from the ship suddenly gone.

Tonks coughed, nearly drowning an inch below the surface, abruptly yanking her head up, gasping, choking down lungfuls of air as fear seized her heart. "Merlin….Dean…did you-"

The younger wizard made a choked, dumbfounded sound. The two floated there in the bath-warm water, shaken.

Professor Gai still floated serenely on his raft, the scene above water oddly peaceful as he looked down at the water with horrified brown eyes. The sheer orange glow emanating from beneath…

It told him enough for him to realize what was happening. The DADA Professor was already leaning over the edge of the raft, dipping his hand into the water-

The unnatural warmth of it made him recoil instantly – the ocean should have been cold, but it was warm - the wizard staring with wide eyes. "He did it…he actually did it."

Dean again made a sputtering sound. "Did what?" he demanded, gesturing down. "You mean to tell me you actually know what that was?!"

Tonks sputtered as well, her blue-green eyes scanning the water's surface, looking for a dimming, a sign of anything. Her skin actually hurt.

Dumbledore had created fire beneath the water.

It was the only thing that could destroy inferi.

Hell, the damnable man had created an explosion!

She scanned the surface, sighting upon Luna and Neville's heads floating farther off instantly. Neville was checking Luna over, almost frantically, blood mixing with her albino-esque hair.

Fred's head bobbed up a second later, the side of the wizard's neck and face a bright red, scalded mess.

Harry, Dumbledore, Ron, and Regulus were still down there.

Tonks hadn't even seen Fred or Luna down there….not once. They were above water though – they were alive.

Her stomach wrenched.

Dean Thomas breathed hard beside her, stammering, "He-he actually…." His gaze darted towards hers. "Did you fucking see that?!"

Tres automatically docked twenty points from Gryffindor, Tonks frantically grabbing beneath the surface for Dean's hand. He'd saved her.

Someone needed to save Dumbledore.

She acted, seizing another breath and diving down.

What she saw was a train wreck.

Where the bottom of the sea floor had once been now was a crater: a sizeable crater.

And beneath it all Tonks could see Regulus floating determinedly down, casting a spell outside the wreckage that remained of the ship, holes all over the hull, the thing barely recognizable.

The summoning charm he'd cast sent a body flying out of it.

Harry.

Tonks almost choked.

Regulus snared onto Harry's arm, the wizard clearly unconscious, not moving.

Not being awake beneath the water meant only one thing.

Tonks let out a choking cry beneath the sea, salter water tasted against her tongue as she screamed internally. Not him. Not Harry. They'd lost too many people. He'd been through too much and she'd been protecting him for too long.

Dean Thomas snared her around her arm, face schooled into a solemn mask as he pointed determinedly down.

There, beneath the water, there was movement.

From just beyond the crater's gaping black hole crawled several more inferi – survivors of the blast.

And they were swimming straight up.

Tonks nearly screamed.


ECOTS


Harry had disappeared beneath the surface.

That alone hadn't instilled something far more than panic within her; it had been the look in his eyes before he'd done it.

Kally had screamed after him, shouting towards Professor Gai, the professor shouting back, but she was unable to hear him. Shaking, nearly freezing from being so poorly clothed and damp, she swallowed dryly and tried to make sense of it.

She'd obviously passed out, then been left.

In the interim something clearly had happened that had caused everyone to be back out, in the waters.

As Kally tried to wrap her mind around that something beneath the water exploded, an anomalous glow suddenly erupting from beneath the waters and sending bodies and bones catapulting out of the water and up, high into the air.

Bones landed near her, clattering against the barrier, Kally screaming, startled, scrambling back so that her hands left bloody smears on the rocks.

The bones merely rolled lifelessly.

That was when something inside her chest seized.

It seized so painfully that she was doubled over, gasping. Merlin…it felt like she couldn't breathe.

It lasted maybe twenty seconds, her fingers curled against the rocks in pure agony, her heart skipping unnaturally. It felt like some ghost had reached into her to seize her heart in a vice, slowly crushing it.

It ended suddenly.

Hand clutching at her chest, breaths coming in raw, ragged gasps, Kally suddenly knew what it was to feel pure terror. Her eyes darted out, breaths fast, frightened.

Splashes were heard.

Tonks, Dean….

Thank Merlin…her heart almost beat normally for a second as she laid eyes on her best friend, Dean grabbing onto Tonks. Neville and Luna were there, but-

That was it.

There was no one else.

Kally blinked as Dean and Tonks dove back underwater, only to emerge a second later, screaming at the others. It was all happening fast – too fast. Dean's eyes caught onto hers across the distance, bellowing, "INFERI! MOVE!"

Kally comprehended the words.

She didn't move quick enough.

The first of the inferi barreled up out of the water, its bloated, blue-gray flesh clinging to old bones as it snared around Dean, dragging him under-

Kalliandra screamed. Her screams mingled with that of Tonks and Luna. Professor Gai had grabbed his wand, casting something-

The wand worked.

It worked.

A spell flew out, fire striking the water's surface and sizzling out, it ineffective.

Magic was working.

Sharking, Kally moved, sliding off the rocks and down into the water. For a second she bobbed there, her fingers weakly clutching onto the rocks like a lifeline. Then she ducked her face beneath the water, trying to see.

Creatures were there….a half dozen of them.

Two had a hold of Dean, dragging him down in a hoard of bubbles.

He was close.

Regulus…she saw him too, so much farther off. He had snared a hold of a limp body. It wasn't fighting, it wasn't moving. Regulus cast something that sent it flying up towards the surface, right before two inferi attacked.

She caught sight of Black spinning in the water, his wand drawn and aimed, a green spell sending a giant bubble ballooning violently out at the creatures.

Kally couldn't care. She couldn't focus.

She knew. She knew who had been banished limply towards the surface. That knowledge distracted her from everything else.

Harry.

Her heart wrenched so savagely that she could have drowned. The pain in her chest suddenly made sense, it too terrible to even contemplate.

Kally wanted to cry.

Bubbles erupted beneath her, Dean there…

It was enough to ground her.

She couldn't do anything for Harry. Not right now. Shaking she closed her eyes, snaring her barely working hands into her bra strap, tugging out what she'd hidden there: her wand. Almost crying underwater she decided to screw control, feeling half hysterical, her lungs already hurting, exhaustion crawling through her. Kally was aware that she'd never swim fast enough to help Dean, Harry, anyone…not in her weakened state.

That was okay though: she was a living grim.

She didn't need to swim anywhere.

With a cold clarity she suddenly knew why her chest had hurt, why it had screamed so painfully. And that…

It filled her with a raw rage. Those things…those things had to die.

Beneath the water pressure built within her lungs, pressure that had nothing to do with holding her breath. Her skin began to tingle, her flesh crawling…

In her fear, in her anger, something within her snapped.

Without thinking she reached, the golden magic crawling across her hands, moving along her wrists, moving into the wand gripped between her shaking fingers.

The spell slid out from her wand's end like a serpent, coiling swiftly beneath the surface like a golden whip. It flew towards Dean, those creatures dragging him down, Tonks swimming after him and firing spell after spell.

Like before, like when she'd drawn on the zombies within Dublin so, so many months ago, Kally felt it snare around the inferi holding him.

The second her magic brushed against them a sudden rush of wrongness tainted her mind. The magic reanimating those things…it was unnatural, it was horrible, and just like that…

It made it so simple.

It had only one, single-minded purpose: to kill.

Lucky for her she shared the same one, her chest tearing with cruel malignancy knowing what she'd seen. Hate…hate boiled in her, bubbling out as those things tried to kill her Dean.

The tendril holding the inferi to this life was so thin, so fragile.

It was unbelievably easy to snap.

With barely a thought she tore it in half.

The dead suddenly flopped lifelessly within the waters, their bony fingers releasing Dean, the teeth that had been clamped around one of his hands abruptly releasing. He broke free, Tonks snaring him by the shirt and swimming up.

The golden light was already moving on, slithering towards Regulus as he became backed against the burnt husk of what had once been a ship. Kally closed her eyes, feeling her magic touch them now, the inferi struggling against her magic, struggling desperately…

An evil, dark magic reanimated them.

Touching them felt wrong on so, so many levels.

Once more she sent the thin tendrils reanimating the dead snapping…a third and fourth inferi falling limp. It physically hurt, despite the wand, Kally moaning beneath the water. She tried to reach out for the remaining two…

She failed.

Regulus' violent spells didn't. His wand sent the final two crumbling, the remnants of their skulls exploding in a mashed, pink mess in the water.

Tiny fish darted out of nowhere, eager to use the pulpy chunks as chow.

Kally's head broke the surface of the water, gasping for air. She grasped at the edges of the grating black rocks for support, to avoid sinking. Her nails drug brutally, desperately against them, the non-witch practically collapsing, only her folded arms preventing her from sinking beneath the surface once again.

Everything in her world spun.

A long minute passed before her vision cleared. Then Kally forced herself up, out of the water, her arms shaking as she barely managed to tug her upper body up and onto the unforgiving rocks. The oddly warm saltwater splashed around her abdomen as she lay there like a beached dolphin.

It took her several moments for the blackness to pass, her wand clutched tightly between her fingers, breaths coming unsteadily. She was weak, she was overexerted, but…the wand…it had helped.

She could hear shouting behind her, a myriad of panicked, frenzied voices. Kally could barely breathe. The images shed just seen below…a blackened crater, a burnt out ship, Harry floating limp…

"Kal!" Dean's voice…he was close.

Another voice – Regulus' – bellowed something…some kind of propelling charm she recognized from her readings.

She caught sight of Regulus' spell sending Potter's body jetting towards the barrier, towards her, the barrier closer than the beach. Kally froze, watching Harry slide limply through the water, her entire form trembling violently as he thudded dully against the rocks, doing absolutely nothing to stop himself from becoming injured.

He bobbed there like a dead fish, almost sinking. He would have had she not thrown herself over the side to grab at his shirt. She was so weak she could barely grip him.

Dean reached them the next instant, before she could be pulled back into the water by her boyfriend's dead weight. He grabbed Harry around the chest and shoved him brutally up onto the rocks, Kally snaring feebly onto his shoulder, pulling him as hard as she could up and onto them. The sharp edges tore at Potter's clothing, leaving bloodied smears behind, but she couldn't, didn't care about that.

Kally cared about the fact that Harry wasn't moving. He was still, too still. He was laying right there in front of her, limp, pale. It looked like parts of his skin had sustained actual burns.

Kally's own exhaustion suddenly dissipated. She was there, shouting his name, slapping his face, and he still didn't say anything to her.

"Harry…Harry please damn't! Harry!"

There was a panicked edge to her voice she'd never heard before. With a splash Dean had pulled himself out of the water, his left hand bloodied, joining her on the rocks. Kally's head jerked up. "What happened!?"

Dean just cursed. "He went after the horcrux."

Harry didn't move. His unruly hair remained plastered handsomely to his brow, sticking out at odd angles as always, but his eyes were not responsive: they were half-closed, half-opened, a hint of those malachite irises showing.

They were lifeless.

Kally's heart suddenly wasn't was like a giant had seized it and began to squeeze. She couldn't breathe.

Her hazel eyes shot back up to Dean's brown ones, but her best friend wasn't looking at her.

Abruptly he shoved her away, knocking her backwards from where she'd crouched, the wizard cursing and already giving Potter a rescue breath. He drug his mouth back up and off of Harry's, swearing angrily. "Truce my ass you bastar-"

Dean was giving him another breath, his cursing cut off as Kally stared, paralyzed.

Harry wasn't breathing.

Harry, who was her Harry. Harry, who had claimed her in every sodding way possible. Harry, who wanted to make plans with her. Harry, who had been inside her. Harry, who she knew every sodding part of, every part hiding beneath the wet clothes sticking to him. Harry, who she was bonded to.

Harry, who was a horcrux, who had thought he would die.

Harry, who had felt it when she'd so much as cut her hand with that letter opener, even though he'd been in another room.

Kally made an unbelievably upset sound, it inhuman. She didn't realize that it wasn't human, that it was a vocalization of a different species, one that her blood had been mixed with over half a year prior.

Later Dean would tell her unicorns were hauntingly beautiful when crying. At the time though all Kally realized was that the others were still swimming back, that her fingers were groping, grasping at Harry's neck as Dean breathed for him, feeling desperately for a pulse she'd personally felt beneath her own lips countless times. She'd felt it pound wildly, frenetically as he'd taken her, touched her, loved her.

Kally found nothing.

From the pain in her chest before, she'd already known he was dead.

"Dean," she choked, her entire body now quivering violently. Dean's head shot up, seeing where her fingers were against Potter's throat, seeing her ashen expression-

"Oh god damn't, Potter!" he snarled, moving and shoving his hands down against Harry's chest, snarling, "Kaylens move!" as he began to press down hard and fast, a loud cracking snapping through the air the instant he shoved downwards.

Harry's ribs were snapping.

Kally shook. She couldn't help it. It was like she'd gone paralytic, useless. The rocks cut against her knees, the non-witch's skin freezing in the sea's spray as Dean continued pressing down hard against him.

Kally was cold. Harry couldn't cast a warming charm on her, leaving her in only her sodding undergarments that she, Ron and Harry had swam out in earlier. For some reason she thought about this as she watched Dean working on him, trying to save him. The entire left side of Dean's body looked mildly burnt, his hand-

"Kal! Fucking focus!"

Her eyes snapped to Dean, finding his gaze angrily fixed on her as he continued shoving down again and again on Harry's chest.

Harry was dead.

Dean was trying to save him.

Harry was dead.

That was all it took.

"No," she whispered. "No." She darted to Harry's face, snaring her fingers in his familiar hair and tugging his head back. She waited until Dean stopped, just like how Professor Gai had taught them, terrified to think about anything else or about why they were actually doing this for too long. Her hands were shaking so badly that she was afraid she'd physically hurt him.

There wasn't time for that.

The second Dean stopped pressing down Kally captured Harry's cold lips with her own, blowing air into his lungs hard. She paused, her lips hovering against his, that familiar tingling she always got whenever they kissed, whenever he so much as touched her, noticeably absent.

That alone terrified her.

Static electricity, sparks, always could be felt. Only now…now she felt nothing.

Kally pressed more air into him, the salty taste of the sea on his lips, Dean instantly resuming shoving down on his chest.

Kally lingered, her mouth brushing against his, the Reach physically unable to move. Closing her eyes, her face bowed against Harry's face as her eyes burned. Her brow pressed to his, Kally barely able to breath let alone speak. His lips were so, so tantalizing close to hers, but he didn't kiss her.

He made no move to kiss her.

Unconsciously her hands moved without her permission, brushing his face tenderly, as if afraid to break him, her hair falling in a wet cascade around their faces…

At some point she dropped her face down by his ear, muttering things to him that he couldn't possibly hear, but she didn't care. Kally whispered a horrible threat at him, about things she'd do to him whenever she found him in the sodding afterlife if he didn't come back. She whispered that she was a sodding living grim and would find a way to bring him back just to hex him. She whispered that he wasn't allowed to leave her, because he'd promised.

Splashing was heard, water getting disturbed at the barrier's edge, Regulus Black hauling himself out of the water and cussing violently. "Not today, ward," he snarled, grabbing Dean by the back of his shirt and hauling him off. "Nothing so crude you imbecile. Magic works now!"

Dean fell back, and for the first time Kally realized how badly he was bleeding. His entire hand had left bloodied marks on Harry's shirt.

Kally stared as Regulus snatched up his wand, pointing it at Harry and muttering something. A blue-green light swept over him, turning a vicious red as it got to his chest-

Regulus cussed again, muttering, "Artificilais spiritus," with an angered wave of his wand. The incantation sent Harry's chest jerking up, it now rising and falling rhythmically, magic causing breath to move in and out of him. A second wave and a growled, "Expirabilis aqua," sent Harry's body jolting again, Kally's fingers clenching in his hair as it was the only thing she could do.

"What was that?" she whispered, Dean having fallen back to sit on the ground, staring at Potter as if he couldn't believe he'd just kissed him. His left hand was clutched tightly within his right.

Regulus did not so much as glance at her, some other string of Latin words uttered, his hands rising directly over Harry's chest. "It's a spell to remove the water from his lungs," he drawled, "so that the oxygen actually gets to his aveoli. Those Muggle methods of revival….they aren't effective."

With that Regulus began to make strange movements with his hands, as if squeezing two sides of something in a rhythm, a look of the utmost concentration on his face.

Then a red, glowing cord emerged from Regulus' hands, extending down into Harry's chest.

Between Regulus' hands a hologram of a raw, unmoving muscle appeared.

Kally felt like her heart was about to beat out of her chest, a gentle wave breaking against the barrier and sending water flying over them all.

This time it was Dean who spoke, asking, "What the hell is that you're doin-"

Regulus silenced him with a vicious look. "His heart needs pumped somehow. Unless of course you'd rather we just leave him long enough for actual brain death to occur?"

She could only stare, her hand clenching hard onto Harry's shoulder, her other fingers winding in his messy hair as she watched. The wizard, one that had confounded Muggles into thinking he was a doctor, was using magic to literally massage Harry's heart. Sitting there, watching him make pumping, squeezing motions with his hands above Harry's chest, sent a cold, slithering ice through her.

Harry's heart wasn't pumping.

Kally wanted to scream.

Regulus was grimacing, Dean staring. "Then-then defibrillate him or something!" he snapped.

Once again Dean's suggestion was met with an icy look. "Flat lining doesn't respond to electrical shocks, child. You have to get their heart twitching again, which in case it has escaped your foolish notice after that long under water his most certainly is not."

It was like the wind had been driven out of her, a sound she didn't recognize coming from her chest. She was trembling, Dean's eyes looking to her, Kally unable to even breathe.

Dean's gaze shot from her back to Regulus, Neville reaching the barrier and crawling onto it, collapsing belly down as he drug in deep breaths. "So-so how do we get it…twitching," Dean asked, sounding stunned.

"You shut up and let me work," Regulus snapped, "so I can reoxygenate the heart. Then we hope it's not so damaged that the impudent imbecile's muscle won't pick up a rhythm again on its own. This is harder than it looks, so allow me to work, preferably in silence."

Kally grabbed frantically at Harry's hand, her fingers intertwining tightly with his cold ones. He was so, so cold. The lack of feeling, the fact that he did not automatically tighten his back against hers…

It was terrifying.

Kally's eyes burned.

They hadn't burned in years.


ECOTS


The ground pressed softly against his face, Harry's gaze opening to find bright sunlight streaming down, a blade of grass tickling his nose.

The blade of grass was iridescent white, shimmering in the daylight, the sight startling.

Harry Potter jerked up, looking around frantically, searching for the others, seeing no one. Dumbledore wasn't there. Ron was gone. Tonks was nowhere in sight. Even Black was missing.

As was the pirate ship, the damn horcrux he'd just destroyed.

In the distance was Hogwarts Castle, rising up from the Scottish grounds like an ancient bastion of safety, its stoning gleaming pearly white in the silvery sunlight. Not five meters off lay the Black Lake, but it was no longer black. Instead its waters gleamed an unnatural violet, the surface flickering and moving with an aberrant life.

Nothing was as it should be.

In that instant he knew the truth: he'd died, given his life to destroy that horcrux. That truth daggered through him like the basilisk's venom once had, so very long ago. His green gaze clenched, the wizard no longer feeling a heartbeat within his chest even though he sought it out.

No…the only thing he now felt within his hollow chest was a deep, profound regret. "Kally," he breathed aloud, the warm, pleasant air surrounding him doing nothing to calm him. Kally. The others…he loved them, but Kaylens…

In that damn moment he knew that of all those he cared about, she was the one he couldn't leave behind, yet he had.

He'd known what he was doing, known what he was getting himself into.

Now he'd well and truly left her.

His throat clenched, Harry alone on the Hogwarts grounds. "Kally…I'm sorry…"

And then, to his utmost surprise, the still, uninhabited grounds of this surreal Hogwarts actually answered him: "Hrm…Kally is it?"

The disembodied voice had come from directly behind him.

"You know, Harry, you've got to watch those girls with those names ending in Y. Dated a Sally once. Witch damn near ran me through with a high heel when I forgot about our Hogsmeade date. They tend to be feisty, those girls."

Harry's gaze flew open. That voice….

He didn't move. He just stood there, going stock still, fists clenched along either side of him, Harry almost afraid to look behind him at the impossible voice he'd just heard.

"Well come now, Harry. Is that any way to greet your godfather?"

That was all it took.

He spun around, his lungs suddenly searing as he caught sight of Sirius Black. And unlike the rest of the place he was in, this surreal, unbearably beautiful place whose colors were all muted in favor of shimmering silvers and whites, the ghost of his godfather stood in normal color, looking solid.

He looked glorious.

"Sirius," he blurted. He didn't trust himself. He didn't trust that this wasn't some sort of strange, twisted delusion he was having as a part of the dying process.

The obvious hallucination of his godfather just grinned incorrigibly at him. "Looking a bit slack jawed there, Harry. Your girl snog you senseless or something?"

Harry choked. "Is it really you?"

His godfather, who had been examining his nails with contrived interest, looked up from his very corporeal-looking hand and shot him an offended look. "Well of course it's me. Who were you expecting? Merlin? Perhaps Ghandi?" Padfoot paused, tilting his head like a curious hound. "I never know with you, with that whole 'raised by Muggles thing' you had going on."

Now Harry choked on a laugh.

"Well?" Padfoot demanded, looking somewhat impatient. "You coming over here or not?"

Had Harry not been so certain that he, himself, was dead, he might have drawn his wand and demanded proof that this was Sirius Black, one of the original Marauders, his godfather.

But he didn't. Instead, for just a second, Harry hesitated.

Then the wind blew, Sirius' robes rustling.

Harry launched himself at his godfather, colliding with him hard. It was like he'd become an innocent kid again. His godfather was hugging him, Sirius' arms very, very real as the Azkaban-haunted wizard let out a loud, barking laugh. There was a carefree note in it, something Harry had never heard before when the man had been alive.

The past year melted away.

Padfoot slammed his hand against his back several times before snaring him by the shoulders and shoving him out in front, as if to get a better look at him. A frown instantly crossed his face, as if perplexed. "You grew."

Harry couldn't help but grin, even if a part of him was gutted. He was gutted, because he knew Ron and Hermione were gone. Luna was gone. Remus and Tonks were gone.

And Kally

Harry sniffed, forcing a grin, his voice shockingly hollow. "You died, Padfoot."

Sirius' nearly black eyes looked momentarily surprised, a hint of mischief playing across his prematurely aged features. "Died huh? So that's what I did," he mused, as if the merest concept was unfathomable.

Harry snorted, grabbing a hold of Padfoot's forearms and squeezing him right back. It was good. It was good to see him. It was good that he wasn't fucking alone here.

For a long time Harry Potter and Sirius Black just sadly grinned at each other like fools. Finally the older of the pair, the one that had still died far too young, far before his 40th birthday, breathed in deeply. "Oh Harry, how good it is to see you, only I wish you were not here."

His hands dropped away, Harry's doing the same. The white grass blew around them, the violet lake's surface unaffected by the breeze in abject defiance of the laws of physics.

Harry swallowed hard, looking away from Padfoot at this strange, queer place. "Yeah…where am I, exactly?

"Well isn't it obvious, Harry? Clearly Disneyland."

He couldn't help but snort, shooting Sirius a dry look, to which his godfather merely shrugged, turning a distant eye out over the waters, as if able to see something beyond them that he could not. "This is the waiting room," he said calmly, the jovial note within his tone absent. "It's a place between life and death, for those souls who are not quiet 'gone.'"

Harry blinked, his brow creasing. "So…I am dead."

Sirius' face once again aged. "Regretfully, yes."

Harry's eyes turned out to look over the crystalline waters of the Black Lake, following Sirius' gaze. "So if I'm dead, then why-"

"Isn't it obvious?" Sirius said it as if the answer were the simplest thing in the world. When Harry could only give him a questioning look Sirius shook his head, walking up to the edge of the lake. "Because, Harry," he reiterated, waving a hand, the waters beginning to ripple, "your friends have not given up on you."

Something in his Harry's stomach dropped, his non-existent heart lurching. With foreboding he approached where Padfoot now stood, stopping in the sand, his gaze looking down…

In the shallows now lay an image, like a Muggle movie screen, and he was in it. He was on the ground, Kally bent over him, her glorious hair a dripping wet mess and hanging in his face while Dean pounded on his chest.

They were trying to resuscitate him.

Harry felt like he was being bathed in ice water.

Kally wasn't just losing him; she was witnessing it in the rawest, most acute manner he could imagine.

His throat clenched. "Kally…"

Sirius hrm-ed knowingly.

Harry's hand reached out towards the water. "Can I-?"

Padfoot heaved a heavy sigh. "Unfortunately," he murmured, "that's not up to us." He afforded him a sidelong gaze. "If it was, I would have shoved you back out to the other side the moment I laid eyes on you. But regrettably…it's not up to us." His eyes turned back to the waters, to where Kally appeared to be soundlessly yelling at him, only Harry could not hear a word she said. "It's up to them."

Harry's heart ached as he watched what was unfolding, as he watched the fallout of what he'd caused. He wanted to reach out for her, to comfort her, to hold her.

He wanted to tell her that it would all somehow be okay, even if it were a lie.

Harry swallowed. "So," he forced gruffly, "what do we do?"

He glanced back, only to see that Sirius was already, somehow, sitting. He sat back in the sand, folding his arms behind his head as if relaxing at a casual afternoon picnic. "We wait, see how it plays out. In the meantime…" he waved a hand, a cocktail with a little silver umbrella appearing in it, "we might as well catch up."

His eyes flickered to the cocktail for but a second. "You mean see if I croak or not."

"Don't be so crass, Harry. This being dead thing is not half bad you know. Granted, I'd rather you haved avoided it all together, but…" Padfoot gave him a sad grimace, Harry heaving a sigh, understanding.

He sat begrudgingly down in the sand alongside his father's dead friend. For a long while the two just sat there. It was strange, that for the past year he'd had so many things he'd wanted to ask Padfoot, so many things he'd wanted to tell him, talk to him about, and yet now that he had the chance, the opportunity, he couldn't think of a sodding thing.

All he could think about were the people he was leaving behind.

"Was it hard?" he finally asked, breaking the silence. "Leaving us behind?"

Sirius' voice took on a hardened tone, as if it were hard to speak. "The hardest," he confirmed. "But…there are others here, on the other side, and they made it all just a bit easier." His eyes shifted to Harry, meeting his gaze. "I am sorry for leaving the way I did, Harry. I never-"

He shook his head, shaking the apology off before it began. "It wasn't your fault."

"Still…"

Harry heaved a breath, no longer able to see the pool of water and what was transpiring. He wasn't certain he wanted to.

He was torn. He was torn between staying right here, by Sirius' side, and running to the water's edge to watch, to catch the final few precious glimpses of his girlfriend before she was gone from him forever.

Harry wanted to cry.

He shook the feeling off, breathing roughly. "So," he ground, "if I'm not..crossed over, and I'm not alive, then mind if I ask how you're…"

Sirius inclined an eyebrow. "Here?"

Harry nodded, breathing that he didn't need to do still somehow difficult.

Sirius took a swig of his cocktail. "Bit of a day pass program for good behavior," he told, grinning wolfishly. "Really Harry, even in the afterlife they've got rules. Utterly maddening, that is."

Harry almost laughed. "Leave it to you to complain about the rules."

Sirius sent him a sidelong glance. "If I'm recollecting Harry, you weren't so far behind us when it came to the rule breaking."

Despite himself he shook his head, a tragically bemused grin on his face. Then he remembered, frowning. "My mum and dad?"

Sirius' grin abruptly disappeared. "They wanted to be here, Harry. They did, but they couldn't. Something about a statute of limitations or something." He sighed heavily. "Once you've been here too long, just being near them…you can taint those you come in contact with. They didn't want to risk tipping the scales the wrong way for you." Sirius glanced back out at the water. "Like me, they want you to live, if you can."

Harry swallowed hard.

"Speaking of…that was quite the stunt you pulled, the one that landed you here." The look he sent him clearly indicated that he had questions, Harry unsure of where to start. Everything was so messy, so sodding complicated. Finally he managed a simplistic response.

"We were running out of options," he said lamely, drawing his knees up to his chest, dropping his elbows over them.

Sirius studied him seriously, something sad in his gaze. "You know, Harry," he tried, almost hesitantly broaching the arena, "just because you are out of options, does not mean you need to die."

Harry frowned, glancing at him. "Didn't you once tell me that was why I wasn't in the Order? Because I didn't understand that there are some things worth dying for?"

Padfoot visibly flinched. "Of all the confounded things for you to quote me on," he groused, nudging a foot in the sand. "I do mean that, but…what you did, Harry…there could have been other ways, other routes, one's that perhaps didn't leave your girl crying over what was left of you." He sent him a meaningful look.

Harry just closed his eyes. He couldn't even feel angry at the reprimand. He'd seen no other way, no other option. "She wasn't getting off that island without the horcrux dying," he responded intractably. "I wasn't letting her die just because I was too much of a coward to do what had to be done."

"You are anything but a coward, Harry. Wanting to live does not make you one."

He cracked his gaze, looking at Sirius, but his godfather was already looking back at the water wearing an odd expression.

"Ah well, if it isn't my brother finally putting himself to good use."

Harry followed his gaze to the pool, seeing Regulus over him, but not able to make out what he was doing.

Instead his gaze once again locked onto Kally, his witch clutching onto his black hair as if it were a literal lifeline, her head bowed, shoulders shaking.

"Kaylens…"

Sirius looked up, smirking despite the situation. "Kaylens is it?" he repeated roguishly. He too glanced back at her, right as Dean Thomas wrapped an arm around her. "Really Harry? She's a bit cute for you, isn't she?"

Despite himself, despite how he was watching her break down before him – something he'd never before seen - Harry broke into a strained grin. "Yeah," he said, as if awed. "Yeah…she really is."

Silence lapsed for a long moment. It'd been a long time. Harry wondered why his friends hadn't given up on him yet, Ron having even arrived.

There was no coming back from that long being dead. Even Harry knew that.

"You know," Sirius mused aloud, voice infiltrating his macabre thoughts, "I knew someone else who used to refer to their girl by her surname." He paused meaningfully. "Care to take a guess who?" Padfoot shot him a look that promised pure anarchy, Harry already knowing the answer to it.

He never took his eyes off the water. "I bet mum absolutely loved that" he dryly remarked.

Padfoot just snorted. "Oh, there was only a little bit of light hexing involved."

Harry's mouth turned morosely. "Lucky me," he joked sullenly. "Kally can't hex."

Sirius looked almost surprised for a moment. "Oh really? A Muggle huh?"

"Worse," he confirmed, mouth quirking at the thought. "She's a Reach."

Sirius' eyes widened, before a loud, boisterous and barking laugh broke loose. "Only you, Harry would bag one of those."

Harry snorted in annoyance, folding his arms over his bent knees. "Never said I bagged her."

"Ah but you forget, Harry," Sirius said with a frightening tone, waggling his eyebrows, "we see everything up here."

Harry shot him a mildly horrified look. "Please tell me you didn't-"

Sirius just grinned, once again waggling his eyebrows.

He groaned out loud, before pausing, frowning. "Wait, if you see," he said, making air quotes, "everything, then why all the questions?"

Padfoot shrugged. "Where's the fun in conversing if I act all knowing? Becomes a bit one-sided, doesn't it?"

Harry let out another groan, Sirius only making it worse with his next statement.

"Don't worry, Harry. We didn't watch. We have more class than that. We simply had to confirm based on a bet James and I had placed-"

He balked. "You placed a bet on us?"

"Well of course," he said plainly. "Can't let the Weasley twins have all the fun, now can we?"

Harry found himself making increasingly strangled sounds, but Sirius carried on as if this were the most normal conversation in the world. "So…girlfriend huh? Finally got over that stuttering, foot-in-mouth syndrome you were suffering from then?"

"Not exactly."

"Ah," he affirmed very seriously, "so she's just a witch of infinite patience then."

"Yeah…she is," he mumbled, the sinking realization that he'd never see her again coming back full force. Before he knew it he was on his feet, his legs carrying him to the lake's edge, Harry only able to watch.

His words came out heavy, dead. "I'm never going to see her again, am I?"

Sirius appeared directly by his side, as if by magic, materializing from one spot directly to the next. "Never say never, Harry." He drummed his fingers along his leg, as if hearing a tune that only he was privy to. "Even if you don't make it through this, you will see her again, it just might be awhile."

His fist clenched along his side, Harry wanting nothing more than to get back to her, to get back to them. Seeing Ron alongside her now…that was just making it so much worse.

Merlin…Ron was going to have to tell Hermione.

He didn't want to think about how that would go over.

"You have me thinking, Harry…the way you've been talking…" Padfoot paused, looking contemplative, like he was planning a particularly complicated prank or break-in to the Ministry. "You're in love with this girl, aren't you?"

Harry's expression grew strained, his eyes fixated upon her as if she were the last bit of sunlight he'd ever see.

"Yeah Padfoot, I am." Swallowing, he forced, "I really am."

His godfather just smiled kindly, dropping a hand onto his shoulder. "Then do me a favor, Harry…if you get back, don't wait as long as Prongs did. Make sure she knows." He fixed him with a firm look. "Make sure she really knows. Never know when you might wind up back here, if you understand what I'm saying."

Harry's jaw clenched, but he nodded. "If I get back," he affirmed, "that's not going to be a problem." It wasn't. He'd make sodding plans with her. He'd make unbelievably sodding specific plans with her, and he'd make damn sure she knew how he felt.

Too bad he was dead.

There was no coming back from that.

"You know," Sirius mused aloud, "if you do live, she's going to be quite cross with you."

"Cross?" Harry repeated, a strange look crossing his face. "No. She's going to kick my ass."

Padfoot snorted. "That's how you know you've got a good one."

Harry did. He did have a good one. Only now he didn't, because he'd left her. He'd promised that he would not go anywhere, and yet…

He'd done exactly that.

His breathing was coming harder, faster, as if he could hyperventilate himself back into existence. "I feel like…I feel like we should be talking about something else," he finally said. "The war. How to win it. Something."

Padfoot's hand squeezed his shoulder. "We are talking," he stated calmly, "about the most important things." He eyed him meaningfully. "It's what is the most important to you. That's what you see at the end of your life. The Muggles almost had it right, it's just not in some white tunnel, and it's not a movie. Instead it's more like…" he gestured at the grounds, "well it's more like this, with a conversation."

Harry's chest lurched with the realization.

Kaylens, somehow, had become the most important thing to him.

"Padfoot…"

"I know, Harry," he assured. "But you will see her again."

There was nothing else for them to do. All Harry could do was wait. So that's what he did, side-by-side with his godfather, Padfoot's arm draped over his shoulders, squeezing him to his side, as they waited for his friends to finally stop, so he could finally die.

Thing was, he didn't want to.

He wanted to go back.

He wanted to be with her.

But he knew he couldn't, so Harry silently pled to every god in existence that she'd somehow know what he wanted, since he'd never gotten the chance to say it.

That was when he noticed something about the image, about those in the water's reflection: he noticed one missing.

"Sirius," he asked, a feeling of foreboding swelling up, "where's Dumbledore?"

"Ah, that," Sirius stated, as if he'd been expecting the question. "Well that would appear to be the question of the day, wouldn't it?" Then he looked around 'the waiting room' as if expecting him to appear at any second. The thing was…

Dumbledore was not there.

Instead he was nowhere.

Harry wondered if he could pull the same trick, if only to get back to Kaylens, if he only tried hard enough.


ECOTS


This was hell.

Her fingers slipped through his impossibly unruly hair, no signs of life in him. Kally had never felt so gutted, so hollow.

She needed him. She needed him to come back. Her lips lowered to his ear, whispering a plea she could only pray he'd hear. "Please…you impossible King of Idiocy," she murmured, the name she'd bestowed on him months ago in the heart of Hogsmeade, "please come back."

Only he didn't.

Instead time passed. One-by-one the others arrived, swimming up, Tonks and Professor Gai floating up with a makeshift raft. Tonks took one look at what was happening and made a sound similar to the one Kally had made.

Professor Gai looked distraught.

"How bad is it?" he questioned, obviously to Regulus.

The Potion's Master merely continued to work without stopping. "If he were a Muggle," he stated deadenly, "we would have already declared him."

"What-what does that mean?" Tonks questioned with immediacy, but Kally's eyes had already closed. She knew what that meant. She was a Muggle.

"It means they'd say he was dead," she choked, gaze flickering open, eyes burning. "It-it's what they do when they stop trying to revive someone." She'd seen emergency shows with her brothers and had heard that phrase. The idea of it being applied to Harry…

She bit down hard on her lower lip, wiggling her fingers between Harry's. She had her face down alongside his, her lips brushing his ear in another quiet threat. "Potter please…please…you're the only one asides from Dean I can stand." Eyes closing, pressing her lips against the side of his head, she desperately pled, "Don't leave me."

She could hear Tres speaking in the background, asking Dean for his hand. He cast something, some sort of spell, Dean's hand sizzling loudly and her friend screaming.

She barely noticed.

Despite Regulus' prior, harsh words he did not stop wizarding CPR. Kally didn't know how long passed. She just knew how sick she felt, bile rising in her throat, her stomach twisting, clenching, churning. It felt like something was inside her chest and squeezing her own heart in a vice. She felt like she couldn't breathe, the thought of losing Harry…

He was strong. Regulus would get him back. He wouldn't leave her.

Regulus suddenly went still, his hands no longer squeezing, pumping.

Her head darted up, Kally unaware of everyone around them as she stared at him. Professor Gai was frowning, shaking his head. Regulus just looked resigned, his dark gaze fixed on his unmoving patient.

Gradually, as if in slow motion, he lowered his hands away from where they'd been placed over Harry's chest, the cord of light connecting his hands with Harry's chest flickering out with a sudden pop.

"No," Kally whispered, already knowing. "Just…just no." She was squeezing onto Harry's hand hard, like that would somehow connect to his heart and force it to work again.

Regulus just met her gaze emotionlessly, a peculiar expression on his face. "If it has not restarted by now," he said in a deadened tone, "then his heart is too damaged." The wizard sucked in a harsh breath, looking down at him. A shadow, as if he were affected passed across his faced.

"He was without oxygen for too long."

From behind her Luna made an incredibly heartbroken sound, Kally letting out a choked noise. "No!" A morning breeze gusted past, sending her wet hair swirling around her face. "Harry, he-" racking her mind, Kally was shaking her head. "No. He can heal, he can-"

"No one can heal from that," Professor Gai said gently, wincing where he sat, his broken leg drug up onto the rocks awkwardly. "I am so sorry."

Kally sucked in a shuddering breath, her head shaking in silent refuting. "You don't-you don't get it. You don't understand!" Kally was moving, grabbing onto Harry's shoulder, looking around her for the first time desperately. "Where's Professor Dumbledore? Harry can heal. He can explain."

It was only then that she noticed the looks everyone was giving her, and the heavy absence of the Headmaster.

Kally felt like she'd been hit in the chest all over again.

Not a single person offered her a word, instead many just lowered their eyes. Fred didn't though – he held her gaze, a grimace on his face. "Kal…"

Kally knew without them having to say it. She quickly moved from that thought back to Harry, rounding on Regulus, desperate. "He's bonded with a phoenix," she relayed swiftly, not caring what she divulged in her desperation. "He can heal. It just takes time. His heart, I'm sure it can-"

Professor Gai blinked in astonishment, the sudden glistening in his eyes looking startled. "He's what?"

Her fingers squeezed onto Harry's. They were wasting time talking about this – Harry needed air! "He's bonded to a phoenix. To Professor Dumbledore's phoenix! He has phoenix tears in him. He can heal. It just takes a bit sometimes. If you just-"

Her hoarse entreating died brokenly on her lips, eyes flickering desperately over Regulus.

"Please," she whispered. "I've seen it."

Regulus Black looked between her and Potter, as if suddenly understanding something. He hesitated…

Then with a curse he recast the spell, the magical cord re-forming between his hands and Harry's chest, the wizard beginning to magically massage Harry's heart once more.

Regulus' eyes still held onto hers. "This is temporary," he growled. "If he doesn't come around…"

Kally wet her lips, trying to speak. "He will." Fawkes…Fawkes had seen to it. He had to heal. He had to, otherwise what was the point?

Time passed….

Harry needed to heal faster.

Kally was shaking worse, Dean coming behind her, his arm wrapping around her shoulders, hugging her against his side as she let out a broken sob. She didn't remember making that noise. Instead she just remained right where she was, her fingertips brushing against Harry's unshaven cheek, his body moving ever-so-slightly with the spells Regulus had cast upon him.

It was like watching Bill be revived, only with less shaking, less violence. The wizarding methods were far more effective, far less brutal.

An indeterminable time passed by. At some point Ron had reached them, the wizard staring with open shock at the scene. He stood there, hovering above them and dripping wet, massive amounts of blood that did not belong to him smeared across his mouth and neck, tufts of red fur still present all over his arms. It was like he'd forgotten how to fully transform in light of what he was seeing.

Something – a knife – clattered onto the barrier, dropping from Ron's hand. Later Kally would find out that Ron had been sent to retrieve it – it'd belonged to his brother. Now though…

Regulus' dark eyes were firmly fixed onto Harry, a look of the utmost consternation tainting his face.

"What's his rhythm?" Professor Gai finally probed, sounding hesitant.

Nothing in Regulus' face changed. "Still asystole."

"So no movement…"

Regulus shot him a dour look. "Clearly, because I would persist in wasting my time rubbing the indolent's heart if it was, rather than shocking it into doing the work on its own."

The DADA Professor winced.

Tres looked towards first Ron, then her. Kally felt like her throat was burning. "I'm sorry, Kalliandra, Ron…but after all this time…it's not-it's still not working."

Now it was Tonks who made a tormented sound.

Regulus Black just continued hand pumping Harry's heart, using magic. His brow creased, as if deep in thought. He looked like he was about to stop again.

"You can't be thinking-" Ron croaked. "You can't stop. You just have to get his heart beating again. Can't you just zap him or something?" He sounded numb.

Professor Gai gently cut him off. "Ronald…it's not that simple. We need Harry's heart to twitch for defibrillation to work. But it's not. Right now…it's up to him."

The movements of Regulus' hands on Harry's heart sped up, as if trying a different rhythm might work.

"We can't force it…" Tres' hollow words hung on the air. "Even wizarding magic…it has its limits."

"Tres," Regulus stated emotionless, "what timing do you have?"

"Forty."

Kally's chest knifed. She pulled abruptly away from Dean to get closer to him. She buried her face against Harry's unruly black hair, her entire form trembling.

"Forty is too long," Regulus stated, shaking his head.

Kally's head shot up, her heart out-of-control. "No…no it's not." Kally's fingers suddenly dug into Harry's shoulders. Forty minutes. Forty minutes. She knew from class that wizards could survive longer than Muggles without air. They didn't get brain damaged as easily. They had a few more minutes. They had to.

They'd started giving him air as soon as they'd pulled him out of the water. His brain was fine. They just…they had to help his heart.

Her lips parted to tell them exactly that, but Tres saw her, shaking his head. "Typically Muggle adults are worked on for ten minutes, twenty if we push it…wizards…only a bit longer…"

Kally was certain her eyes were on fire.

Ron Weasley reached out a hand, grabbing onto Harry's shoulder with her, a malevolent glare directed at their professor, as if daring him to say it again.

Neville spoke. "You said," he articulated slowly, as if coming up with an argument, "wizards can live indefinitely with wizarding CPR in class. It gives them normal blood flow. They don't get brain damaged after awhile like they would with Muggle CPR, right?" The Gryffindor fixed both Tres and Regulus with a questioning grimace, as if challenging them to tell him he was wrong.

Kally wanted to hug him, or kiss him, or something.

"Yeah," Ron grunted, his grip tightening onto his friend. "What Nev said."

Regulus remained focused on his task, his hands movements slowing, another rhythm being tried.

Professor Gai just shook his head slowly, looking sad. "Neville…you're right, but artificially sustaining life isn't life. You cannot keep someone alive like this forever."

Ron's hand slipped over hers, squeezing so hard it physically hurt. Harry's hard, muscular shoulder was beneath her palm. She knew what he looked like, what he felt like. Harry couldn't...

She couldn't finish even the thought.

Harry had told her she wasn't allowed to die. He'd told her he needed her, so he had something to look forward to after everything was finished.

And now he was doing this.

Now he was laying on these cold black rocks, as if he didn't care that he was letting himself die.

Kally's gaze flickered desperately across his too-still face, air still hissing in and out of his water-free lungs thanks to Regulus. They needed his heart to twitch…

"Perhaps…" Regulus stated, hands slowing further.

Kally's heart stopped working right. Her eyes flew up, moving back and forth between Tres and Regulus. "So that's it?" Her words came out on a barely audible whisper. She couldn't speak louder. She was trying. "You need his heart to twitch to save him?" Her whispered words sounded like she was being strangled.

Regulus turned his attention from Harry's chest to eye her. "Yes." His hands continued their work, as if reluctant, the glowing red rubber band linking his hands and Harry's chest remaining like a literal, visible lifeline. "What you did before would not work," he submitted, as if predicting what she was thinking. "What you did to the Weasley would fry what was left of his cardiac muscle fibers. He would certainly die from it."

Kally wanted to scream.

She couldn't.

"We need to stop soon," Regulus stated, meaning clear.

Ron growled something carnal, Kally flipping her hand around and giving Ron's a squeeze, rolling her shoulder out from under Dean's grip.

She didn't want anyone touching her for this.

Harry was dying.

They couldn't let him.

Harry's words from barely a week prior flitted through her mind.

"You're going to have to suck it the hell up and try to live."

Kally closed her eyes, wind tousling her wet hair in a way eerily reminiscent of the way Harry so often did. He couldn't die. He couldn't.

"Otherwise I'm going to have to find a way to bring you back, and believe me I will, and when I do I'm going to be pissed."

Kally could have sobbed. Placing her palms flat against his chest, on opposite sides of the magical link that was keeping his heart temporarily beating by force alone, taking care not to touch it for fear she'd break it, she concentrated.

Slowly, unbelievably slowly she felt her own pulse quickening, her breaths coming swifter. Her fingertips flexed against his pectorals, his wet shirt clinging to him as she tried to concentrate.

She needed him.

He was dying.

Harry couldn't die; all she was capable of doing was killing things. But with Bill...

She could play with electricity, with life energy.

Maybe she could do the reverse.

Besides her, Ron went unbelievably still. A pressure begin to build up within her ears, the air around her growing cold as she breathed in. Desperately she tried to feel, tried to concentrate, her breaths growing even quicker, swifter.

Dean scrambled back on the rocks, grabbing Ron by the back of his shirt and hauling him with him. Tonks too moved, a protective arm placed in front of Luna as she urged the girl several steps backwards. Even Fred and Neville shifted back, foam from a breaking wave rolling over the black stones.

Regulus and Tres alone remained right where they were, but Kally didn't notice them.

A tingling had begun on her skin, Regulus' hands continuing their resuscitative work as she felt tiny bits of static electricity tickling her hands. Then, like before, like always she reached.

Golden pinpricks of light rolled over her pale skin, sliding down onto Harry's chest, sliding in….

Kally couldn't explain how she did it. She still didn't know. She could sense life forces: the dead, the living, those somewhere in between…

The hollowness of Harry, the cold of him struck her stomach in a way she was ill prepared for. He was gone. He was nearly gone. Only the most miniscule remnants of life remained within him, left only due to Regulus' efforts.

Harry was trying to leave.

Like hell he was….

Kally tried to snare onto that, trying to find his heart, only…

There was something else, something unnatural, something that hurt to even brush up against. It was like she was going through his sodding soul, only to brush past something very much alive, very much malevolent.

Inside Harry lay something dark, something undeniably angry.

It was worse than the inferi.

As soon as she touched it all she could feel was hateful, burning rage.

Kally nearly recoiled, nearly screamed-

She was hyperventilating, breathing too fast. She didn't know that Dean was suddenly snapping that they had to interrupt her, stop her. She didn't know that the golden light was completely enveloping her hands and wrists, sliding across Harry's chest, neck, face like water. She didn't know how ashen gray she was suddenly becoming, her lips turning cyanotic.

The thing inside Harry was trying to stop her. It was trying to distract her. It wanted Harry dead. It wanted Harry dead so it could use what was left of him as a permanent vessel. She could feel this, she could feel a hissing….

Kally's head screamed, throbbing. It was like she felt something burning.

Suddenly Kally knew what it was: she could feel the horcrux, and its raw, undiluted anger as she tried to save him. It didn't want that. It wanted him dead.

It was pure, unadulterated rage.

Kally could feel it. She could feel it separate from him. For a second, but a moment, she was distracted. Harry couldn't live if the horcrux lived, but the horcrux…it could easily live without him, in the hollow shell that remained.

She was weakening. She wanted to kill it. She wanted to kill it here and now. Hell, she could touch it. All it would take was a squeeze, a fight, but…

She wouldn't have the energy to help Harry then.

She fought past it, struggling, searching, and then…

She felt Harry. She felt him still there, lingering, but barely. She felt how he couldn't breathe. She felt how his pulse needed to beat. She felt how he was trying.

The thing that had been trying to force him to leave was the horcux.

She ignored that thing and focused. Pinpricks of life energy poured through her fingers into his chest, Kally finally finding his heart. It was still, too still. She let the pinpricks of energy caress his cardiac fibers. They were not firing, they were not doing anything. They just lay there, dead, Regulus mechanically squeezing them.

Snuffing the life out of something was never easy. But pushing it back in

Kally's entire form was shaking, her mind screaming. Her energy caressed the fibers of Hary's heart as carefully as a lover, the caresses growing desperate, needing the longer they failed to respond. She needed the fibers to feel her urgency. She needed them to work, to fire on their own, to do something.

She had to be careful; she couldn't force them. They had to twitch on their own.

She let the life energy caress over them, hoping desperately that they would move…

They didn't. They remained preternaturally still, dead.

That thing within Harry, that malevolent, horrible thing laughed.

Kally felt her own heart barely beating now; it was skipping, stuttering…

There was nothing left in Harry to force his heart to beat, to make it even so much as twitch; not with that horrible thing in him. It was like an opportunistic parasite; the second Harry had gotten too weak to live, it'd killed him.

That thing wasn't the only thing that could kill. Kally excelled at it. She was good at transferring energy in less than nice ways.

There was a moment of calm clarity as she desperately tried to breath, where she suddenly knew how to help.

Suddenly the light rolled over her, attacking her chest, tiny points of energy from her own heart being pulled indelicately out of her cardiac fibers and forced into his. Kally poured every bit of energy she could into him, her own muscle stuttering, faltering. Her chest clenched painfully, like something was squeezing her own heart as hard as it could. It felt ready to burst.

At some point blood had begun to run from her nose, down to her lips, the coppery taste upon her tongue unnoticed.

And then she felt it…

One of the muscle fibers in Harry's heart twitched.

And then another.

And another.

The dark, horrible thing within Harry screamed in anger-

Suddenly she felt his entire heart begin violently twitching, spasming, a great shot of energy shooting back and through her.

Kally's vision swam with black, the Reach collapsing backwards, someone grabbing her-

She had enough energy left in her as she desperately tried to breathe, her own heart still skipping, beating irregularly, to see Regulus' stunned expression.

Then he was shocking Harry with a spell. His body jerked, spine arching off the rocks…

The conjured hologram of Harry's heart, the one hovering at the end of the rubber band of red light, the one that Regulus' hands had been rubbing, suddenly began to move.

It was no longer twitching.

Instead it was beating, and it was beating with regularity.

A faint smile touched Kally's lips.

Then she passed the hell out in Dean's arms.