A/N: Warning of character death ahead - and some depictions of violence. The final showdown has begun.

Chapter 35 - "If not three, then seven." - Part III

Reality hit at breakfast time the following morning. Harry was walking along with Severus, heading up to the Great Hall to eat with his friends when a large barn owl came soaring toward them, Hooting loudly and landing on Severus' shoulder. Severus untied the message from the large bird's leg while Harry fished out a lone owl treat from his pocket-locker, hearing the clinking of the tubes of Smell 'Em Coming potion as he did so. Something instinctive told him to take one. He passed the treat to the bird and slung his head back to swallow the potion.

"We need to get over to Borgin and Burkes," Severus said.

Harry flashed a look at the older wizard, realizing the older wizard was speaking those words into his message through the coin to the others. Severus met Harry's eyes with his grim ones.

"Harry, you must be quite vigilante this morning. I'm tempted to insist you return to our quarters, but I honestly believe you should stay with your peers to be on the lookout for danger."

Harry blinked. Our quarters... Then, hang on… am I considered part of the team? Brilliant! Then, hang on… "What did that letter say?"

Severus dismissed the owl, which took off and soared back toward the stairwell that Harry and Severus were approaching.

"Ministry Law Enforcement was called to a major disturbance in downtown London about an hour ago, one that involved severe injuries to numerous muggles, and compromised our secrecy as a hidden society," Severus told Harry. His hand was on Harry's neck as they continued briskly along. "That is a Death Eater ploy, designed to thin the Ministry's defensive reserves by creating a mess that requires all available hands, while an even worse criminal event is taking place elsewhere." They took the stairs two at a time. "We must intercept that cabinet in Knockturn Alley."

"And while you three of the squad are off doing that, I'll be doing what, exactly?" Harry asked carefully.

"You'll go about your normal routine, but be prepared for anything, Harry." Severus said as they crested the top of the stairs. He surprised Harry when he dropped heavy hands onto both of Harry's shoulders, and lowered his head to hold eye contact again. "You must be very vigilant, and you must keep us posted through the coin."

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Harry was halfway through his bowl of oatmeal, when the scent of skunk caught his attention. It was faint and thready, reminding him that he'd smelled this same concentration at Gringott's that day that Lucius had taken guardianship, but hadn't actually seen an enemy. It must mean one or more are close by, INSIDE the castle. He reached for his coin and palmed his wand. The squad had only been gone for perhaps thirty minutes. He had no idea how long they would need to accomplish their goal.

Harry put his wand to the coin, to send his update message, but his scar suddenly exploded with searing, agonizing pain. Oh no… he just knew that his life was now in the most jeopardy he'd ever faced. There was definitely another horcrux nearby, probably two. The pain was as bad as when Harry had directly encountered Voldemort himself.

They're coming for me! was all he was able to message into the coin before his instincts told him to jump to his feet.

He looked around with squinting eyes for McGonagall, and found her watching him with comprehension as he stumbled towards the doorway to the professors' private passage. He had to get away from the rest of the student body! People could get hurt, just for being in the wrong place at the right time. Harry tried and failed to stifle the thoughts screaming through his mind as he jogged unevenly. Either way, I'm going to die… If they have to kill me, to use my scar horcrux to bring Him back, I'm done… If I don't have to die, and they can still resurrect him, he'll kill me first thing. He knows he has to, and won't be stupid enough to waste another chance this time!

Not a second after he'd finished that thought, a very familiar, very reviled voice magically projected throughout every corridor in the school: "HARRY POTTER! REPORT TO THE SCHOOL'S ENTRANCE IMMEDIATELY!"

"That was bloody Dolores Umbridge!" Several voices yelled loudly from within the Great Hall in a frantic chorus of concern.

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Lucius took the lead once the three of them POPPED simultaneously into the cobbled street in front of Borgin and Burkes. He knew the counter charms that dismantled B&B's warding from a previous occasion of having held a meeting to recruit new Death Eaters. Donald Borgin had entrusted Lucius with secret access to his family's store.

"Persolvo!" Lucius whispered as he forcefully casted the charm to unravel the intricate warding of the store's entrance. "Alohomora."

And they were in. Lucius darted to the back of the store, back to where Wormtail had held the boys the previous week. Sure enough, there was a tall structure sitting among several bookcases. A discarded cloth covering that had served to make it appear to be in storage, had clearly recently been tossed aside to the floor.

Lucius faced Severus and Remus, as each registered this reality, and as their coins vibrated with a message from Harry.

"Oh, Merlin," Remus said with raw fear coloring his tone. "They've already started their assault!"

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There were shouts of alarm, scrapes of benches, clamoring of tableware as it fell to the floor. Everyone was in motion behind him as Harry darted through the doorway. His vision bleary and scar pain raging, Harry started to race down the corridor, thinking only of putting distance between himself and the rest of the school. Numerous students had apparently decided they should follow him, and he realized belatedly that a long train of them was running behind him. He stopped and spun around, holding his hands up, eye's pleading for them to halt. He pressed the heel of one hand against his scar as if it would help the blinding pain, and with his free hand, he held a finger to his lips. The group of a dozen of his peers grew silent and still, all eyes on him.

"She's going to be more powerful than you remember, and far more dangerous and cruel," Harry rasped at them in a whisper, now recognizing that the entire group was fifth years from all houses, all DA members. "Listen to me very carefully! If you have to fight, cast the broadest shields you can. It's very important that you don't let their magic get past your shields. Others around you will get hurt too if you don't help."

Pain drove him to bend down to brace his hands on his knees. Merlin, it was blinding. This is bloody awful. People could die, right here in school- STOP! Harry warned himself. He gulped and forced all thoughts from his mind that didn't pertain to dealing with the matter at hand.

He took a long, shaky breath, as what sounded like a large mob of antagonistic, jeering dark wizards made its way along the upper level, toward the staircases that opened into the Grand Entrance. They were very close by, and making a lot of noise. There had to be at least twenty of them….

Snapping back to reality, Harry whispered more loudly now, "You have to help the teachers protect the others who won't know what to do!"

They could all hear the teachers barking orders at the students to shelter beneath the tables. Younger years were beginning to bawl in terror. McGonagall called for all professors to cast an Enclosure Shield immediately, and at least a dozen voices yelled nearly simultaneously: "CLAUSTRA SEPTRA!"

Harry made a pushing gesture. "Go! Go back! You won't be able to help me! You're safer within those wards!" This time he yelled it, because the noise from the invasion was so loud he wasn't sure his peers would hear him otherwise.

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Dolores Umbridge had reached the top of the stairwell closest to the corridor where Harry was now a sitting duck. She pressed the tip of her wand to her voice box. "HARRY POTTER! REPORT TO THE SCHOOL'S ENTRANCE IMMEDIATELY!" She bellowed again, and damned if she didn't add a righteous, "HEM HMMM!"

Harry gulped as he watched his peers retreat. He took a long breath. His best bet was to try to fly over the heads of all of these invaders, and attempt to lead them away from the student body.

He was scared now. Very scared.

SHITE!

His fingers found his coin. A message had come through, but he'd missed it. He pressed his wand tip against it and whispered. "Lots of intruders in the Grand Entrance. All of the students and teachers are trapped in the Great Hall." He watched until his words began to cycle through their loop on the coin, then pocketed it again.

Harry focused on his palms and soles, felt the tingling in his hands, but kept his wand in hand to use while flying. He took a quick inhale of breath, and as he exhaled calmly, spun on his arched left foot to launch himself into flight.

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Severus, Lucius, and Remus each took a turn climbing into the cabinet. For each, the journey consisted of being shaken and shook like a multi-faceted muggle martini. The cabinet seemingly danced a jig, before booting the unfortunate wizard into a portal, which volleyed him through a long length of dark, spiraling centrifugal force, and finally into the base level of the sister cabinet. Severus landed in a crouch, and quickly scrambled out of the cabinet's confines, finding signs of a recent gathering in the form of discarded firewhiskey bottles, crisp wrappers, and even a mitten.

He scowled as he stepped away to make space for his shortly arriving partners. His eyes swept around the room, taking in more signs of destruction, the likes of which certainly had resulted from the overinflated egos of a group of dangerous idiots, come to put on a show for their Dark Lord.

This is not good.

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Harry could hear his schoolmates yelling in fear and his professors yelling for them to stay still and quiet. He was hovering up near the ceiling of the Grand Entrance, high above Dolores Umbridge. She was poised to descend the staircase. His vision was compromised by his squinting eyes, which was the only way he could concentrate on not screaming in pain. The horcrux is here.

He struggled to spot it, blinking and grimacing and squinting and searching. Where the bloody hell is it?

There!

Umbridge wore a very old, very delicate, jeweled headpiece that looked to Harry like a tiara. It definitely was made for a smaller, nicer head than that old cow's. And Umbridge's wasn't the only familiar face he was seeing… Harry's stomach churned as he first heard, and then spotted Pius Thicknesse. His heart rate was through the roof already, but then he saw that the orange trio of LeStranges was among the masses as well.

Bugger!

But there was a strange dynamic going on between Bellatrix and Dolores. Each seemed to think she was in charge. Hmmm, who would win in a battle of wands? Bellatrix or Dolores? Snarky reflections aside, Harry's magic was failing, and his hopes of thinking of a way to get the diadem off the former DADA professor's head were quickly dashed.

In fact, Harry was losing consciousness.

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"Where is that awful boy?" Dolores demanded impatiently as she took the stairs down to the first level, stepping regally, as any woman of beauty and stature should do, while wearing such a beautiful symbol of omnipotence upon her head. Dolores already knew she had formidable power of her own, but with this lovely artifact on her crown, she felt invincible. She'd already sparred with the Stained Bellatrix LeStrange, and had bested the pathetic criminal. The Dark Lord will certainly see me as the wiser choice to be his new First Advisor.

She was impatient to find The Boy Who Lived, and trap him, so that Lord Voldemort could kill him, finally. Then, the rest of them could get back to the business of purging the muggle threat from wizarding society. That was all she wanted. It was quite simple, really.

Nearly there.

The former High Inquisitor stepped down from the last step, just as Bellatrix crowed her intolerable, cackling laugher, and sent a ZIP of translucent yellow magic above Dolores' head. There was a yelp of pain, followed by the plummeting form of an adolescent wizard, soaring downward, and nearly colliding with the floor, before curving into a very sharp turn at the last possible second and seemingly reversing his flight to an upward trajectory.

Ah, there he is. Dolores smiled her prettiest, most princess-like smile as she flicked her wand and delightfully casted, "Arresto momentum," and then, "Incarcerus maximus."

But Bellatrix raced down the last of the stairs from behind Dolores, shoving past her, and quickly used her wand again, releasing Harry from the ropes that were wrapped so completely around him he was nearly mummified. Harry barely had time to take a breath, and would likely have let out a bellow of pain, now that he was in even closer proximity to the horcrux, but Bellatrix was already on to the next installment of this terrifying drama.

"Laedo letalis!" She screeched, hitting Harry with a spell that put him into a silent stupor. "Levicorpus," she said more calmly, using her wand to raise the disabled boy-hero into the air, where he would hover for the next stage of their ceremony. To Dolores Umbridge she seethed, "We never damage a sacrificial body until we've taken what we need, you idiot."

"Hehmm hmmm!" Dolores erupted, straining to hold her temper. She tossed her head. Never mind Bellatrix! We've all that we need to resurrect the Dark Lord! She raised her head and squared her shoulders triumphantly, casting a glance through the grand, arching doorway into the Great Hall, where the entire student body, along with all of those besotted professors, were currently bearing witness to this monumental event. She raised her wand.

"Bombarda."

The force of her power had expanded tenfold with the help of her little diadem, and the translucent barrier that the professors had erected shattered, like glass, and dropped dramatically to the floor, in shard-like pieces that disappeared seconds after landing.

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McGonagall rushed to put herself between the doorway and the students, wand at the ready to defend them. Professors and DA members rushed forward as well. They stayed within the Great Hall, wands raised, chests heaving with agitated, terrified breathing, waiting to defend themselves and each other.

Two of the wizard invaders took that as an invitation to have some fun, and sent a few lethal hexes at the students, who seemed to think they could handle themselves in combat.

"Sectum sempra!"

"Abelmaim pugna!"

"Punire!"

To both wizards' surprise, all three of the young wizards they'd targeted managed to successfully shield themselves with a containment shield.

"Pfffft. They're too young to know that much magic!"

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Dolores was impressed by the wandwork being implemented in the clearing beside her. The orange LeStrange brothers were conjuring and designing a very large box-like structure, made entirely of granite, with room enough for a throne-like chair inside, which Dolores would sit upon for the ceremony that was about to begin.

"In you go, love," Rabastan LeStrange said to Madam Umbridge, gallantly sweeping his arm to gesture her inside to her special seat.

Dolores let out a happily giggled, "Hemm hemm!" and carefully stepped onto the granite slab that formed the bottom of the box, which was like taking a seat on a stage in her mind. She sat gingerly in the regal chair. It wasn't as comfortable as one would have expected, and she fussed with propping herself more carefully. She jumped slightly when Bellatrix yelped out another one of her vicious hexes.

"Sanguis siphonis!" Bella's wand was pointed at Harry Potter, and it slashed sharply to the left, inducing a muted grunt of yet more pain from the hovering boy wizard. Then, quick as a whip, the orange witch flung her wand back toward Dolores, sending a substantial measure of Potter's blood in a red streak through the air…..

….which landed with a loud SPLAT on Dolores' face.

"Silencio!" Rabastan chirped, flicking his wand and landing the charm on the startled former High Inquisitor, and newest loyal servant to Lord Voldemort, before she could counter.

"Ferox ignis!" Bellatrix screamed dramatically, inducing an ERRUPTION of very hot, very fierce flame within the confines of the box.

"Lapsus clausa!" That was from the other male LeStrange, Rodolfus, who casted the spell that closed the granite box tightly shut.

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Severus Disillusioned himself, and flew directly into the aerial view of the Resurrection Ceremony underway in the Grand Entrance. The enormous snake familiar of the Dark Lord also made her appearance, straight through the front doors of the school, adding exponential menace to the already extraordinarily perilous plight of those who did not yearn for a return of Lord Voldemort.

His heart was in his throat as his worst nightmare played out before his eyes. Severus had felt the tension from the diadem as he'd watched the Umbridge witch strut around, thinking she was the next in line for the throne. Well…indeed she was. His default defense mechanism of reverting to disdain-filled narrative kept him from making a costly mistake. Harry was being held captive, and appeared to be in a weakened, if not badly injured state, again. It was not yet time to act.

As the LeStranges trapped and sealed Madam Umbridge within their granite box, Severus recognized the makings of a ritual he'd read about, but was not known to have been attempted before now. They'd combined the diadem horcrux, the sacrifice of a loyal servant, and the blood of "shared life," and trapped these within a vessel filled with Fiendfyre. As the first BOOMS and POPS of the conflagration within sounded off, Severus felt an abrupt relief from the tension. The diadem has been destroyed.

But the enormous snake induced that same tension an instant later, as she writhed in a frenzy on the open floor in front of the large, granite box. She knows what's underway.

What would emerge next would be a newly resurrected Lord Voldemort, and Severus couldn't bear for Harry to be anywhere in the vicinity. Unfortunately, he still could see no way to help the young wizard, and knew he could end up dead in a failed attempt, leaving Harry to perish even still. He clenched his jaw against the desperate fear surging through his veins.

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Lucius and Remus emerged from the Room of Requirement to find themselves confronted at wandpoint by aurors Tonks and Dawlish, who'd barely survived the invasion of dark wizards that had moments earlier stormed through this same passage.

"We had to disillusion ourselves!" Tonks admitted in disgust. She looked Remus over, as if needing to see for herself that he was unharmed thus far. "There were too many of them. We've sent off our Patroni to summon more help, but that disaster in London has the entire Auror Force already engaged."

"Albus has been conspicuously silent as well," Remus added. "Something is simply off about the duration of his absence. He was to have joined us by now."

"We need to get down to the Great Hall to help with the students," Lucius urged, the fierce thrill of terror for his son, and for Harry, and of course for all of the others, was threatening to consume him. An idea struck suddenly and he slapped his forehead. "When in peril, do as Harry Potter would do! Summon a house elf. Aflie!" He bowed to the small elf from Malfoy Manor when she popped into the fifth floor corridor. "I need your help with transporting me within the castle. You must be very careful for your own safety." He took her hand. "I'll send her back for the rest of you shortly."

Remus checked his coin and finally saw a response from Albus:

I've been trapped….. in the Floo Network,….. have not yet found passage….. to a stable landing….. I've instructed Fawkes to….. respond to your….. calls for aide… Godspeed.

"Merlin, preserve us." Remus muttered grimly. "FAWKES!"

Then, a missive from Severus came through, just as the beautiful phoenix familiar of Albus Dumbledore popped into the space above Remus and landed on his shoulder.

They're resurrecting Him as….. I send this. We….. need to destroy the….. horcruxes in the Chamber….. NOW!

Remus sent a message of his own: Leave that to me.