A/N: The bad news is: I had to split the battle into two chapters. The good news is: they're both finished. One more chapter and this is all over!
As always, a HUGE thank you to i was botwp for the advice and encouragement!
Chapter Twenty-Three: To Lead the Charge
May 2005
Ruins of Malfoy Manor
Lucius stood next to her, mumbling and waving his wand about as if it would do any good. Did he think she wouldn't be able to feel it, if it were indeed buried in these ruins? Rodolphos stumbled around among the burnt timbers, the singed pages of destroyed books swirling around in the breeze. Both of them were complete imbeciles.
"It's not here," she ground out.
They must have seen something in her face, for the in next moment, both of them had Disapparated. Bellatrix slid into her alternate form and wreaked hell and flames on the last of the Malfoy's ancestral home.
The girl was an aberration. No witch with such filthy blood should be able to accomplish so much. The last of the Order was hidden away at that fucking school, once again made Unplottable and invisible by the mudblood. Shacklebolt was the official leader, but Bellatrix knew from whence the real power came.
There was something inside the girl, something that terrified Bellatrix down to her bones. She had seen it in the girl's eyes the night she had branded her as muddy filth and later, as she had tried to break her mind with Unforgivable Curses. It had been enough to seduce poor, unstable Dolphie. And now it appeared she had turned Cissy and Draco as well, her baby sister fleeing into the enemy camp with Bellatrix's most precious possession.
Truth and fantasy were hard to separate, but Bellatrix knew the witch was a threat. She whined. Everyone wanted Hermione Granger. Voldemort had wanted her too, she was sure of it. Had she been at Azkaban? Laughing at her as those soulless creatures sucked away her sanity? It was all her fault.
Destroy her.
Rage was consuming her. Bellatrix could feel it trembling through her muscles and across the thin skin of her wings. The filthy excuse for a witch would die, but first, Bellatrix would take away everything she loved.
Battle was a strange thing. The possibility of death drove fear into even the strongest hearts. Hermione armored herself against fear by being prepared. She planned; she studied; she practiced, and it gave her the strength to see death on the horizon and still move towards it.
This day was different. For the first time since she battled Death Eaters in school, Hermione felt unprepared. Her new body was strange. They had a plan, to be sure, but it was flimsy. If she were to calculate the odds of succeeding - a thing which Draco had forbidden her from attempting - she knew she would be disappointed.
Bellatrix was circling the castle, waiting for a way inside, attempting to terrify the Order with her fiery breath and massive wings. Hermione felt her dragon's lungs fill like bellows, bringing the scent of grass and dirt, water and stone, fear and sweat. She released it on a roar.
Come on, you bitch.
The wards fell. The Black Dragon swooped low overhead, spitting a burst of fire in their direction, but seemingly in no hurry to attack. The three of them scattered, taking to wing as they tried to keep her in their line of sight. Bellatrix huffed in amusement.
As she passed them, Hermione looked up. The wind from her passing rattled across Hermione's scales, causing the spines on her back to rise in fear. The danger was palpable, clattering in her bones. Bellatrix was a huge dragon, more of a dragon than Hermione could hope to be, but with her reptilian eyes, Hermione could see the woman underneath.
It was like taking a bombarda head on. Rage speared through her followed closely by a familiar, slimy worm of shame wriggling in her gut. The cackling witch had tortured her for hours. Tortured her until she begged for mercy, before returning her to the locked room containing a scratchy silk bedspread and all her nightmares. When she and Rodolphos had stripped away her freedom, her magic, her pride and her self-respect, they had gone even further until they'd taken away her hope.
A whisper of wings and a slide of scales and Draco was there. He circled her once, his wing tips caressing the skin under her own wing before coming to a stop in front of her, hovering gently. She could feel his thoughts brush against hers.
Get it together, Granger.
His face was all bones and sinew, but somehow she could picture a single platinum eyebrow lifted over his slitted gray eye.
Prat, she grumbled back.
He butted against her neck, twining around her and wiping away the last of her fear. With eyes closed and wings keeping her afloat, Hermione drank in the feeling of his body near hers. Compassion, strength, and affection all flowed across their connection. Hermione caught sight of the bruise-like stain on Draco's arm, the smudged reflection of his dark past. They both had scars, and somehow, she felt like his scars were hers, and that hers belonged to him as well.
Mine.
Pansy's warning yelp was the only warning they had before Bellatrix attacked.
Bellatrix was all roaring great flames and gnashing teeth, whipping the air around her into a frenzy with her massive wings. She dove for Hermione, who canted abruptly, pressing her wings against her side and diving towards the ground. A moment before impact, her arms unfurled, catching the wind on the stretched skin and she was carried back upwards with great, heaving thrusts.
Another attack, another dodge. They couldn't get close enough to land a blow. As she passed, Hermione felt the hot breath of Bellatrix's open mouth scald the underside of her belly. A great crash of teeth closing over the thin air was followed by a shriek as Draco clawed at Bellatrix's face. The larger dragon knocked him away effortlessly before regaining her equilibrium and resuming her attack on Hermione.
Draco tried to draw her attention again as he slid around a swipe from Bellatrix's tail, snapping at it as it passed. Hermione could feel his fury at their failure throbbing along her spine. Or was it her own anger? It was becoming difficult to tell the difference. Pansy was doing little better, unable to get close enough to sink her fangs into the black dragon's hide. Hermione barely dodged a claw-tipped wing, the razor-sharp appendage scraping across her thick scales.
Suddenly, Hermione's wings vibrated painfully as the Hogwarts wards reactivated. A shimmering, white line of power shot upwards from the ground, gruesomely destroying every wizard in its path. The Legion army was now split in half, both sides trapped against an impenetrable magical barrier, the Order on one side, the Centaurs on the other.
It quickly became clear that Bellatrix had little interest in either Draco or Pansy, or even on the battle raging beneath them. She wanted Hermione. It should have scared her. The focus of the great beast's glowing eyes should have sent her spiraling away. Instead, Hermione wanted to laugh. Bellatrix had given Hermione the means to destroy her, the one thing they had struggled to identify when making their plan.
Bait.
It seemed the thing Bellatrix wanted more than anything else, the thing that would bring her where they needed her to go, was Hermione. She slowed her movements, allowing Bellatrix to move forward before sliding out of the way. With every retreat, Hermione lured the Black Dragon forward. It wasn't long before Draco and Pansy caught on. Hermione's mind filled with Draco's displeasure.
Stupid. Risky. Caution.
Despite his objections, he followed, keeping Bellatrix distracted as they were moving her slowly through the sky. They were all accumulating injuries as they went. It hurt, seeing him and Pansy bleed over what was apparently a personal vendetta. The sooner they got Bellatrix to the appointed place, the better.
There! From the corner of her eye, Hermione caught a glimpse of the Quidditch Pitch.
The innocuous looking sand shimmered in the sunlight, a field large enough to contain all four dragons, and dangerous enough to trap a beast.
They were low to the ground now. When Hermione took a blow to the abdomen that sent her spinning through the air, she allowed herself to tumble to the ground, tucking her wings against her body and releasing the spell. Her human body took on the momentum, and she spiraled several feet before her slowing charm slid her to a stop, crouched on all fours.
Bellatrix landed in front of her, the ground shaking with her weight. The huge dragon had to be injured or better yet, incapacitated for their plan to work. Spells would be of no use. Her dragon form wasn't powerful enough. The world around her slowed. Draco was still in the sky, diving towards them, Pansy hovering not far behind. Bellatrix reared up, and her neck muscles coiled to attack.
Hermione took a deep breath and sprinted forward, drawing her knives.
It took far too long to set the Eggbomb. The fucking timing delay didn't want to stick properly. The longer George crouched in this hidden corner of the Lestrange Mansion and fiddled with a ceramic egg, the more likely was his discovery. But dammit, he needed to blow this bomb. If he had to stand here and set it off personally, thereby becoming a cloud of bone and blood, he would be very fucking put out.
"Don't worry, Forge," Fred chuckled. "You know I'm here for you."
"Shut. It."
He hoped everyone wasn't having this same problem. A few too many suspicious sightings and some lucky Legion member would send up an alarm. Then they would all be fucked. George chuckled as he realized that he had been in a very similar situation not long ago, and had experienced far fewer problems. Umbridge's castle had collapsed like a house of cards. If only this seething pile of rocks and evil could break as easily.
And just to make things more interesting, the Polyjuice was fading. George could feel the uncomfortable sensation of his borrowed features shifting and snapping back into their original form. Desperately, George gripped his wand and tried the delay spell one more time.
"Oy!"
George whipped around at the strange voice. Fuck. He was a goner.
"Stop right there!"
But just then, the Eggbomb lit with that damned beautiful glow that meant the delay had finally taken hold. George was already on his feet, tearing away from his hidden corner. He hoped he could give them a good chase so they would fail to discover the explosive he was forced to leave unprotected.
Casting hexes over his shoulder, George was gratified to hear his pursuer grunt and fall the floor with a clatter.
"Nicely done," Fred crowed.
Now it was time to get out of this hell-hole. He came around a corner at a dead run, just in time to see Blaise get hit squarely with a bright orange hex. The man cried out and fell backward, clutching at his face. With a shout, George sliced the attacker from hip to ear, hopping over the fallen body on his way to Blaise.
"Bloody hell," he swore.
The skin of Blaise's neck and half of his face looked old, cracked like cement. He winced in sympathy, even as he pulled the man upright, trying to wake him.
"He's out cold," Fred commented.
"Well spotted," George retorted.
Now what? Time was ticking away, and George could feel the impending destruction like an itch along his spine.
"Head's up!" Fred cried.
George heard the shuffling behind him a moment before the curse hit him like a sack of potatoes before he could even raise his wand. Turning on instinct, he fired back, catching his enemy full in the chest. The man was certainly dead this time, the pool of blood spreading beneath him evidence enough. As he blinked stupidly, the edges of his vision began to cloud.
A blinding hex. Lovely.
"I've got you, mate," he huffed, wondering if it were true. The 'bombs were set to go off in only a few minutes, and George couldn't see past the end of his nose. Blaise was indistinct now as George once again struggled to gather the unconscious man into a sitting position. He was filled with regret over the several years he had spent at the bottom of a potions bottle, the drugs and alcohol eating away at his strength. When had he gotten so thin?
"Bloody fucking hell." he panted. "Now what?"
"Like I said before," Fred's voice was very close. "I'm here for you, brother."
A sensation slithered across his body like cold pudding. He shivered uncontrollably. Something was trying to invade his body, accessing his mind.
Don't fight me.
George shrugged. What did he have to lose, after all?
Suddenly, Fred was there. Not the incorporeal presence he'd been thus far, but a warm, loving weight across his heart. He remembered long nights when they were children, wrapped around each other as they giggled and whispered in the dark. They hadn't even needed to speak most of the time, so aligned were their minds. Fred was the other half of George's soul, ripped away from him in agony and loss.
Suddenly, he felt whole again, achingly complete. Tears slid down his cheeks.
"Freddie," he sobbed.
I'm right here Georgie.
George realized could see, though his eyes were still muddy. It was like a new perspective layered over his own. He was dizzy, the world was out of shape and painted in black and white, but he knew he could navigate the halls. A new strength filled his limbs. He felt young again, but better yet, he could get them out of there.
Now would be a good time.
With a chuckle, George slung Blaise over his shoulders like a sack of flour and fled.
Draco and Hermione had Bellatrix down. They had figured out a way to get her to the Quidditch Pitch, and with all of them still alive. It was quite impressive actually. If Pansy didn't feel like she was going to drop from exhaustion and pain, she would be excited. The end was near.
Pansy blinked in surprise. Hermione had dropped her dragon form and was attacking Bellatrix with knives. The woman was either incredibly stupid, or insanely brave.
Probably both, Pansy decided.
Just as she prepared to join the fray, movement flickered from the corner of her eye. In the distance, beyond the castle and back at the battle, a massive blood-red dragon climbed into the sky from the shelter of the tree line. Dread pooled in Pansy's stomach. Fucking hell.
The Potters emerged from the field on their brooms, three other airborne pairs also rising to surround the deadly beast. They immediately attacked as they had planned, throwing curses and hexes. It took less than five seconds for Luna to retaliate. She snapped her teeth, effectively eviscerating a wizard and his broom, while her tail lashed out and cleaved another Order member in two.
It had been planned ahead of time. Divide and conquer. Pansy had been all too ready to volunteer to be the one to keep Luna busy. Even if she had thought Draco would be willing to leave Hermione, Pansy still would have insisted on the pleasure of taking a chunk out of the fucking beast who had taken Neville, the only thing in the world that was uniquely hers.
Draco and Hermione would have to handle the bleeding beast on the ground by themselves, for Luna was laying waste to the fragile humans with her fire and and a spiky tail. Veering off to the left, Pansy sliced through the air on her way to intercept. Luna was larger, with a powerful wingspan a belly full of flame, but Pansy was fast, agile and poisonous. And she was filled with a deadly fucking rage.
Luna wasted no time attacking Pansy. The two dragons circled each other, growling and lashing their tails, taking swipes with their talons and teeth. Heedless of the danger, Pansy dove straight in, tangling with the larger dragon. She managed to latch onto Luna's legs, haphazardly striking her belly with her fangs.
Once. Twice. Thrice. Luna howled in pain. Pansy reveled in the sound. It was like bathing in chocolate: sinful and utterly delightful. Nobody fucked with a Parkinson. Nobody dared take what was hers.
With a great heave, the red dragon dislodged Pansy, immediately twisting around to land a blow. Pansy took the broad side of Luna's heavy tail straight to her chest. The world tilted as she flipped to the ground, rolling several yards before coming to a screeching halt.
A fretful whine escaped her bruised ribs. It was difficult to breathe. Her wing was broken. She looked up and saw Luna destroy two more wizards. Idiots. They should have cleared out by now. Pansy tried to get up, but found that her back leg wasn't working properly.
Ginny hovered over her on a broom, muttering and weaving her wand in the air. The cooling sensation of a healing spell washed over Pansy. It still hurt. Fuck did it hurt. But her leg was mobile again and she could take a full breath. She sighed in relief.
"Wasn't sure that was going to work," Ginny quipped.
Pansy snorted and flicked her tail at the woman, gaining her feet again. There was so much power in this form, and Pansy had promised herself when she had transformed for the first time that nobody would ever be able to hurt her again. It was time to keep that promise.
It took two sweeps of her wings to get airborne again.
Pansy was arrowing in on her target, intending to wrap herself around the large dragon and hold on for dear life, when a bright curse slammed against Luna's side. She staggered in mid-air. The blood streaming from her multiple puncture wounds made the grass sizzle. The four remaining wizards dove in, firing curse after hex, until Luna was fighting to stay airborne.
Hovering above her, Pansy waited for her moment. The pain was eating at her, weakening her limbs and begging her to land and find a safe place to heal. She ignored it. A hex from Harry drove through Luna's wing, leaving behind a smoking hole in the delicate skin. She keened in pain and spiraled towards the ground.
Pansy followed.
Her claws wrapped around Luna's neck. She grappled for stability with the other, using her wings for balance. There was a great satisfaction in the draw of her fangs from her lips. Before she could strike, Luna twisted and fastened her teeth around Pansy's leg. The pain was immediate and intense. Pansy slid away, crying out.
In that moment, the red dragon surged into the sky, gamboling left and right but headed toward one place: the Legion encampment.
Neville.
There had been plenty of terrible things in Draco's past. Having one's mind invaded by Voldemort had been horrifying in a way that was hard to describe. Draco distinctly remembered the sickening sensation of holding a wand on Dumbledore, not knowing he wouldn't have to use it. Hearing one of his best friends scream as he burned to death in Fiendfyre had been terrifying.
But watching a human Hermione run full speed at the Black Dragon was, without question, the worst moment of Draco's life. He knew she would be crushed, decapitated, eviscerated. It was his job to keep her safe. He should have taken her away, hidden her in a cave somewhere in the Alps. Instead, he would be forced to watch her die.
He fell on Bellatrix, claws outstretched. He would tear this fucking beast limb from limb. He would drink her blood and swallow the very essence of her life. Hermione disappeared underneath Bellatrix, knives ready. Draco howled.
His mouth was bruised from the strength of Bellatrix's scales. His claws ached and his wings burned. Bellatrix roared in pain, twisting to escape his grasp.
Not gonna happen, you fucking bitch.
After a moment, Hermione staggered from underneath Bellatrix, her face and hair coated in blood. Nobody could bleed like that and survive. His mind went blank. Bellatrix managed to buck him off in his moment of stunned fear. He tumbled to the ground.
With aching ribs, Draco looked up desperately. He blinked in surprise as Hermione used her wand to remove the steaming liquid from her skin before sheathing her knives. Her face and hands were red and shiny, tiny blisters rising from the burns. Dragon's blood. She wasn't dying, he realized in relief, but she was badly hurt.
His mind reached for her in a panic.
What returned was nothing but utter calm. She thought she had it all under control.
He wanted to snort. He wanted to scream at her.
Fucking Gryffindor.
Bellatrix twisted, her mouth reaching desperately for the human standing nearby. Draco landed in front of her, blasting the Black Dragon with every bit of flame in his throat. She moaned through her teeth and dropped, Draco's fire leaving behind curled and roasted scales. It was then that Draco saw the blood seeping out from under her, the work of Hermione's knives.
With the last of her strength, Bellatrix swept the ground with her tail, knocking Draco to the side with a grunt. Hermione flipped in mid-air, missing the moving appendage and landing on her feet. She whipped her wand toward the obelisk in the center of the practice pitch. The sand beneath them disappeared, revealing a blanket of chain link.
"Move!" she screamed at Draco.
Draco dragged at the air, desperately pushing himself away from the injured dragon beneath him. With a deadly whistle, the chain netting shot upward, encasing Bellatrix in a cage of steel.
He dropped Formus spell, leaving his dragon body behind and catching Hermione in his arms just as she reached him.
"Are you okay?" he choked out.
Her skin was badly burned; some of the hair on her head and both her eyebrows were singed away. His hands trembled as he cast a healing spell over her. He couldn't seem to get his heart to stop racing.
"We got her."
Hermione was beaming. Unable to help himself, Draco grinned back. She looked a fright, as usual, but damn if she wasn't the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. They had done it. Against all odds, they had trapped the Black Dragon. It was time to finish this.
"Let's kill the bitch," he ground out.
Both of them turned, ready to slice her open until she bled to death, but before Hermione could even draw her blade, Bellatrix moved. Her chest expanded with a great breath, the steel links creaking under the strain. She stretched up as much as the netting would allow, her wings bulging through the gaps. On a deep exhale, Bellatrix blew fire, turning the metal a glowing amber. The links began to snap one by one.
"Fucking hell."
Narcissa knew the moment Lucius apparated onto the grounds of the Lestrange Mansion. The link that had kept them so close for so many years tugged at her. It had weakened after the Battle of Hogwarts and Bella's resurrection. A part of his soul had died with that disgusting ritual, and so had their bond.
She was alone in the Mansion, a ticking clock beating at her mind even as she searched for the lost treasure she needed so desperately. It had taken nothing to slip away from the slowly regrouping wizards near the edge of the property. They were distracted and afraid. It took even less to make her way through the old castle, the way more familiar than her own home, now nothing but ashes. What she needed was in Lucius's private rooms. After stealing it so many years ago, he kept it there as a trophy.
The sensation of his presence rippling across her skin caused her heart to kick up in fear. She had only minutes to find what she needed and get out. If he found her, he would never let her leave alive.
Except what she sought was not to be found, and Lucius was moments away. Knowing it was too late to run and fruitless to hide, Narcissa squared her shoulders and turned to face her last demon.
"My sweet wife."
He entered the room softly. After a moment's pause, he moved to the sideboard and poured two glasses of wine, as unruffled as if she had just come down to dinner.
"May I offer you a drink, my dear?"
"Fuck you, Lucius."
A small huff of surprise left his lips. "I see spending time with those savages has lowered you in more ways than one."
As he stepped toward her, she gripped her wand tighter.
"Now, now, there's no need for that," he purred. "I admit, I was quite upset when I found you had thrown in with the enemy. But I'm ready to forgive you if you only submit."
She would rather die.
"You forgive me?" Narcissa hissed.
"You betrayed me!" White-hot rage ripped through Lucius's voice.
"You betrayed us!" she shot back. "The day you brought that foul creature back from the dead, you abandoned your soul. You abandoned your son!"
Lucius calmed immediately, sipping from his glass.
"He hates me for what I did," Lucius admitted, unperturbed. "It was unfortunate that he should witness such a dark ritual when he is so . . . fragile."
"Draco was once the light of your life," Narcissa reminded him.
Lucius hummed. "So much undiscovered potential. I admit to the greatest disappointment that my seed could produce such weakness. I would question his paternity if I did not know for certain he was mine."
Narcissa straightened, the memory of the old Fidelity Curse making her sick to her stomach.
"The boy's love for you has never dimmed, however." A sly smile curled his lips. "Does he know, I wonder?"
A lump of white-hot fear crawled up her throat. Without permission, her fingers crept to the center of her breast, where the damned thing still sat, the thin, silver chain like an iron weight around her neck. Spying the movement, Lucius threw back his head and laughed.
Harry felt a surge of triumph as Pansy chased Luna from the battlefield. A small cheer went up from the remaining soldiers perched on brooms. The edges of his sight were getting fuzzy and narrow.
Shaking his head, he tried to clear his vision. No luck. He thought back to when he had taken the Dancing Death poison. It had been several hours. He sat on his broom and flexed his toes. He could see them move, but he couldn't feel them anymore.
"Back to the battle!" he ordered. Obediently, they turned their brooms and headed toward the surging bodies, bright curses flying overhead.
It was time to end this. He wasn't afraid to die, but he was terrified he would drop in the middle of everything. He needed to fight. He must see the Order rise victorious before he died. He had to know Ginny and Lily would be safe.
"Let's go!" Ginny shouted to him, beckoning him from her broom.
Bloody hell she was gorgeous. He wished he had told her more often. The past few years had been mostly filled with pain and humiliation, but the small moments of light and laughter had been all Ginny. He wanted to touch her skin again. He wanted to make her smile. He absolutely must keep her alive.
"Everything alright?" she asked, her eyes glittering with panic.
Steering the broom next to hers, he leaned in and nipped at her throat.
"Behave yourself, Potter!" she objected with a grin.
"Time to finish this."
Her warm brown eyes turned sad as she flew ahead, dodging a green curse. Gulping down the knot that had formed in his suddenly tight throat, Harry followed.