Harry Potter is Dead

Chapter 13 | A Demon Beneath the Cherry Tree


He stood in a gorgeous meadow, dotted with wildflowers as far as the eye could see. A large cherry tree cast dappled shade over a vast expanse. Twittering songbirds flitted between its branches, and butterflies drifted lazily over the pink blossoms. He could hear a stream splashing in the distance, somewhere out of sight.

He did not trouble himself to wonder why he was there. It was quite a nice place to be, really; for now, why would he want to leave, anyway? He thought perhaps the heady perfume the wildflowers gave off had something to do with his inability to string together coherent thoughts, but he did not let it bother him. It was nice just to relax.

He smiled and looked up at the sky. It was very blue.

"It's your turn, Neville."

Neville turned at the sound of the man's voice. In the space of time his back he turned away from the cherry tree, Professor Lupin had appeared beneath its boughs, his robes a bit shabby and his hair speckled with gray, but otherwise much younger and happier than he had been in recent years. A wardrobe stood beside Neville's childhood teacher, the doorknob rattling slightly.

"Hurry up already. I want to try, too." said a voice.

Neville swiveled around again and found a queue of children standing where there had been previously been empty space, fidgeting in their Hogwarts uniforms and tapping their wands impatiently. They were his old classmates, Neville realized with a dull shock, but as they had appeared in their third year. He looked down at his own Gryffindor robes and noticed, quite unsurprised, that he himself was no older than thirteen.

"Come on, now, Neville, there's nothing to be afraid of." Professor Lupin said.

Neville hadn't been feeling much at all up until that moment. But as Professor Lupin spoke, and the rickety wardrobe gave a mysterious shudder, a terrible fear gripped Neville as if from nowhere. It was his final exam and he could not remember the incantation; he was going to fail, and already his classmates were beginning to laugh . . . not to mention the horrible something that would soon burst free of the wardrobe. Neville felt a wave of nausea. He didn't know it was possible to feel this afraid . . . it wasn't, he decided a moment later. He didn't know where it where the fear was coming from; only that it kept growing and growing, never stopping, even as it rooted his feet to the ground and made his heart pound painfully in his chest.

The briefest flash of a silver knife. Neville staggered, but before he could even process what had happened, the image of the sunny meadow had reappeared before his eyes as bright and cheery as before. But something was terribly wrong. The cloying scent of blood mingled with the flower's perfume, sharp and metallic in the air.

"Move it, Longbottom!" Draco Malfoy's snide voice carried above the rest.

"I don't . . . I don't want to, Professor," Neville said, and a dark shape hovered over him, laughing horribly.

"Don't be silly, Neville," replied Professor Lupin, and there was a forceful quality to his voice that made Neville shudder. "Nothing is going to hurt you."

A wave of pain hit Neville with sudden and incapacitating force. He dropped to his knees this time, unable to see, biting his tongue until he tasted blood. The pain did not abate quickly as it had before, but lingered like a bruise.

"You're lying!" gasped Neville through gritted teeth.

"You are perfectly safe here!" Professor Lupin yelled, red with anger. Behind him, something began to throw its weight against the door of the wardrobe. Neville felt stabs of pain every few seconds now; he dropped to the ground, unable to defend himself from his phantom assailant.

"No . . . " Neville muttered, "No . . . !"

The smell of blood was heady and overwhelming, and the screaming had all but obliterated other sounds, and Neville could not manage to lift his wand against the terrible thing that finally burst from within the wardrobe.

Bellatrix Lestrange swaggered forward, cackling madly, and kicked Neville in the stomach. "Don't you close your eyes, boy! Crucio!" Her wand slashed downwards, and he was back within the confines of Hogwarts, writhing on the ground at her feet. How foolish Neville had been to let himself believe he had ever even left. The meadow was only a dream, a hallucination, created as his tortured mind had lingered on the edge of consciousness.

Bellatrix twisted her face into a sadistic smile. "Did you think you could sleep right through our little chat? Manners, Neville! Didn't your filthy little Mudblood mother teach you anything? I want you awake. I want you to feel everything."

Neville bared his teeth in anger, but he could not force himself to rise. Another bout of the Cruciatus Curse blurred his vision once more; when the pain dulled, Bellatrix's silhouette and the charcoal castle walls of his cell drifted in and out of focus. She cast another spell at him, one he did not recognize; with a snap and another wave of unbearable pain, he felt his left arm break.

"Does it hurt, boy?" Bellatrix jeered.

She raised her wand and Neville slammed against the wall, held as if a hand gripped him by the throat. He was choking, unable even to stand on his own. Bellatrix removed a flask of what looked like firewhisky from her cloak and downed a good amount of it. She laughed again and stumbled closer so that when she spoke, Neville could smell the alcohol on her breath.

"Oh, did I hurt you? Poor baby. Looks as if my spells are finally doing the trick." Bellatrix was suddenly an inch from his nose, crooked teeth bared in a ghastly smile. "Of course they are. Tonight's the night!"

Bellatrix took another swig of firewhisky. Neville's eyes widened, fearing the worst. She didn't mean -

"By tomorrow morning, my master will be stronger than anyone that has ever walked the earth. He will be unstoppable." She said the word with relish, letting it roll slowly off her tongue. "Immortal."

Neville began to struggle against her spell, which caused her to laugh and then to stagger off balance. He had to get out, he had to at least warn Luna. It's tonight, it's happening tonight. His frantic thoughts raced at a million miles an hour. We have a few hours at most, maybe. We have a plan. We can do this. I just need to escape. Need to escape . . . But Neville could not force himself to move. His arm was broken and he was bleeding badly, and he was in more pain than he had ever been in his life. As his vision flickered once more, he wondered if it would be easier just to succumb to death now, and let the others worry about the problem at hand . . .

Bellatrix released him with a flick of her wand and laughed as he crashed to the ground. She kicked him several times in the stomach, cackling even louder when he groaned. "You know, this reminds me of something else." She stopped for a moment, raising a finger to her chin in mock concentration. Then Bellatrix's face broke into a wide smile and she kicked harder than ever. "Ah, yes! This is exactly like the night I reduced your Mudblood parents to empty, drooling shells!"

A hot, corrosive anger began to burn in the pit of Neville's stomach like wildfire. Torture he could withstand, but the talk about his parents made Neville's blood grow hot. He began to shake uncontrollably; spots of red appeared in front of his eyes.

"And you know," Bellatrix lifted her wand, ignorant of his growing rage, "I think I'll do the same to - AUGH!"

Her words ended in a scream, because in one swift fluid motion Neville leapt up from the ground and lunged at Bellatrix. Caught by surprise, her wand slipped from her fingers as they toppled downwards. Neville punched her several times in the face with his good arm, releasing his rage with each swing. Bellatrix was very much capable of besting him in a wizard's duel, he knew. But if he could keep her wandless . . . he just might make it out of there alive.

Bellatrix was both strong and furious, and managed to free herself from Neville's grasp once her shock had abated. She dove for the wand, which had fallen several yards away. Neville let out a reflexive, "No!" and lunged for it as well. His hands caught her cloak and he pulled her back. She twisted around and rammed her elbow into the place where his left arm had fractured, and even the adrenaline pumping through Neville's veins could not mask the pain. He roared, dazed, and she wriggled free. Bellatrix's hand closed around the wand.

There was a flash of light and a bang. Neville had only a split second to duck; he felt something bright and hot whiz past his face and strike the wall behind him, opening a gaping hole in the tower. Both fighters were thrown back, dazed; dust and debris rained down upon them, and the ground beneath their feet shuddered dangerously. Moonlight flooded the destroyed cell, accompanied by a fierce gust of wind that whipped at Neville's hair. He was only a few footsteps away from falling to his death.

Bellatrix, intoxicated from the firewhisky, was still getting her bearings when Neville emerged, running full speed, from the cloud of dust. He charged at her headlong, knocking her into the bars that separated his prison from the rest of the castle. There was a crack and a groan, and Neville saw blood spatter the bars where Bellatrix's head had struck them. He ripped the wand from her grasp and threw her to the floor, and without even thinking, blood thundering loudly through his brain, brought it down in a vertical swing.

Neville had uttered no spell, but red stains immediately bloomed on the front of Bellatrix's robes, tracing the slash Neville had made with his wand. Though her face was deathly white and strained from discomfort, she seemed neither shocked nor angry. She merely clutched at her wound with one hand and propped herself up with the other, quite indifferent. She had retained her grin all this time.

"Well, boy." Bellatrix spat blood onto the floor. "Didn't know you had it in you."

Neville kept the wand trained on her, though he knew she wasn't going anywhere. The thrill of the fight kept him jittery, acting like the perfume of the flowers in his dream, in the same way that they kept him from thinking clearly as he watched his enemy die at his feet. Neville tried to keep a straight face, but Bellatrix must have seen a shadow of fear that flickered across it. She began to laugh hoarsely, and then to choke; more blood spilled from her mouth. But still she smiled.

"Your first kill . . . always the hardest." Bellatrix laughed again. "It doesn't matter, though . . . I will not live to see it, the Dark Lord will rise tonight greater than before . . . and will punish you . . . punish all of you . . . for I am his greatest . . . servant . . ."

Bellatrix was weakening, and Neville knew it. He should have left, before she died; he did not want to see it happen. But something kept him rooted to the spot. He watched her face grow slack, and her body cease stirring. In her last moment, Bellatrix's eyes found his, and for that instant he thought he saw a trace of sadness in them. But using what must have been every last ounce of strength she left in her, Bellatrix smiled wickedly up at him once more, and her lips formed one last whisper even through the blood.

"You are a monster, Neville Longbottom."

And when she died, her sadistic, gleeful expression remained.

Neville stood there for a moment, staring at his opponent's empty shell. Feelings of guilt were already washing over him, and somehow he could not convince himself that she deserved the end she had met at his hands. Her last words thundered through his brain, echoing terribly: Your first kill . . . the Dark Lord will rise tonight . . . you are a monster, Neville Longbottom . . .

He shook his head and swallowed. "That was for my parents." Neville said with as much force as he could muster, and with another spell, he blasted away the iron bars and sped down the tower steps.

Neville had covered what felt like several miles of stairs before he remembered the coin in his pocket. Luna. He thought, and halted immediately, pulling out the Galleon and sending her a message with shaking fingers: I'm out. You've got to get here now, and bring everyone you can. Voldemort's nearly ready. The plan has to happen tonight, or not at all.

Luna's reply came shortly thereafter, urgent and alert. Mr. Weasley's just gone to send word. Can you get the wards down?

Yes, Neville responded. I have a wand. All that's left is the Carrows.

Great. We can be there in maybe an hour.

Perfect.

Neville could picture Luna's face with photographic clarity as he received her final message.

Good luck, Neville.

He smiled as he replied.

Thanks, Luna.

Neville stowed away the coin and continued down the staircase, taking the steps two at a time. He quietly stunned the burly Death Eater that guarded the entrance to his tower, and emerged into an empty stretch of hallway he knew to be one of the seventh floor corridors, somewhere in the east wing of the school. The Dark Arts classroom - and therefore, Amycus Carrow - was on the same side of the grounds, only a few floors down. If he could sneak there undetected and silently Imperius Amycus into bringing down the wards, he might be able to avoid a fight altogether, even if the plan involved the unfortunate use of an Unforgivable Curse. But with security in the castle having turned it into little more than an educational prison, Neville would have to watch his step. Deciding it was his best chance, he stripped the guard of his clothes and stowed the unconscious man within an empty classroom nearby. Neville hoped the overlarge Death Eater robes would be enough to disguise him, at least from afar.

"Episkey." Neville whispered, pointing Bellatrix's wand at his left arm, and let out an involuntary sigh as the bone snapped back into place and the stabbing pain was reduced to a dull ache. Next he mended the cuts and abrasions to the rest of his body, and wiped the blood from his face. Once Neville was healed and clean, he pulled his hood over his head so that shadows hid his face, and swept off along the dark hallway.

Neville was immediately glad he had chosen to leave his own bloodstained prisoner's robes behind. Though he passed no other Death Eaters directly as he crept carefully through the halls, he spotted several from a distance that were no more than silhouettes in the dark castle. He was able to fend them off with a curt nod from afar, and they did not question his presence.

Neville was minutes from his final destination when a ghost suddenly floated through the wall only a few feet in front of him. Neville swore; he had let his guard down, and the ghost had seen beneath his hood. He turned to run even before he realized its identity - but to his immense relief, it was Nearly Headless Nick.

Nick had sense enough not to cry out, but he did jump so violently that his head wobbled dangerously on its ruffled collar. Neville pressed a finger to his lips, and Nick closed his mouth, which had fallen open in surprise.

"My - Mr. Longbottom - " Nick said in a hushed whisper. "How on earth - "

"Shh, Nick," Neville silenced him, then checked either end of the corridor before continuing, "Listen, the Order's on its way now. I need you to wake up the teachers, but tell them to wait for our signal. We're stopping Voldemort. Tonight."

Nick's eyes widened in surprise, and then he assumed a look of dignified determination. He puffed out his chest, straightened his head on its ruff, nodded, and vanished through the opposite wall. As bizarre as it felt at such a grave time, Neville found himself grinning as he closed the last hundred yards between himself and the Dark Arts wing.

Amycus' quarters were opposite his classroom, moved, at his request, so he didn't have to walk too far to get to work every day. Even from the hall, Neville could hear him snoring.

"Alohomora." Neville whispered, and with a quiet click, the lock turned and the door swung open a crack.

The sound of snoring intensified. Neville could only see a sliver of the room from where he stood, but even in the darkness he could make out the piles of rubbish that littered the floor; evidently the house elves had either been scared away or simply refused to clean up a Death Eater's mess. Amycus himself was curled in his bed, wearing a pear of dirty flannel pajamas and a nightcap.

Neville attempted to tiptoe inside as quietly as he could, but the door creaked on its hinges and Amycus stirred fussily. Neville stopped dead, heart hammering in his chest. What was that spell that was so popular in his sixth year? The one Harry had found in his potions book? Mimbletona . . . no. Muffius. Muffletum.

"Muffliato." A faint buzzing filled the air as Neville cast his spell. He looked towards Amycus as he began to move forwards into the room. The man merely grunted, muttered something incoherent, and rolled over in his bed. Neville raised his wand. It shook a little as he said, for the first time in his life, "Imperio."

Neville decided that he did not like the curious sensation which spread from his head, down his arm, and all the way to his fingertips. He did not even need to give an audible command; as soon as the thought crossed Neville's mind, Amycus' eyes snapped open. Wordlessly, the little man rose from his bed and retrieved his wand from the pile of dirty laundry he had evidently tossed it in before turning in for the night. At Neville's request, Amycus moved his hands in complicated motions, speaking in a hushed whisper.

Though it was not visible from where they were, Neville knew at that moment, half of the wards around the castle were dissipating in the air. He wondered if the Order was there yet, gathered at the edge of the grounds, or else hiding where the dementors who guarded the borders could not get them. Could they see the magical walls being brought down before them? Neville hoped not, for if the Order members could see them, so could every Death Eater in the castle.

It was becoming evident that Amycus' work required more time than Neville had anticipated. He shifted anxiously on the balls of his feet, wanting to get to Alecto as quickly as possible, but also reluctant to leave her brother to his own devices. His frown slowly growing, Neville paced the length of the dirty bedroom, checking both the door and the single window every few minutes.

"How many left?" He asked Amycus, after what felt like hours.

". . . Extravi Salvio Hexium." Amycus finished twirling his wand only to begin waving it in a different pattern. He answered in a dead voice. "One more. Extravi Maxima Atum Contego . . . "

A loud, grating noise like metal on metal pierced the air; for one wild moment, Neville half expected the castle to come down on them. One look out the window confirmed his worst fears, however: one of the shields was slowly disintegrating, and was apparently issuing the highly noticeable sound.

Neville whipped around at Amycus and bellowed over the din, "You! Finish the spell and then tie yourself up! Toss your wand out the window!"

Amycus gave one vague nod, and Neville tore off down the corridor. His hood flapped back as he ran; there was no point in hiding himself now, since his cover would undoubtedly be blown any minute -

"Amycus! Amycus, damn it, answer me! I swear, If you've let those wards go down on anything but the Dark Lord's express orders - "

Neville only had a second's warning before Alecto Carrow barreled around the corner, wheezing and clutching a stitch in her side, missing him by mere inches. She recognized him suddenly as she flew past, but it took her several seconds to skid to a halt and whip around in shock. By this time Neville had already sent a Stunning Spell in her direction, but Alecto deflected his attack with a flick of her own wand.

"Longbottom!" She shrieked, cheeks flushed with color. "Avada Kedavra!"

Neville managed to dodge the jet of cold green light; he rolled to his right and shot another two Stunning Spells at Alecto, but she blocked them easily.

"Confringo!" She screamed. Neville's shield charm went up only just in time; he felt it crack with the force of the spell.

Neville swore. He needed to get out of there as quickly as possible, for the terrible screeching that still sounded over everything had undoubtedly awakened half the castle by now. Neville only hoped that the Order members could get through in the confusion, before the grounds were swarmed with Death Eaters.

"Paellicula!" Neville cried in desperation, executing his wild plan even as it formulated in his brain.

The corridor immediately filled with a dense, purplish mist that obscured everything, seen or heard, outside of the immediate vicinity. The dark shapes of wall lamps and tapestries loomed suddenly out of the smoke as Neville approached them; even the screeching noise of the wards being brought down was silenced to no more than a dull hum.

Quietly, cautiously, Neville moved toward the dark silhouette he knew to be Alecto. Intermittent flashes of light and muffled cries told Neville that she was firing into the abyss, frustrated, but to no avail; her spells were flying in the completely wrong direction. With a silent flick of his wand, the mist reducing his words to a mere whisper, she fell to the ground. With another wave, the mist vanished as quickly as it had come, and Neville saw that Alecto lay before Stunned before him.

Neville set off again with a bounding leap, wasting no time to take in the scene. The grating wail suddenly silenced as he ran; Neville, passing a window, skidded to a stop and backtracked, eyes caught by the scene that was playing out beyond the glass. The last flickers of a reddish shield wavered and vanished just as he looked, and in the distance, Neville saw a band of dark figures rush onto the grounds towards the school. From this far away, he could not see their faces, even as they were illuminated by bright flashes of light, but Neville knew immediately who they were. He smiled. The battle for Hogwarts had begun.