Before Cora could do anything, a massive booming sound caught everyone's attention and they turned in time to see the Slytherin hourglass shattering, almost in slow motion. The emeralds, that had recorded the number of House points they had received, trickled out and spilled everywhere. The jewels caused the duellers in the Entrance hall to slip and slide as the smooth beads got under their feet. For a couple of moments there was a slight panic that had nothing to do with the battle, before the fighting was resumed once more.
In the transition between the two phases of panic, Regina slipped away. She knew, now, that she would become her mother's most sought after target and was determined to put as much space between them as she could. While Cora was a cold, calculating near-psychopath, she was still Regina's mother and the younger Mills wasn't sure whether she would be able to duel her without letting her feelings get in the way. She would much rather someone else take down Cora.
Rushing upwards, Regina darted behind a cracked, toppled pillar to survey the scene below in the Entrance Hall. Students ran in every direction. Some had paused in their duelling for long enough to move injured friends out of harm's way. Neville was entering the space from the Dungeon corridor with armfuls of a plant that Regina recognised as Venomous Tentacula. He seemingly released it, jumping aside as the plant wrapped itself around the Death Eater closest and began pulling him in tighter and tighter.
Yaxley was standing close to the front doors and Regina's heart contracted painfully as she watched him shooting curses towards Emma, who was valiantly fighting him off. Sending a curse in his direction, Regina breathed a sigh of relief as he went rigid and then keeled over. Emma glanced up in surprise, meeting her eyes and winking, before darting away to assist Neville with the killer plant.
She moved upwards through the castle, being drawn into battle with numerous masked and unmasked Death Eaters. Regina recognised all of them, most noticeably Abraxus and Finnegan Jones, Rodolphus and the Carrows. Each of them fixed her with a look of confusion, before their eyes hardened and they became more focused in their attack. She retaliated with just as much determination, using the highly charged atmosphere around her to fuel her. Sending a curse in Finnegan's direction, slashing her wand furiously through the air, Regina watched as his eyes widened and he stumbled backwards. His back hit the stone railing behind him and he disappeared over the edge.
As Regina turned to look for her next opponent, she caught sight of a dark head of hair and painfully familiar dark eyes disappearing around a corner. "Henry?"
When the figure didn't respond or stop, she pushed through the battling witches and wizards and set off after him, convinced that it was her son. By the time she reached the corridor he had been heading towards, there was no sign of anyone who could have matched his description. Feeling the knot in her chest almost double in size as she wondered whether Henry was in the castle somewhere, Regina turned back to join the battle.
"You have fought valiantly. Lord Voldemort knows how to value bravery." Regina froze as the cold, high voice filled her head. She felt as though the Dark Lord was standing beside her, hissing his words directly into her ear. It was loud enough for that to be true, but she knew that it was simply a spell, designed to magnify his voice so that everyone in the castle and those in Hogsmeade could hear it as well. "Yet you have sustained heavy losses. If you continue to resist me, you will all die, one by one. I do not wish this to happen. Every drop of magical blood spilled is a loss and a waste. Lord Voldemort is merciful. I command my forces to retreat immediately. You have one hour. Dispose of your dead with dignity. Treat your injured." There was a slight pause, the voice silent for a couple of beats before it sounded again, just as loud as before. "I speak now, Harry Potter, directly to you. You have permitted your friends to die for you rather than face me yourself. I shall wait for one hour in the Forbidden Forest. If, at the end of that hour, you have not come to me, have not given yourself up, then battle recommences. This time, I shall enter the fray myself, Harry Potter, and I shall find you, and I shall punish every last man, woman, and child who has tried to conceal you from me. One hour."
As the voice died away, Regina felt as though her shoes had been fused to the stone below her feet. She couldn't bring herself to move, to break the spell that had been left behind after Voldemort's threat. Around her, people were starting to make their way out. The Death Eaters trooped out of the castle, none of them willing to push their luck by going against the brief truce that their leader had called. The students and teachers and members of the Order made their way down to the Great Hall, supporting the injured and tenderly transporting the dead. Regina had the urge to run, to bury her head in the sand, to avoid learning the truth about what had happened. She knew, in her heart, that there was tragedy waiting for her beyond the heavy wooden doors and her eyes filled with tears as every potential outcome ran through her mind in quick succession.
The unnatural silence that seemed to fill the castle drove Regina towards the Great Hall. She pointedly avoided looking down at the flagstone floor of the Entrance Hall after catching sight of a large blood stained which turned her stomach and made her retch. Placing a hand on the wooden doors, she paused and closed her eyes for a moment, breathing in deeply, before stepping over the threshold and looking around.
The first thing she noticed was that the long House tables were gone missing, which was helpful considering how crowded the room was. Witches and wizards stood around in clumps, talking quietly and attempting to comfort each other. There was sobbing from all directions and Regina scanned the room for the people she was most eager to see. Passing the raised platform at the front of the room, glancing quickly at Madam Pomfrey and her helpers who were doing their best to cope with the number of injuries that had been presented to them.
In the very centre of the Great Hall lay a row of dead bodies. Some were so badly injured that they weren't immediately recognisable. Regina forced herself to look away from the lifeless face of a young girl she recognised from her Advanced Arithmancy Studies class, feeling sick to her stomach. As she looked up, Regina's eyes fell on a group of redheaded people, surrounding one of the bodies. Almost as though her feet were carrying her forward without her knowledge, Regina made her way towards them. She reached out and laid her hand on Arthur's arm, her eyes conveying everything she couldn't put into words. He merely nodded at her as Molly lurched to her feet and threw herself into the younger woman's arms. Wrapping her in a tight embrace, Regina allowed her gaze to fall on Fred, tears spilling from her eyes as she considered everything her friends had lost.
Pulling back slightly, Molly looked at Regina with sadness covering every inch of her usually sunny countenance. "Regina…"
Turning her head slightly, she glanced at one of the bodies lying beside her son's. Following her gaze Regina felt as though an invisible hand was squeezing heart. The breath was knocked from her lungs and the room around her began to spin. She went cold and then very hot as she stared at the young woman laid out on the flagstone floor, looking so peaceful that she could have simply been asleep.
A terrible, heart-broken cry was ripped from her lips as she stared down at the bodies of her niece and nephew-in-law. Tonks and Remus had been placed side-by-side, their hands almost touching; together in death as they had been in life. Regina stumbled forward, dropping heavily to the ground beside the young woman, not noticing the impact as her knees connected forcefully with the flagstone floor. She reached out and brushed a strand of hair, matted with dried blood, away from Tonks' face. Regina's palm rested lightly on her niece's cheek for a moment and she looked into her lifeless face, before she crumpled inward and gave in to her devastation.
"It was your sister…" Molly murmured, placing a hand on Regina's shoulder. When the younger woman looked up at met her eyes, both sets filled with tears, she nodded. "Bellatrix murdered Tonks."
That information was harder to swallow than the news that her niece was dead. Tears clouded her vision once more and she drew in a long, stuttered breath. In that moment, all she wanted to do was be wrapped in the safety and comfort of Emma's arms. Suddenly she was terrified; she hadn't seen the blonde anywhere since just after she'd spoken to her mother.
"Where's… what's happened to… where's Emma?" She forced out, the colour draining from her face as she was suddenly hit by the very real possibility that she might have lost her girlfriend in the battle as well.
"The last time I saw her she was helping David and Philip bring those with injuries in from the rest of the castle." Arthur told her quickly, seeing how agitated she was. "She was fine." They glanced up as figure entered their field of vision. "Philip…"
"I'm so sorry, Arthur… Molly…" The younger man reached out and laid his hand on Arthur's shoulder. "I don't know what to say."
"How's it looking?" Arthur asked, turning the attention back to the bigger picture, wanting to be distracted from his grief for a moment or two.
"Killian, Emma and David are doing a final sweep of the castle now. Kingsley, Neal and Hestia are out scouring the grounds. We think we've got everyone inside, but…" He shook his head. "We've lost so many…"
"Mom!"
Regina was sure that her heart had actually stopped at the sound of her son's voice, harsh and much too loud in the near-reverent hush of the Great Hall. Her head snapped up immediately and she watched him running through the groups of people towards her. She only just managed to open her arms before he was throwing himself into them and clinging onto her tightly.
"Mom… I'm sorry. I couldn't go… I couldn't leave you."
"Henry…" She grasped at him desperately; smoothing down his hair, straightening his robes, cupping his face. "Henry. Sweetheart. We need to get you out of here." She looked up, wide-eyed, catching Aurora's husband's gaze. "Philip… Is the tunnel still open?"
He shook his head. "We blocked it up in case they tried to use it."
"I won't leave you!" Henry said firmly, clutching at his mother more tightly. "I won't. I… Is that… Tonks?"
At the wobble in his voice as he stared down at his favourite cousin's corpse, Regina felt the white hot pain of the young woman's loss even more keenly. She held her son against her tightly, running a hand through his hair in a repetitive motion as he sobbed against her shoulder.
They stayed like that for a while, before someone joined them, wrapping them both in a tight embrace. Regina didn't need to open her eyes to recognise the woman who had pulled them both into her arms. She buried her face in Emma's hair, breathing in the familiar, soothing smell of her shampoo and perfume and the scent that was so uniquely Emma.
"Harry Potter is dead." Voldemort's magically magnified voice broke through the tense silence that had fallen over the castle. Instinctively Emma and Regina shifted so that Hnery was sandwiched protectively between them. "He was killed as he ran away, trying to save himself while you lay down your lives for him. We bring you his body as proof that your hero is gone. The battle is won. You have lost half of your fighters. My Death Eaters outnumber you and the Boy Who Lived is finished. There must be no more war. Anyone who continues to resist, man, woman or child, will be slaughtered, as will every member of their family. Come out of the castle now, kneel before me and you shall be spared. Your parents and children, your brothers and sisters will live and be forgiven and you will join me in the new world we shall build together."
No one spoke as the voice died away and silence reigned once more. Almost as though drawn by an invisible magnetic force, everyone in the Great Hall who was capable of moving walked through the doors and out into the Entrance Hall, heading for the main doors. They stepped outside into the dawn light, looking warily at the Death Eaters who had taken up their positions in a line facing the open front doors of the school. Voldemort himself stood at the front of the group, visible for the first time since the barrel had broken out. His great snake, Nagini, was draped around his neck and he was stroking her head lazily with one long, pale finger.
"NO!" Minerva screamed at the sight of Potter cradled lifelessly in Hagrid's arms. Regina instantly recognised the laughter that answered the older woman's anguish and was disgusted, but not surprised, at how much Bellatrix was enjoying McGonagall's despair.
"No!"
"No!"
"Harry! HARRY!"
The screams and shouts of abuse from the crowd towards the line of Death Eaters grew louder and louder until Voldemort shouted, cutting through them like a knife through hot butter. He raised his wand and flicked it lazily in their direction. There was a loud bang and a blinding flash of light, before the noise died away instantly.
"SILENCE! It is over! Set him down, Hagrid, at my feet where he belongs!" Voldemort waited until the teenager had been placed on the ground before pacing backward and forward triumphantly. "You see? Harry Potter is dead! Do you understand now, deluded ones? He was nothing, ever, but a boy who relied on others to sacrifice themselves for him!"
"He beat you!" Ron screamed into the silence. At his words the crowd of witches and wizards behind him began to make themselves heard once again. A second, even louder bang erupted from the end of Voldemort's wand and the telltale signs of a Silencing Charm tugged at Regina's throat.
"He was killed while trying to sneak out of the castle grounds." Voldemort told them gleefully as soon as it was quiet once more. "Killed while trying to save himself!"
Regina saw what was about to happen and tried in vain to reach out and grab the arm of the teenager who was pushing through the crowd. She missed and Neville stepped forward, breaking free of the group of people clustered around the castle doors and lunging towards Voldemort and the Death Eaters opposite them. He barely made it a few feet before the Dark Lord flicked his wand lazily and Disarmed him with very little effort. He laughed coldly as Neville stood in the bleak stretch of courtyard between the castle and its attackers.
