Yay! Lucky number 88! (In my original plan all those years ago this story wasn't going to get past 18 chapters… likewise, it wasn't going to be written over a span of 4-5 years. Pfft.) A/N at the end… because it'd give stuff away to have it at the beginning…
Disclaimer: Characters and settings belong to JKRowling and Warner. Och aye!
ooOOoo
Chapter 88
His foot skidded out from under him and he began to slide.
Harry flung out an arm, but the only rocks he snagged with his fingers were loose and rattled down with him, bouncing faster and faster. He tried to dig in with his elbows to slow himself down, which worked for a moment, but then a jutting rock hit his funny bone (which wasn't funny in the least) and Harry yelped and cursed and skated backwards down the skree on his stomach.
There was a terrible stink – it was –
– he was on top of it, gagging –
– he dropped and landed on a shelf, landing on something soft and almost buried in heather, the stone in his hand throbbing as he rolled –
– he sprawled and spread out his arms in hope of catching something.
"Ow!" Harry hissed a painful curse when his elbow hit a rock again and went numb. His hand opened – "Oh, no…" – and the stone flew out, falling up and away and down, down, down. Harry rolled, trying not to fall after it, the numb hand plunging through something like an old suitcase built of twigs, the other hand clinging to the heather desperately, knowing there was no way he could catch the stone now, trying to follow it with his eyes as it fell and hit something invisible –
Crack.
There was a hole in the world. It writhed like Medusa's hair. The stone smashed into a thousand golden sparkles that drifted away on the wind.
Harry had seen something like that before – that time Draco had reached out with his hands and been knocked unconscious. The spinner spell he'd sent out from the top of the cliff had given him a basic idea of the shape, but the stone let him know that there was something there, a something that would be like touching a downed power line if he was stupid enough to get close.
It could only be the tree.
He should be ecstatic. But Harry moved slowly, trying not to breathe. His mouth had gone dry. That was never a good sign. His hand had feeling coming back to it. And this, he sensed in his marrow, was not going to be good: he had punched through the cloaking heather and into some sort of cavity. He was lying on something brittle, something that snapped and clung like old leather. Something… very wrong.
It smelt like death, but there was no sweetness of maggots: this was the sort of death that even flies were afraid to approach. Fragments of magic clung to it, crept cold into Harry's fingers and slipped through his hair.
A dead cow?
Harry's hand had gone through ribs, he realised. Too small to be a cow's.
A calf? A dead sheep? An alpaca?
Then he saw the skull. It was still wearing a hat. Reddish hair poked in wisps from beneath it.
Oh.
He'd found the farmer.
The dock by the water trough – Hagrid said it can be poisonous. The young thistles. Hagrid always keeps them out of the paddocks. These plants don't belong in pasture. But they're young. They must have sprung up after the farmer's death.
The magic seemed to snigger in his ears, dry as scales sliding through pebbles. It had Voldemort's dry edge.
There was a blank space in his mind. In that space Harry found a small corner and braced himself and let the horror wash over him. His mind buzzed. His dry mouth suddenly filled with saliva.
Numb, Harry made it to his knees and threw up away from the body. It was bad enough being sick – his mind sent up a the vague idea that it didn't think it could handle vomiting on a corpse on top of everything else.
Still in that strange demi-space of humming in ears and ghostly flutterings around the edges of vision, Harry wiped his hand on some heather and climbed the rest of the way down, being very careful not to get too close to where he'd seen the edges of the barrier tree shake its fury. The rocky slope here evened out and gave him lots of handy solid rocks and plants to hold onto as he made it the rest of the way down.
He concentrated hard on the climb. Hand. Foot. Hand. Hand. Foot – no, other foot. Foot. Don't think of anything else but Hand Hand Foot… Don't think of anything else, like where my hand has just been…
Once safely in the bottom of the gully, Harry realised he could still hear the buzzing in his ears. At first he thought it was the tree, but then he looked down at his hands and noticed they were shaking. He lifted one to his face.
This hand had… it had… there was…
He doubled over, heaving, but nothing more came up.
Still choking on the bile burning in his throat and the clinging memory of foul magic tickling his skin, Harry stumbled to the small creek. It wouldn't even be that in a few weeks, not unless there was a lot of rain, but it was enough. Harry scrubbed and scrubbed at his hands and arms, using dock leaves and rough-fronded ferns until his skin began to speckle with scratches. Then he lay down on his stomach and drank from the stream. It probably wasn't a wise idea – this was farming country and the water hadn't come from some sanitary city supply – but it tasted fine, a little loamy and with the mineral taste of rock under the mildly bitter tang of fallen leaves, moss, gorse and heather; it washed out the bile from his mouth and the morning chill of it brought him back to himself. Harry rinsed and spat, rinsed and spat until he could only taste the water.
The smell… the smell seemed lodged in his nostrils. Even when he buried his face in the ferns and breathed deeply, knowing that the wind was carrying away any reek of death, his imagination kept the smell alive.
But he didn't have enough time to stop and worry about death. Not unless he wanted to achieve that unhappy state himself without achieving anything productive along the way. He got up.
Time to battle evil again.
Work, work, work.
"Right. Let's see you, tree."
He was pretty sure he knew where the tree was, but he charmed a small stone to pulse soft light and threw it.
Crack.
Yes, there it was. Right where he'd thought it would be. The ground was bare, as if something grew in the area and took up the light and the nutrients. Smaller plants crouched away from it.
Harry took out the darts.
Best to aim low. The main thing was to hit something woody. Even bark would do – Elmsworthy said the darts were sharp and heavy enough to penetrate bark and get far enough into a branch or trunk to apply the potion – the further in the better, but even sprinkling the potion on the tree should do the trick. A leaf would work, yes, but slowly. Possibly so slowly it missed the time window. And there was the possibility of Voldemort coming along and doing a spot of pruning before it got to the heart of the tree. The surest chance of success lay in getting the potion beneath the bark of the trunk. From there it should travel laterally, jumping from grain to grain once it was past this initial defence.
Theoretically.
Harry aimed and threw.
Crack!
The dart whistled back over his head. It rattled against the stones.
Bugger, he thought, smoothing his hair with one hand. That tree had better aim than he did – he'd felt it part his hair. But at least he'd been given a better idea of the actual tree. He was sure that one sweep of bitter light had been a branch twisting to bat aside the dart. Did the tree have some sort of consciousness or self-preservation ethic? None of them had considered that before.
Interesting. And potentially very troublesome.
But Draco or Ron must have succeeded – why else would the barrier have sent that ripple around it? – so that meant Harry was in with a chance.
Right. One down, three to go.
Two darts later, Harry was getting very worried. The tree had batted away the second and third darts. He had no idea where they'd landed.
Last chance…
He stuck his tongue between his teeth and took a deep breath.
He threw.
The tree crackled and the dart was tossed somewhere a long way away.
Harry stood up. He didn't swear. Apart from this sick cold feeling in his gut he felt as numb as he'd been after the realisation he'd fallen on a corpse.
He'd failed. He'd been so sure he was the one – the chosen one – meant to come through the barrier, but Dumbledore had been right. If Dumbledore and Flitwick had been here they'd have figured out some clever way of bypassing a stroppy tree.
He blinked and wiped at his eyes savagely. Did it matter if he lost the unicorn's protection? He was so tired. If Voldemort showed up now at least it would be an end to it. He squeezed his eyes shut against the tears. Self pity? Probably. Realism or self pity, it made no difference. At the end of the day the world would still turn and the stars didn't give a shit if one more human life carried on into the next day or guttered out.
Oddly enough, this made him feel better.
Harry took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. He opened his eyes.
He must have turned, because he suddenly noticed something glittering in the stones on the other side of the creek. He jumped across the creek, skidding on the loose stones which had been left by the snowmelt of spring, and picked it up. It was the first dart, and a scratch on the metal had brought out the shine. The point was bent, of course, but the rest looked sound. Harry touched his wand to it to measure the potion still inside, and found that it hadn't leaked. Not a drop was gone as far as he could tell. It couldn't have penetrated the tree, in that case.
Damn, damn, damn.
Harry tried to straighten the point with his fingers.
He'd expected it to resist or maybe even scratch his fingers. He certainly hadn't expected it to bend like butter. It was the work of a couple of seconds to get it back to normal.
His fingers had a silvery gleam to them. But what –?
The unicorn blood.
He'd touched his eyes. The unicorn blood had flaked onto his fingers. And now the tip of the dart gleamed with it. It was almost transparent now – he could even see the injection spell Hermione had put on the point.
Harry held it up to his ear. Yes – there was the faintest hum, as if the mistletoe potion inside the dart was interacting with the unicorn blood.
He took one last breath to calm himself and told himself it couldn't possibly work – hope was too dangerous right now – and threw the dart.
Thunk.
The world took a deep, crimson breath.
Black emptiness erupted in front of him as the tree groaned and shook and shattered its bonds. Something screamed – silently, in Harry's mind, ringing its pain and rage within his skull.
Voldemort.
Harry was thrown backwards. He landed on his back. Instinct made him throw an arm across his face, and he took it down just in time to see the fireball rise up and disappear in the clouds. He lay there stunned, watching it go, unable to believe he'd actually done it, he'd actually broken the –
A mind reached for Harry's.
Harry closed his eyes and thought hard of the countryside to the south of Hogsmeade – picturing a farm he'd seen once from the Hogwarts Express, thinking of it so hard he could almost feel himself there. He added a few sheep and let himself wonder at the oddity of the distant fireball far, far to the north.
Voldemort snarled in pain and rage.
South? South all this time? But I have found you now, Harry…
Harry let himself feel frightened (oh no Voldemort's found me whatever shall I do, Auror Moody and the twenty other Aurors with me?), then blanked his mind with thoughts of the perfect Wronski Feint and statistics from the last Chudley Canons game he'd got results for.
There was a slight twang and the welcome sensation his head was his own again. Voldemort was gone. To the south, if Harry's bluff worked.
Don't forget your tanning lotion.
Harry grinned and opened his eyes again, looking at the blackened ruin that had been a barrier tree. His grin faded.
If Draco had had that reaction from his tree, why hadn't Harry seen it? Must have been Ron's tree earlier, he decided as he rolled to his hands and knees and scrambled to his feet. He couldn't see the barrier very well from the gully, only the more transparent heights of it, but he fancied he could see two stripes of pewter still running away in opposite directions from the closest point to him.
The oak was a mess. Blackened branches trembled as the last of the spell left the tree in scribbles of light. One fragment of spell reached out for Harry and he lifted his hand at the last minute to ward it off.
It snarled as it evaporated.
Harry let out a breath. He could have sworn it was aiming itself at his scar.
That fireball must have been seen miles away. Even if someone wasn't coming to check the tree after the ripples from Ron's tree, Voldemort would be an idiot to ignore this new development. Wherever he thought Harry might or might not be, Harry wouldn't be surprised if the Dark Lord showed up in person to briefly survey the damage. And he'd be in a very bad mood, no doubt.
Harry told himself that it would be a good thing if Voldemort suddenly appeared – it meant he'd have a chance to hit him with the anti-Voldie potion. But the deeper primordial part of his brain, the part that dealt with threats and fear, wasn't listening. It was telling him to get the hell away from here as fast as Simon could –
Hell. He'd left Simon up there alone. A horse bridled and saddled right next to the gully containing the destroyed barrier tree was a target for any Death Eater flying reconnaissance.
Harry leaped across the creek and started up the slope with as much momentum as he could. The run took him up the lower parts quickly but petered out as he hit a patch of scree and went down on his knees. The denim stopped scraping but the sharp pain let him know there would be bruises tomorrow. And he wouldn't have a tomorrow if he went screaming around like a Kneazle on catnip. Slower but with as much determination as ever, he tackled the steeper sections using plants to hold him up where he couldn't get decent footholds. It was hard going and his arms were aching by the time he reached the ledge he'd fallen onto – the one with the corpse. He kept his eyes on the job rather than letting them seek out the pitiful sight again.
Left hand, right hand, left hand, right hand, check the left foot… He hissed through his teeth as a stone dig into his shin. His sneakers scrabbled at loose rock, but the plants he was using seemed deep-rooted enough. When he ignored the dirt and the mess and the occasional spider (not an Acromantula) he scared out of the rocks, he guessed he was making good time. Maybe he wasn't going as fast up as he'd come down, but he didn't mind. It was better than breaking his neck.
There was an odd rushing noise. Harry had never seen the sea, but the noise was like what he imagined waves would sound like. It grew louder and louder, although never rising above a whisper. He turned his head just in time to see the two vertical pewter ripples coming back around the barrier. They collided where they'd begun, winking out.
The barrier was definitely beginning to react now. Odd spots blossomed and grew and then evaporated back into the eye-watering pearlescence.
Voldemort would definitely be wanting to investigate this one. After remembering at the last moment that wiping the sweat out of his eyes would get rid of the unicorn blood (and that would be a bad thing), Harry blinked hard instead and set to the climb again.
It seemed an age before he reached the top. He'd started thinking about his own safety halfway up: it wouldn't do anything to help Simon if he himself was captured. But it seemed that nobody had come to investigate the northern tree just yet. Was that good or bad? It was certainly good in the short run.
Harry worked his way along the rocky face – there was the hint of a path, although not one used by people. But it gave him a bit more of a toehold than he would have had if he'd gone straight up. Finally he came to a thick stand of some sort of plant they'd never studied in Herbology (which was probably a good sign, come to think of it), and he heaved himself up the last of the way and flopped onto his stomach in the middle of the heather he'd tied Simon to.
The horse whinnied softly. Wheezing and gasping for the oxygen the clouds seemed to have stolen along with the light, Harry rolled over onto his back and looked up and into a large pair of nostrils.
"Good boy, Simon," he croaked. And laughed. Because Simon wasn't dead and neither was he (no matter how dirty and sweaty he was), and at least two of the three trees had had the spell lifted off them. "You're alright. Er, well," he amended, as he sat up and got a better look at the horse's expression, because any relief that Harry had returned had been swept aside by the horse's prior concerns which, going by the fossilised sneer of distaste characteristic to horses and camels, were major and life threatening, "well, you're not in pain or dead. But what's wrong? Steady, now…"
Harry got to his feet. It was harder than it should have been: his knees were dissolving and he'd left his balance halfway down the cliff. He rested his hand on Simon's nose for balance.
"Hey there, Simon. Oh. Oh dear…"
It was lucky the wind wasn't a chilly one, because it was tangling through the mane and forelock and sending it flickering like black flames, and the horse had been standing still long enough to have been chilled if it had been a few degrees lower. Simon wasn't shivering. If he'd been human he would have been steaming – metaphorically speaking.
Simon's expression was indescribable. The closest Harry had ever seen to it had been that time at the start of second year when Snape had been sure Harry and Ron would be booted out of Hogwarts for flying a car into the Whomping Willow… that time right when Dumbledore said they couldn't possibly be expelled for a mistake made before the start of school.
Snape had looked like that.
And now Simon was giving Harry that look along with an extra dollop of resentment, like it was all Harry's fault that he was here surrounded by brazen insolence.
The cows liked Simon.
More than that, the cows positively worshipped the tall dark stranger in their midst.
One cow was licking Simon's shoulder. One, a particularly stocky individual who only came up to the horse's elbow, was wrapping its long tongue around a stirrup. It had pulled it down from where Harry had left it slid up on the stirrup leather, letting the iron bump against Simon's side. The bell cow chewed dreamily on a rein. On the plus side, they were very careful not to poke him with their horns, even the one scratching its head on Simon's rump. Maybe it was the salt from the sweat that they liked, because there was another one snuffling about behind the saddle.
One seemed to be – of, for Merlin's sake, it was – chewing his tail.
"Shoo," said Harry, trying not to laugh. Horses mightn't laugh but Harry was positive Simon would understand being laughed at; moreover he wouldn't take kindly to any slights to his dignity. So Harry swallowed the laugh and when he smiled he tried to keep it out of his voice.
He waved his arms and the cows moved back. They gave him great big liquid-eyed looks of supreme suffering. It would have melted his heart if their eyes weren't glowing green. It was still creepy, although the effect was diminishing. The unicorn-sight was definitely wearing off.
"I'm away for ten minutes and you've got a throng of worshippers," he scolded the horse with that smile he found he couldn't hold back now, ruffling Simon's forelock, pleased the horse was still here and hadn't run off out of horror of the cattle. Or the fireball, for that matter – pretty amazing the horse had stayed after that, Harry considered gratefully. "Well, at least you would've been warm in the glow of their adoration."
Simon didn't seem to think this was funny. The green at the back of his eyes flickered with annoyance. He wrinkled his muzzle and scratched his head against Harry's shoulder with more force than usual, nearly knocking Harry down.
Harry didn't bother to take offence. He grabbed a handful of bracken and used it to briskly wipe off the worst of the spit the cows had left on Simon's neck and shoulder. "There. Much better." The coat wasn't at its shiniest but it was smooth again. Not that Simon seemed to appreciate this. "Well, we don't have time to groom you properly," Harry told the horse. "We've got to find Draco. He should be waiting for us by the stile. If he's finished his tree off, of course. He mightn't have, but –"
As if on cue, the ring squeezed his finger. "Well, maybe he has and I missed the fireball. Although wouldn't the barrier be down if… ah. Maybe it takes time. That was two squeezes. Back to the stile – no, hang on." The ring was squeezing his finger again. "Let's make that the bridge. Three squeezes." Strange Draco had changed his mind – maybe he'd forgotten the code for a moment. He squeezed the ring to let Draco know he'd got the message. "There we go."
Harry checked the girth and brought the un-licked stirrup down from its resting place. Then he remembered –
"Oh, bugger. I forgot to say the password. Hope Malfoy's not too worried…"
Harry spoke the password and squeezed the ring three times to confirm. There was a pause, then another three squeezes rather sharper than the earlier trio – Draco had got the reply but wasn't happy about the wait. Harry wasn't sure if he was meant to reconfirm from his end, but decided that if he did Draco might just think he'd forgotten the code. Best not to have Draco think he was uncertain – Draco tended to panic under stress. He'd been stressed enough when Harry had last seen him and having to wait for Harry to confirm the bridge probably had him yanking at his blond hair.
What if Draco panicked under the stress of Death Eater interrogation? Would he betray Harry?
Maybe. But Harry doubted he'd betray Harry and Simon.
Not unless someone had a wand to his father or mother's throat…
Bad thoughts. Harry shook his head, trying to dispel them.
Simon, temper marginally improved by increased distance from the cows, turned to see if Harry had found some peppermints down in the ravine, effectively breaking Harry's negative train of thought.
Harry gave an amused snort. "Sorry, Simon. Apples when we get back to Hogwarts, okay?"
Simon condescended to have his nose stroked as a form of appeasement by Harry for the lack of apples and peppermints brought back from the exploding tree.
With his hand still resting his hand on the horse's nose, Harry looked around. He breathed through his clenched teeth.
There was one last thing he had to do before he left here.
He picked up the upside-down Algiz stone. It clung to the heather and came away with a faint sucking noise. The fake path wavered and disappeared. Now no more people should be tricked (although Harry had strong suspicions that the farmer's body had lain down there since the barrier was set up… and how exactly did Voldemort set it up? Blood sacrifice? It'd be his style). Harry bit his lip and put the runestone on the top of the cairn. There was the smallest tingle in his fingers as the wards reset themselves. "There we go," he said. "I'm sorry." He couldn't think of anything else to say, and the farmer (if it was him, and it wasn't likely someone else had fallen down that cliff – Muggle hikers were discouraged with spells from coming anywhere near magical livestock, Hagrid had told him) was long dead. Maybe Harry would look for his family later. Providing there was a later, of course – and providing finding them wouldn't put them into danger. But someone needed to keep an eye on the cows. Domestic animals couldn't just be abandoned. At least they had water, but he wasn't sure how long the spring flush of grass would last. The cows watched him with large, trusting eyes. Harry was almost becoming fond of them. So far they'd been the most normal part of his night. Morning. They hadn't done anything more worrying than chew Simon's tail, and despite the long horns they'd been quite gentle. "Don't worry, cows. I'll try and let someone know you need attention. Don't want you running out of food."
Harry gave the horse a pat on the neck as he put the reins back over Simon's ears and remounted.
He gave the gully one last lookover. The blackened oak seemed inert from this distance: a victim of lightning. And the barrier still stood far away, cloaking Hogwarts with rippling waves of magic; standing between him and his home. Between him and Ron and Hermione. Between him and Luna.
"Come on, Simon."
Once Harry had wrestled the gate back into place and the horse and rider were away down the road, the cow with the bell around her neck shook her head and turned to the cow next to her. "So that was Harry Pu'er."
"Always thought he'd be taller," said the second cow. "Yon wizard's a skinny, paukit(1) thing."
"It's nae size that counts, it's intent," the bell cow said stoutly. "And did ye hear him? Telling us he'd find someone to check we had food. Fair melted mah heart, he did." Her dark eyes filled with compassion. "Puur wee lad. Auld Nick hisself in his shadow, snapping at his heels..."
The second cow flicked an ear. "Och. He's no' a bairn," she told her friend pragmatically. "And he's got auld Langshanks minding him."
"Huh. Hisself wha disnae ken hisself, ye mean?"
"Aye, true. But he's got the magic – it wis coming aff him like rain."
"Delicious, it wis – Ah saw ye chewin' on his tail, ye cheeky besom. Shame he wouldnae let us lick his chest. Ah could've reset that spell wi' only mah tongue –"
"Now, Gladys, ye know it would've bin wrang," the second cow told her sternly.
"Och, Ah ken reet well what's needed," the bell cow said huffily. She paused to chew cud before adding doggedly, "Ah still say we should ha' tellt Harry."
"Tellt Harry aboot Langshanks? Dinnae be daft. Lad'd only be fasht. It'd gie him the skitters, ye ken, knowing he needs tae lose his darlin' cuddy as weel as hae a stooshie wi' auld Snakeface. We couldnae ha' tellt him. Ye saw how peely-wally he was when he cam back wi' the smell o' Angus' death on his claes and how the very secht o' his horse cheered him. Nae, Gladys – wee Harry Po'er's got enough tae be goin' on with wi'out us lot gieing him grief. Besides, if he'd wanted tae ken aboot a'thing he would hae asked us direct instead o' shooing us awa' like he did."
"Aye. Ye're right. An' we helped him wi' them tattie bogles." She gestured with a horn uphill to where – if viewed carefully enough – ragged robes with enough scabrous limbs for nearly five Dementors could be seen trampled into the mud where they must have been cornered in a bend in the hedgerow. "He didnae even say thanks for the helpin' horns an' hooves," she grumbled in a quick shift of mood. "Where's manners in the youth o' today, Ah ask ye?"
The second cow sighed. Not for the first time, it occurred to her that it was never the one with brains who got to be the leader. But oor Angus was a good 'un as wizards go, and didnae deserve tae be sacrificed to mak that wall o' jobby magic. Avenge the death o' oor wizard for us. Luck tae ye, Harry, luck tae ye an' the horse ye rade in on.
ooOOoo
A/N: I made a heavy raid on the Scottish Vernacular Dictionary at firstfoot dot com for the conversing cows, as well as dim memories of Billy Connolly and various Scottish co-workers over the years. Extra special thanks go to Whitehound for ironing out the creases and adding several more terms. Any mistakes are, however, mine.
(1) For anyone unfamiliar with the Scottish dialect (like me), here are a few rough translations by a kiwi making feeble attempts to learn Chinese (yeah, because that really helps matters…):
Auld Nick – the devil
bairn – child
claes – clothes
cuddy – I loved how it can refer to a small horse or possibly a donkey and then having the cows use it for Simon. Poor auld Langshanks – er, the long-legged horse aka Simon, that should be…
fasht – upset
hae a stooshie – have a fight
paukit – too small
peely-wally – pale
puur wee – poor little
secht – sight
skitters – bad digestion, to put it delicately.
tellt – told
tae ken – to know ('hisself wha disnae ken hisself' 'himself who doesn't know himself')
tattie boggle – scarecrow, here used to refer to a Dementor
ooOOoo