Shout out to Leapyearbaby29 for going through and reviewing every chapter. Made me think I should actually update this thing, lol
Action-packed chapter ahead.
No Church in the Wild
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The Hanging Tree (Part Two)
Multicolored streaks of light shot across the room, ricocheting off the walls wildly, exploding in sparks as they narrowly missed the Death Eaters who were trying to organize themselves, shouting instructions over one another, but it just caused more confusion, more noise. Many tripped over their own feet as they dove to dodge the attacks that seemed to come from nowhere.
"Confringo!" Harry roared. The spell shot outward, blasting his target backwards. The man's robes caught fire as he slammed into the wall, sparks from his clothes jumping onto the hair of another witch next to him who shrieked, patting at her smoking head frantically as she danced about, colliding into everyone around her, inciting even more panic.
Harry ducked out of the way of a diving Wildfire Wheel, tugging Hermione's arm to get her moving in the same direction. She was pressed close to his side underneath the invisibility cloak, busy casting her own spells with deadly accuracy. Each of her victims howled in pain or were left without a weapon as their wands flew out of their grasps.
Without missing a beat Harry took advantage of the distraction, teeth ripping open the last packages of Whiz-Bangs and Whirly Pops Neville had given him. He tossed the whole lot into the air.
"Incendio!"
Loud, whistling, blazes of glory exploded in all directions to join the chaos Harry had already started above.
Low to the ground, in the middle of all the madness, Harry saw Ron and Malfoy still huddled behind Hermione's shield. Malfoy was ducked down and protecting his head with both arms. Ron was on the other side of him, presumably doing the same though Harry couldn't see from his current position.
The fireworks were providing a great distraction, but there were so many Death Eaters packed into the room that it was more difficult to maneuver around them then he'd anticipated. More seemed to be Apparating in by the second too. An army gathering its soldiers.
"It would seem that Harry Potter has decided to join us..." the Dark Lord's voice hissed in cold amusement, magically amplified over the whistling, spinning fireworks and shouting voices.
The shadows cast from the large fireplace he stood in front of outlined Voldemort's tall figure, playing across his pale face, elongating his arrogant smirk into something even more dangerous and predatory while he scanned the crowd, seemingly unmoved by the pandemonium happening around him.
Though he knew there was no way he could be seen while under his cloak, a chill ran through Harry at the sight of his mortal enemy so close. And he couldn't help the feeling of uneasiness as those red eyes passed over where he and Hermione were, weaving their way carefully through the panicked crowd, drawing closer to the others.
Hermione's shield charm had failed by this point, and Ron and Malfoy were left exposed. Harry's eyes went to Ron who was laid out on the floor. He'd assumed his friend was staying as low to the ground as possible for safety, but now he could see how loose his arms lay on either side of him. Clearly unconscious.
Then he saw how the right side of Ron's face was a bloody, gory mess… A deep chill suddenly ran up Harry's spine as he realized what he was really seeing.
A horrified gasp escaped Hermione and her hand suddenly grabbed his- squeezing Harry's in a temporary death grip in her shock. Then she dropped to her knees in the growing pool of red around Ron's head, her trembling hands going to Ron's face, carefully cupping it through the invisibility cloak.
She whispered hoarsely to his unconscious figure, "Hold on Ron... just hold on... we'll get you to help, you'll be okay..."
"My Lord! We breached Hogwart's grounds and we found her! We have her!"
Harry, a strange numbness settling in his chest, forced himself to look away from his horribly wounded friend, towards the excited voice at the front of the room.
Two more Death Eaters had appeared, holding a struggling woman between them. A firework swooped in one last circle above their heads before bursting apart with an impressive bang. The kaleidoscope of neon lights illuminated Narcissa Malfoy's frightened expression as they dragged her forward.
Next to him, Malfoy suddenly jumped to his feet. A Death Eater barely managed to snatch his arms, struggling to hold him back from running to his mother. "Let go!" Another stepped forward to help, and after a moment Harry recognized Snape.
"Very good, very good!" Voldemort was saying over the sounds of Malfoy's struggles, gazing down in approval at the woman brought before him. His eyes slightly narrowed as he placed a hand on Narcissa's flat stomach. "But, you are without child now… tell me, where is the infant?"
Narcissa twisted in the clutches of her captors, catching sight of Draco behind her. "If—if you let my son go I'll tell you!"
Voldemort moved his hand to her cheek. Long fingers playing at her hair. "No… no. I think we're past that now Narcissa. We'll find the child. He can't have been far from where they found you."
"Please, my Lord-" she pleaded.
He ignored her, gaze scanning the room again. "Are you watching Potter?" The Dark Lord raised his arms, spreading in a wide, theatrical arc. The Elder Wand sparked brightly at its tip, a yellow light enveloping it briefly. It lengthened, the illuminated tip sharpening to a dangerous point.
"Are you ready to let her die while you cower in the shadows?"
Teeth clenched, Harry's fist tightened around his wand.
Voldemort traced the knife-edge oh so lightly across Narcissa's cheek, a thin line of blood in its wake as she grimaced.
"Stop!" Harry ordered, slipping out from his cloak. He stepped forward, locking eyes with Voldemort. "I'm here. I'm the one you want to fight."
Death Eaters swarmed from all sides. He'd stepped far enough away from Ron and Hermione that he hoped she wouldn't be discovered. Rough hands grabbed at nearly every part of him, wrenching him helplessly back and forth, wand torn from his grasp by a witch to his left.
"Ah. So predictable," Voldemort commented airily. "To his knees."
A well-placed foot to the back of his legs and Harry was down, more kicks and blows rained down on his back and he was brought low, bowing helplessly before his foe.
He chuckled. "Good. Now, I'm sure you had an eyeful of your blood traitor friend's predicament but- here's another little preview of what's in store for you… and everyone you've ever been associated with, of course," Voldemort smiled, calmly readjusting his grip on the Elder wand before promptly plunging the newly formed weapon straight through Narcissa's chest.
"No!" Malfoy screamed as Harry felt utter shock.
Narcissa gasped. Her feet gave out from under her and she fell forward, causing the blade to sink deeper, piercing through the back of her white gown, blood blossoming across the fabric. Eventually, Voldemort tilted his wrist and allowed her to slip off.
She collapsed to the floor, her long blond hair spread out beneath her.
"No! No!" Malfoy managed to break lose, leaving a stunned Snape behind him.
Malfoy ran to his mother's side, immediately dropping down next to her, both hands pressed to the wound. "No no no…."
Narcissa managed to place a trembling hand over his. A small trail of blood wound its way from her lips. She smiled softly up at her son, expression full of remorse and, somehow, love.
Frantic, Malfoy looked around the room for help, eyes glistening. He found Harry. "Dittany! Now! Hurry!"
Harry could only stare back at him. Trapped as he was. And there was no Dittany left. There was nothing. Draco, of course, knew this.
But Draco was not thinking straight. He turned from him to Snape, voice breaking, "Please, help!"
Narcissa's hand fell to her side. Her eyes slipped closed.
"No..." Draco arms shook, his hands still pressing on the wound. A sob ripped from his chest.
Voldemort chuckled, looking down at the pair at his feet, quite amused by it all. The Elder Wand flashed again, resuming its previous shape, the blood disappearing from it.
"What do you think, Potter? A fitting end to a traitor like her?"
Harry glared at Voldemort through his unruly bangs, a cold anger coursing through him. It was the only movement he was allowed by the Death Eaters holding him in place. "You didn't have to do that! Coward!"
Voldemort's pale face cracked into a macabre grin. "Well, if you thought that was cowardly, I just can't imagine what you'll think of this."
Voldemort placed his wand atop Draco's bowed head. It spurred Harry into movement, and he struggled against the hands holding him. They redoubled their own efforts though and he was painfully shoved back into place.
"Draco, move! Run!" he tried to warn. But the other boy was oblivious, completely lost in his own grief. Tears ran freely down his face.
A flurry of movement to Harry's left grabbed his attention. In one smooth move Snape whipped open his outer cloak, pulling multiple beakers from his robes and performing a wordless spell that unstopped them simultaneously. He threw a hand out and the beakers flew in all directions, crashing against the floor, the walls, the ceiling. Dark smoke billowed from the shattered glass, quickly filling the air.
"Severus!" the Dark Lord thundered- he'd dropped his wand from Draco's head. His expression was shocked. Furious. "You DARE!"
Snape ignored him, brow furrowed in concentration, wand making quick movements while chanting: "Conjuris omni illtu plantusim…" He twisted around, aiming at Harry who ducked his head. No not at Harry, he realized, but at the Death Eaters holding him, "Omnis captivus il aeris!"
Harry felt vibrations. Rumbling. It seemed to be coming from beneath him, the floor tiles shifting about. Thick, green ropes suddenly began to wriggle themselves out from beneath and between the grout where Snape's potions leaked into the surface. Across the entire room, dozens upon dozens of the green ropes burst free from the destroyed tiles.
No, they weren't ropes. They were plants. Vines, he realized. They grew before his eyes, longer and longer, each one sprouting ever higher, up towards the ceiling.
A single vine reached out and wound itself around the Death Eater to Harry's left, wrenching her arm away from Harry while another shot forward, spooling around the shocked witch's leg. To his right, another plant spooled itself around another hapless Death Eater, even as they yelled in shock, shooting spells. But it seemed a doomed effort; other vines quickly joined the first, all of them working in unison to completely engulf the ensnared Death Eaters.
The scene replayed itself, again and again around him, the vines exploded out of the ground at amazing speeds, shooting across the room to loop around the limbs of whatever or whoever they could reach.
A vine broke through a support column, snapping it loudly in two, and that section of the roof collapsed inward. Multiple cracks of Disapparition echoed around the room as Death Eaters disappeared to escape from the deadly falling debris.
The room was really falling apart now, vines virtually everywhere. They were growing completely out of control, replicating more every passing moment. He could hardly see even four feet in front of him.
They continued bursting forward from the ground, growing larger in both width and height, pressing and coiling against the ceiling which flexed and curved. Pressure lines and cracks suddenly appeared in the molding and bits of plaster rained down on their heads.
The hands holding Harry in his kneeling position began to disappear one by one, more concerned with protecting themselves from the horror show unfolding around them, and Harry managed to wrench himself loose. He immediately took advantage of his newfound freedom, retrieving his wand back from the woman who'd snatched it from him, her own arms twisted behind her back by the vines.
He glanced back to the front of the room, and saw Malfoy get snatched by a vine, it wrapped itself around one of the Slytherin's legs and though he was desperately trying to pull it off and shake it loose, he could not. Malfoy gave a shout as it began to pull him roughly across the floor, away from his mother's body.
Where had Snape gone? It seemed he'd completely disappeared from the chaos he'd created. Perhaps he'd been forced to Disapparate?
"Potter!"
Harry turned and saw the potion's master had somehow found Ron and Hermione. He crouched next to them, a hand on each of their shoulders. "Come, we have to leave now!"
"Hurry!" Hermione beckoned desperately.
Harry dove forward, running for them. His hand grasping Snape's arm. At once, he felt the familiar tug begin at his navel—
With a pained shout Harry fell to the side, buffeted hard in the shoulder. He hit the ground, nearly pinned under a huge chunk of ceiling plaster.
Dazed, he realized if it had fallen even a few more inches to the left it probably would have smashed his skull in. But the others were gone, they'd successfully Disapparated without him.
He spared a glance towards Voldemort and was shocked to see even he had managed to get caught up too, his wand hand was actually pulled down and pinned tightly to his side, vines wrapping themselves around his torso. As Harry watched, one even wound across Voldemort's face, pulling his head painfully to the side, gagging his mouth. He couldn't cast a spell. He couldn't wriggle free.
They locked eyes.
Clambering back up to his feet, Harry ran towards him.
Voldemort struggled against his binds as Harry reached his side. He snatched Voldemort's pale wrist, at the hand holding the Elder Wand, and he twisted it mercilessly.
The Dark Lord shouted through the vine gagging him. Shocked. Pained.
Harry ripped at his fingers, and he felt the grip loosening- Voldemort gave another shout but he could not stop Harry from pulling the wand from his fingers. Now he was defenseless. Trapped. Abandoned by his Death Eaters. He was practically as vulnerable as the day he'd been reborn out of that cauldron by Peter Pettigrew.
"Kill him!"
Behind Voldemort's shoulder, Malfoy hung upside-down, gasping, face contorted. Blood blossomed in big patches on the leg of his jeans and Harry realized that the vine had not just wrapped itself around his leg, it was actually going through his leg. His face was twisted in pain, desperate. His voice cracked as he demanded, again, savagely, "Kill him Potter!"
Harry shifted his gaze back to Voldemort. The so-called Dark Lord looked enraged. He struggled against the vines fruitlessly.
Harry took both wands into his right rand. He laid their points gently on Voldemort's forehead.
"Do you have any remorse Tom?"
His adversary's eyes were wide. His pupils shrunken to pinpricks of terror and hatred as he looked back and forth between the wands and Harry, his chest rising and falling rapidly as the vines continued their squeezing pressure around him.
He managed to bite down on the vine in his mouth, making it retreat temporarily. "Never!" he spat. "You dare ask me that!?"
Harry nodded.
He thought of his parents.
"Avada Kedavra."
Despite his calmness, the bang was like a cannon blast, both wands erupting green blasts of color straight into Voldemort's forehead. His snake-like face held a surprised expression for one brief moment before it seemed to crumple inward on itself, eyes rolling up, mouth slack.
Harry stepped back, lowering his weapons.
It was done.
He looked over towards Malfoy and found him hanging limply in the air, like some macabre tree ornament. He'd fallen unconscious. Perhaps there had been no witnesses to this monumental event.
Feeling somewhat numb, Harry started forward, intending to cut the other boy down and get them both out of there. He'd only taken a few steps when he felt a sudden sharp pain and had to stop, huffing a breath. His... heart?
Puzzled, he glanced down. A sword tip was emerging forward from his chest.
"It may be a fake, but it's still sharp," Bellatrix Lestrange's cold voice suddenly whispered in his ear, shoving the sword further and further through him. He felt the hilt pressing into his back. Her voice suddenly rose hysterically, "You took my master's life, so I'll take yours!"
Harry stumbled to his knees, the sword pulling back out of the wound with a wet sound. He thought she kicked him in the back too but everything was fading to black at the moment and he couldn't be sure.
Distantly, he felt his body his collapse forward to rest in his own gathering puddle of blood, but it was a muted sensation. He didn't feel much pain, only a calm numbness spreading through his limbs. His vision fully dimmed to nothing. His hearing quickly followed and Bellatrix's unhinged cackling faded into a peaceful silence.
In fact, his mind's eye was already beginning to see the image of a familiar train station… He was certain he wouldn't have a choice about leaving this time...