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Chapter 52
A Final Gathering
For all that Ed and Al had been eager to get home, the day after tomorrow came more quickly than either of them felt ready for. They didn't have to do anything like pack, obviously. They couldn't bring anything with them. But somehow, Alphonse felt woefully under prepared. Not for the transmutation. Al had personally done the sums backwards and forwards, had drawn and redrawn the array. He knew Ed had done the same. After a certain amount of too-risky transmutation, it stopped being all that scary. Not for facing Voldemort either. Al had done that before, and while he suspected that the combined soul might be stronger together than any single piece, Al would have more back-up than last time. And Voldemort would be disoriented.
The problem was elsewhere. "Are you going to be okay without me?" he asked Eve in the odd way of the armadillo. She still did not reply in words - apparently his brain would get better at interpreting animals the longer he was an animagus - but everything about her seemed to say an affirmative.
I'll be fine, she seemed to say.
"I knew getting a cat wasn't fair to the cat," Al said. "But when Tonks brought you, I just couldn't say no."
Eve butted her head against his armored flank. They were walking down an empty corridor, Eve eager to show him the best places for exploring on four paws. She did seem to understand that he was leaving, seemed to be making up for the time they wouldn't have.
"Luna agreed to take care of you." Al added. "If you want."
Eve clearly acknowledged that, but she didn't do anything to indicate what she might feel about it. She would do what she wanted, Al suddenly understood. She just wasn't quite sure what it was going to be. Eve was hardly a kitten anymore.
But Alphonse also understood that the individuation phase of a young cat didn't mean that said cat was immune to feeling abandoned and alone. "Just be careful," he said. "Get help if you need it."
Eve's response was to butt her head into his flank again. That sensation was odd, filtered through his plating. It wasn't the almost-nothing of feeling impact in his sense of motion, like back in his armor in Amestris, but it wasn't like his human skin, either. Some odd in-between. He wouldn't describe it as numb, either. It wasn't numb. It felt with the exact acuity armadillos were supposed to feel. That acuity was just different.
Alphonse tried to stop thinking about it, just leaned into Eve's uncomplicated touch. She was a kneazle cat, a familiar. For as long as she had him, Al was her wizard. And then he wouldn't be. For Eve, that was all that needed to be said.
Ed, on the morning of Halloween, found himself in the Greenhouses. Professor Sprout had a class of first years, and technically Ed should have been teaching his own classes. But Professor Sprout had been trying to get Ed down to the Greenhouses since the start of term and it had occurred to him that he was out of time.
"They're mixing substrate today." Professor Sprout heaved a large bag of loamy soil onto the counter. "As an alchemist, I'm sure you have a unique perspective on what a plant needs to grow."
Ed did not have any first year alchemy classes. Electives didn't start until 3rd year, and however young Ed had been when he started alchemy, even thirteen was too young for these wizard kids. If Ed felt lost working with kids his own age, he had no idea what to do with eleven year olds.
But Professor Sprout gave him an encouraging nudge and Ed found himself teaching a guest lecture on the properties of soil. He kept it simple, got his hands dirty, and started two separate mud ball fights.
He thought the kids might have even learned something. Professor Sprout seemed to approve. "We have to do this again," she said at the end of class, while Ed wiped the mud from his arms.
"Yeah," said Ed, trying to make his agreement sound like goodbye.
Professor Sprout smiled gently; Ed was pretty sure she'd gotten the message.
Harry loitered in the Gryffindor common room on Halloween morning. He had been half-certain that he wasn't going to show up for the final confrontation that the Elrics had planned. Ginny, however determined she was to be there herself, had been completely nonjudgmental about it. Ron, on the other hand, was somehow both judging him and not judging him at once.
Harry had come to recognize that Ron knew him frighteningly well. He had an instinctive understanding of what Harry wanted, even when Harry was too stressed out or too stubborn to admit it to himself.
So when Ron cornered him with a raised eyebrow and a "Y' sure about this, mate?" Harry realized he should probably reevaluate.
"No," he said. "I think I might actually want to be there."
"I know I want to see it be done," said Ron. "Really know it's all over."
Harry considered that, cast a quiet Tempus. It was getting into the afternoon, wasn't it? "We should-"
Ron nodded vigorously. "Hermione's already on her way over with Ginny."
"Shit," Harry said, half rising from his chair by the common room fire. "On their way where?"
"Where else?" said Ron, looking only moderately exasperated. "Elric's office."
Harry probably could have guessed that. It was always there or the Room of Requirement.
By the time Harry and Ron got there, Elric's office was more crammed than Harry could remember seeing it. Hermione and Ginny and Draco Malfoy stood in a tense cluster, all looking wary. There was Professor McGonagall, arm linked with Madam Pomfrey's. Professor Snape was there, looking mildly shell shocked about the whole thing. Harry could relate. For all that the Elrics seemed to gleefully drag people into their bullshit, Snape had mostly stayed out of it. Maybe he hadn't even known this was happening.
Luna, oddly enough, had a hand on Snape's arm. She was clearly trying to be reassuring, but Snape seemed as perturbed by that as by anything else.
"Ron! Harry!" said Bill Weasley, who was somehow there as well. He was supporting the Headmaster, who already looked worn out.
"Bill?" said Ron. "What are you doing here?"
"Been setting wards on the clearing all morning. We'll be doing some pretty dangerous magic, so Ed called me in to help keep it contained."
"That dangerous?" said Ron, whistling low. "Bloody hell." There was a round of soft admonishments about his language, but Harry privately thought that bloody hell was right.
"Well," said Professor Elric. "Dangerous alchemy. Technically. Some of the worst."
"The worst. Not some of." It was only then that Harry noticed there was a man in the room he did not recognize at all.
Incredibly, Alphonse scowled at him. "You would know," he said.
Professor Elric seemed proud of this rare display of sass on Al's part. Or, Maybe not so rare, because Luna certainly didn't seem surprised. Even Madam Pompey only seemed amused. The Headmaster, resigned. The unfamiliar man did not deny it. "I would," he said. "So I know it pays to be careful."
"I'm sorry," said Harry. Because it did pay to be careful, especially around admitted users of the darkest alchemy. "Who are you?"
"Nicholas Flamel," he said, firmly shaking Harry's hand. "I'd like to thank you for rescuing my Philosopher's Stone just a few years back. You kept it out of terrible hands."
"Nicholas Flamel?" said Harry incredulously, looking to Hermione for confirmation. She always knew what was what. She just shrugged at him. "You're supposed to be dead, aren't you? Dumbledore said you had just enough elixir to get your affairs in order after you destroyed the stone."
Flamel smiled thinly. "I lied."
"Not how zee stone works, for one sing," said Professor Elric.
"No one knows how the stone works," said Hermione. "No one except for the Flamels!"
"Right," said Professor Elric. "I don't have time to explain zis to you and I probably shouldn't anyway. So let's go wis zat."
Hermione was absolutely about to argue, Harry could just tell, but Ginny elbowed her harshly. "We are about to permanently kill You-Know-Who and you're worried about the theory behind the Philosopher's Stone? Really?"
Hermione sniffed. "You're right, of course. But excuse me for wanting to know why Professor Elric knows anything about it, before he leaves us forever."
"There are too many of them in Amestris," said Alphonse. "And you don't even want to know zee formula."
In the ordinary course of things, this statement would be guaranteed to earn a biting reproach if Harry knew Hermione at all. But this wasn't the ordinary course of things. Firstly, Ginny elbowed her again. Secondly, both Elrics and Nicholas Flamel had something hard in their expressions. Hermione might actually be learning how to leave well enough alone. Weird.
"They know the secret of the Philosopher's stone," said Snape, looking at the ceiling. "Of course they do. Why not?"
"Not the weirdest thing they've said," said Ron, ever practical, even in the face of his least favorite professor. Apparently, not even Snape could find fault with his logic; all Ron got in response was the usual curling of Snape's upper lip.
"Can we focus?" said Ginny, no longer content to just elbow the people nearest to her. She beat a hasty glance at Snape, amended. "Please."
Snape very pointedly did not look at her, turning instead to look at Professor Dumbledore. The Headmaster inclined his head. "You have selected the best location, Mr. Weasley?"
"I have," said Bill. "If you'd all come with me."
From there, it was a slow walk down from Elric's office, out across the grounds, and into the Forbidden Forest. Given the general sense of urgency, Harry figured it was as brisk a walk as Dumbledore could manage. Aside from his slow and careful gait, aside from his missing hand, the Headmaster seemed diminished somehow that Harry couldn't place.
Still, they made it in good time to a clearing just deep enough into the forest to escape the Hogwarts wards. That magical disturbance, Harry could feel. It was like a sense of safety he'd forgotten about peeled away. He grasped for the familiar handle of his wand, felt Ron do the same next to him. "Hogwarts doesn't like it when folks start placing their own wards." Bill said apologetically.
"Sentient buildings," Professor Elric grumbled unhappily.
"This is perfect," Alphonse assured.
"Yes," said Nicholas Flamed, eyeing the clearing critically. "Do the two of you need help drawing the circle?" Professor Elric and Alphonse exchanged uneasy glances.
"You can start wis zee inner pentagon," Alphonse offered.
"Bothers me how simple zis circle is," said Professor Elric. "But it is, so only help if you want to. Don't sink it'll save us much time."
There was a subtext here - a context, too - that Harry was missing. He tried to figure out what it might be, studying each face in turn, but didn't get much beyond the fact that they were serious.
"And you'll stand on zee other end of zee clearing when we actually set it off." Alphonse added.
Astonishingly, FlameI did not seem remotely offended by this show of mistrust. "I would expect nothing less."
This seemed to settle both Elrics, though they were clearly still wary. Merlin, this did not seem like the right time to be dealing with whatever conflict the three of them shared. Why on earth would you just casually invite someone you didn't trust to a delicate process that would determine the course of your life?
Why did they so deeply distrust Nicholas Flamel in the first place? How did two people from another world, who spent their time here first in Germany and then in Britain, mostly monitored, manage to have actual history with a France-based retiree? Renowned alchemist or not, that was the picture of Flamel that Dumbledore had given Harry back in first year.
Just an old man, minding his own business and settling his affairs.
The Flamel in the clearing didn't look older than fifty. Grey at his temples, creases in his forehead, but a still-strong body and an obviously alert mind.
Ginny was getting antsy again. Harry hadn't really known how deeply touched she was by Voldemort's diary, not even when she was plunging a basilisk fang into the diadem, pain and murder in her eyes. But even she was watching this strange exchange between Nicholas Flamel and the Elric brothers. She didn't try to interject, try to speed things along.
It was Alphonse who ended the stand-off. "Let's do zis," he said, glancing up at the position of the sun. Harry wondered what was important about the time, or if Alphonse just felt the same sense of urgency that Harry did.
There were curt nods all around and the three of them began marking gouges into the ground with long sticks. Harry wasn't far in his alchemy study at all, didn't think he'd be continuing with it, but damn was that a remarkably simple array for something that required the sort of wards Bill Weasley was checking on. Bill's face was grim, too, more careful than Harry was used to seeing on him.
Professor McGonagall, perhaps predictably, was watching the Elrics and Flamel work on their array. She was always focused and serious, but Harry thought this might be the most focused he'd ever seen her.
Glancing around the clearing, it occurred to Harry that there were probably more people here than there needed to be. Professor Elric had been pretty serious about keeping teams small back during their strike on Malfoy Manor, but he seemed to have thrown that principle out entirely today. Harry did a headcount. Fourteen people were standing in this clearing, counting himself. Fourteen.
His fists clenched at his sides, suddenly overwhelmed by the sheer number of ways a transmutation to reunite Voldemort's soul might go wrong, especially with thirteen people Harry wanted to keep safe. Well. Maybe eleven. He didn't really give two shits about Malfoy or Snape. Harry took several breaths through his nose, running an idle finger against the familiar grain of his wand.
It was just as Harry managed to calm himself that the Elrics and Flamel tossed their sticks aside, stepping carefully out of the circle.
"Are you finished?" Professor Dumbledore asked, no twinkle in his eyes at all.
"Yep," said Professor Elric.
"This is the terrible, all-powerful array you've been speaking of?" McGonagall seemed deeply skeptical.
Professor Elric looked at her shrewdly. "One of zem."
"Zee ozer one is more complicated," Alphonse added. "If zat makes you feel any better."
Professor McGonagall looked like she'd tasted something sour. "It doesn't."
"I'm tapped into the wards," Bill announced from his place on the edge of the clearing. "They're stable and ready to go."
Luna produced the tin can that held the horcrux from Harry's brain, stepped delicately across the lines of the transmutation circle to place it in the middle. The can was menacing, somehow.
Ed and Al began exclaiming at once and she fixed them with her hazy stare. "He won't set it off with me inside. He wasn't lying when he said he was done. Besides, I'm not done with this world yet. Not quite." Flamel. they were worried about Nicholas Flamel, who had not yet moved to the far side of the clearing.
Bafflingly, Flamel did not seem to take this personally either. He just backed away from the circle, hands carefully visible. Alphonse muttered something quiet and apologetic in German, and Merlin Harry would have done anything to understand their exchange. Of course Flamel spoke German. It was just as likely as him speaking English, if Harry thought about it.
By the time their exchange was over, Flamel was standing only just within the ward line, nearly as far back as Bill. Harry did not like the Elric-Flamel dynamic at all. But before he could spend too long dithering about it, Luna was stepping out of the circle.
She, apparently, trusted Flamel not to harm her. "I don't think any of the horcruxes are happy to be like this," she said matter-of-factly. "We should finish this."
Just like that, Flamel was forgotten. Everyone's focus was directed solely at the transmutation circle, watching as Ed and Al squatted at the circle's edge, activated the array. The light, as usual, was blinding.
Harry squinted against the glare, tried to peer past the crackle of alchemical energy. The tin can seemed to be buckling against tremendous force. Shapes, wispy and undefined, were dragged into the circle. One was distinctly a cup. One seemed to have no shape at all. The last was -
"Dolores?" said Professor McGonagall aghast.
Sure enough, it was an impression of Umbridge. Her expression was clearly shocked, but there was something about the way her face held that expression that was uncanny. Was unlike the way she had held shock in the time that Harry had known her. She was not herself; there was a distinct glimmer at her throat. A locket.
As quickly as it had come, her impression was gone with the cup, with the formless mass. The tin can bucked and roiled. With an awful grinding sound, it folded in on itself, collapsing into a pile of aluminum dust. Atop it was a red stone. A terribly familiar red stone.
Harry wanted to be sick. He had no time to process that, though, because the Elric brothers were releasing the transmutation, kicking dirt over their etched array so that it could not be activated again.
Professor Elric picked up the new Philosopher's Stone - clearly that's what Voldemort's soul had become - and slipped it into his pocket. He said something soft and bitter and sardonic to Alphonse in German, then turned to face the crowd.
Harry was not the only one who'd put together the pieces, not the only one staring at Elric's pocket in horrified fascination. Hermione wrapped a white-knuckled grip around Harry's forearm. "Is that?"
"Just a little one," Professor Elric confirmed. "We never sought we'd make one." He and Alphonse exchanged one of their more loaded looks.
Hermione swiveled to look at Flamel, who seemed to be trying to hide in his cloak. Harry tried not to think too hard about why that might be. Harry looked around at the field of people who'd just watched Edward and Alphonse Elric make a Philosopher's Stone from Voldemort's soul.
Professor McGonagall was thin-lipped and furious. Luna serene. Ron and Ginny and Madam Pomfrey all looked confused. Dumbledore was resigned again. Everyone else was in various states of horror and shock.
"Is that stone all that's left of him? Ginny asked. "What are you going to do with it?"
"Take him where he belongs," Alphonse said, voice gentle.
"You don't mean hell, do you?" said Hermione, abruptly all fascination again. "You two never struck me as religious."
"Oh no," said Professor Elric. "We're not religious. Not hell."
"It's just zat he's supposed to be dead several times over," said Alphonse. "So we're..." he paused, looking conflicted for a beat too long. "Dropping him off in zee dead zone on our way home."
Hermione did not look satisfied by that answer, but Alphonse was already turning to Luna and wrapping her in a hug. The appropriate time for questions, apparently, was over. From there it was hugs all around.
Harry had not expected hugs from either Elric, really, but he got one from both. Professor Elric hadn't seemed like a hugger, and Harry didn't really know Alphonse all that well. For all that their lives had gotten complicated in unison, Harry hadn't been one of the people who'd gotten emotionally close to either.
"This is it?" said Hermione, a quaver in her voice. "You're leaving?"
"We have to get home," said Professor Elric. "We left everyone in zee aftermath of a giant mess. Gotta see how zat shook out, see if we can help."
"What about alchemy class?" Very little was higher on Hermione's priority list than class.
Professor Elric glanced at Nicholas Flamel. "I sink I've just introduced you to zee most accomplished alchemist in your world."
Flamel looked at Professor Elric incredulously. "Are you joking? I thought you were kidding in your letter. I've been retired for nearly a century!"
Professor Elric gave him a hard look. "Cope."
While this conversation was going on, Alphonse was on the other side of the clearing. Harry inched closer to snoop, leaving Hermione to negotiate her continued alchemical education. Ron was with her. Harry trusted him to be practical for her. Besides, Malfoy was moving in on the conversation himself and Harry had limited tolerance for his ex-arch nemesis.
Alphonse was being hugged especially tightly by Madam Pomfrey. "I'll miss you," she said, "And not just because I'll miss your help in the Hospital Wing."
"Hire more help." Alphonse said tearfully.
"Would that Hogwarts had the budget," Professor McGonagall said. "Be safe in that crazy postwar world of yours, would you? And make your brother quit his job."
Alphonse laughed. "He said he quit just before we came here. Zey'd take him back, but I don't sink he wants to go back."
"Thank Merlin for that," said Professor McGonagall. She gave Alphonse a hug of her own. "Now what do you have to do next? You have another circle to draw, don't you?"
"Yes," said Alphonse. "It'll take us a while, if you want to head back to zee castle." He seemed to give Professor McGonagall a meaningful look. "You'll recognize zee array, unfortunately."
McGonagall stared Alphonse carefully in the eyes. "I'll be staying." she said. "I suspect most will want to stay." That turned out to be correct. As the Elrics drew their second transmutation circle of the afternoon, the rest of the group watched in a tense silence.
This circle was much more complicated, more like what Harry had expected for the first one. Honestly, he marveled at the level of detail they achieved by dragging sticks through the dirt. He shuffled back towards Ron and Hermione, curious at what commentary she was whispering.
"I think I see the symbol for restructuring Carbon," she said. "Why am I seeing a symbol for restructuring Carbon?" She continued like that.
Ginny sidled up next to them. "I'm glad you decided to come, Harry."
"Me too," Harry said, giving her a sheepish smile. Other conversations were quietly erupting around them. Hermione and Malfoy dragged Flamel back into discussion. Snape and Professor Dumbledore were talking quietly, perhaps urgently. Bill Weasley, one eye still on his wards, was talking to Professor McGonagall and Madam Pomfrey.
Luna was the only one who maintained a silent vigil. It struck Harry that Alphonse might be her only real friend. She was about to lose him. He resolved, not for the first time, to be more careful about including her. She'd been at the Department of Mysteries, after all. And she never once looked at Harry like he was crazy.
For such a complicated array, especially given that the Elrics were working freehand with no reference, it came together quickly. Luna and Professor McGonagall and Madam Pomfrey got extra hugs, and when Hermione realized that Ed wasn't coming back around to her, she tackle-hugged him.
"I'd say keep in touch, but..."
Incredibly, Professor Elric grinned at her. "Right?" he said. "Zis whole universe hopping sing is absolute bullshit."
Hermione did not even pretend to look scandalized at his language. Like Luna was losing her only friend, Hermione was losing the only people their age that could really keep up with her. Oof.
Then, before Harry was really ready for it, the red stone was coming out of Professor Elric's pocket and being placed at the center of the painstakingly complicated array. Shoulder to shoulder, the Elric brothers put their hands to the edge of the transmutation circle. There was the blue flash of alchemy, and then they were gone.
Silence descended over the field. Ginny was the first to break it, gripping Harry's hand in hers. "It's over," she said, voice little more than breath. The late-afternoon sun caught in her hair.
There was no longer even a stone to show for Voldemort's pursuit of immortality.
Word Count: 4069
Onward to the Epilogue, folks. Thank you all for sticking with me through to the end. It's been a blast, and I cannot overstate how much each of you contributed to my growth as a writer. Looking forward to seeing you all for one last hurrah, and then it will be on to new fanfiction adventures.
