The auror captain smirked as the curse-breaker they brought fired a particularly powerful spell at the house's wards, making them shudder from the strain.
Bringing Bill Weasley along, was definitely a right call.
She calmly watched as her squad, consisting of three junior aurors and led by the curse-breaker, rained spells on what appeared to be random spots on the house.
'Thank Merlin that I managed to raise the muggle-repelling wards before these idiots started the raid,' she thought with a sigh.
She couldn't believe that her subordinates managed to get promoted from trainees with the skills they were currently displaying.
'To be fair though, I should have still been a junior auror as well… Scrimgeour is probably so generous with the promotions because of our current lack of manpower and the recent events. What with Sirius Black still on the loose, the international tri-wizard tournament that some idiot decided to restart, and the strange disappearances that keep happening all around the place,' she mused darkly.
Looking up, she observed contentedly that her square had almost finished bringing down the wards.
'We may just reduce those issues by one, though I doubt the old man's intel is to be trusted,' she thought absentmindedly, foolishly letting herself relax.
She barely noticed the house's door suddenly opened and two figures emerged from it, sending spells their way.
"Bloody hell," the senior auror cursed as the Weasley got hit by a red spell, presumably a stunner.
'I let my vigilance down… Ha, Moody's never going to let me live this down,' Nymphadora Tonks realised with a groan.
Thankfully, Black and his partner in crime didn't start firing any fatal spells for some reason, and she dearly hoped they would continue that way.
Unfortunately, they were two men down.
Shifting her spiky pink hair to a black buzzcut, Nymphadora Tonks started her retaliation.
.
Harry watched with anticipation as his godfather kicked the door open.
While no doubt their situation was bad, with the consequences of getting caught being too dreadful to think about, it was Harry's first time having a real duel with wizards.
Sure the said wizards were aurors, but despite the pink-haired woman and the familiar-looking redhead, the other three seemed to be barely out of Hogwarts.
'Wait, I'm pretty sure that I know them,' Harry considered, and after a moment he confirmed their identities.
The first two were two Ravenclaws from the last year, and the remaining one was a Hufflepuff.
'Didn't that eagle bastard bully me during my second year for being the heir of Slytherin?' he thought with spite and his wand that was previously aimed at the puff, now pointed at the old Ravenclaw.
While the older boy's accusations of Harry's ancestry turned out to be correct in the end, that didn't give him any right to throw spells at the younger student when he passively walked down the corridors.
"You are thinking too much," chastised Sirius as Harry fired an overpowered stunner at the unsuspecting Hogwarts alumni.
He belatedly realised that the older and more experienced man was right.
Sirius' own stunner had just connected with the Weasley look-alike and his second spell was already on its way towards the only woman on the field.
Harry watched in fascination as her hair transformed into an inconspicuous and comfortable-to-fight-in style, right before she batted Sirius' spell away.
'I've never seen anyone do that before…'
Heck, he didn't know it was even possible to bat away spells like they were some sort of mundane projectiles.
Noticing that he was falling into his thoughts again, Harry shook his head and turned his attention back to the others.
He knew that his godfather would busy himself with the skilful, albeit odd, woman.
Luckily, by the time the young auror noticed his astonishingly fast stunner flying his way, it was too late.
He barely managed to cast a wordless protego that didn't offer much resistance to the red spell and shattered immediately upon impact.
In the next moment, the charm hit the young auror in the torso and sent him into a dreamless sleep.
Encouraged by his success, Harry continued throwing spells.
He threw a banishing charm, followed by a stunner and an incancerous, for good measure.
His target, the Hufflepuff alumni, was momentarily surprised by the quick spell chain and his comrade's fall, but he still acted on time.
He skillfully dodged the first two spells and raised a shield for the last one.
Fighting his own surprise, the remaining claw joined the fray by sending two stupefy charms, cast in quick succession, at Harry.
The boy swiftly face-planted on the floor, allowing the two spells to harmlessly pass above him, and generously sent back an exploding curse.
The auror met the spell with a powerful shield charm and Harry realised that he wouldn't be able to bring the two aurors down with the spell repertoire he was using.
Instead, as soon as the two men brushed off their initial surprise and got comfortable fighting him, he'd lose.
'I hope Sirius won't be too mad,' he thought and got up, dodging an expelliarmus cast by the puff.
"SSSecare," he hissed in a very low tone, graciously sending the parseltongue variation of the cutting curse towards his last aggressor.
While no one could identify Harry with his current form, getting caught speaking in the language of snakes could easily remedy that.
The junior auror's shield immediately cracked when the white, almost translucent, spell reached it, but the young man somehow managed to ricochet it away in the last moment.
"ANDREW, ANOTHER," came an urged shout
The puff, or Andrew, didn't see the following stunner and thus, two out of the three Hogwarts alumni were out.
.
Hector Fawley, a recent graduate of Hogwarts and a proud junior auror, almost froze when his second mate fell.
He was alone now.
'Fuck me sideways. It's my first time fighting while on duty… Who's this guy and why are his spells so powerful?' he wondered with indignation and narrowly avoided a spell coming his way, the same spell that cut through Andrew's shield as if it were paper.
He didn't dare imagine what would have happened had it hit him.
'I have to call for backup,' he mused and risked throwing a glance at his commanding officer.
Tonks was slowly, yet surely, getting pushed into a corner. She wouldn't last long against the notorious mass murderer Sirius Black.
"The fight's here," Hector heard, right before a strong force connected with his upper body, knocking him a couple of meters away.
It also took his wand…
The young auror let out a pained yelp as his back met the pavement.
He didn't fall into despair just yet though, he had one last card up his sleeve.
.
Harry sauntered towards the unarmed auror, throwing his wand somewhere behind him.
There was no reason to either break it or steal it after all.
Not bothering to say anything, Harry levelled his wand at the downed man, who was looking at him with contempt, and muttered the stunning charm's incantation.
"Stupef-"
He cut his spell off and scarcely managed to throw himself back, just in time for a nebulous purple fire to materialise on the spot where he stood a moment prior.
Had his magical sense not warned him about the magic about to go off, he'd have been seriously harmed.
'No, I'd have been burned to a crisp,' he corrected with dread, feeling the magic of the insidious fire.
With barely controlled killing intent, Harry gazed at the man who almost killed him.
He was holding a wand!
Just as Harry was about to introduce him to what the real nasty curses were like, the man disapparated away with a crack.
"Curses," he muttered.
He didn't have any time to think about it though because someone let out a pained yelp behind him.
Harry turned around and saw Sirius on the floor, clutching his bloodied sides.
He immediately raised his wand, ready to defend his godfather, but there was no need…
The auror woman was lying soundlessly on the floor; she was unconscious.
Knowing that there wasn't any imminent threat to them nearby, Harry rushed to the injured man.
"Sirius," he cried, taking note of the deep gushes on his person.
The man gave him a weak nod in answer.
"Vulnera Sanentur," he muttered and traced his wand over his wounds.
Harry watched in amazement as the song-like words caused the flow of Sirius' blood to cease.
Sirius cast the spell a couple more times and finally, the wounds knitted themselves.
"Useful little spell, init? Remind me to teach it to you sometime," he murmured, his voice getting quieter as he spoke.
By the time he finished, Sirius fell to Morpheus' clutches.
"Sirius," Harry cried again and rushed to the man's side.
For a short moment, he feared the worst.
Thankfully, his fears turned out to be unfounded.
'Thank god he's alright,' he thought placidly after checking the older man's pulse; it was strong and steady.
Despite feeling reassured, Harry still chose to cast a healing charm on the man.
'The only healing charm I know…'
"Therapo," he lightly hissed and a calm green spell hit his godfather.
'Damn healing spells. Why are they so exhausting to cast?' he wondered.
The unconscious man's complexion visibly relaxed after the spell, making Harry sigh in both content and fatigue.
His joy, however, was short-lived as he heard quiet cracks reverberating behind the nearby houses.
'The backup,' Harry realised with dread.
Acting on instinct, he pulled out his invisibility cloak and threw it over Sirius' body.
He also cast a few sticking charms, making sure that it wouldn't fall off as soon as he woke up.
There was another problem though…
'What if someone steps on him?' he wondered, panicking as he started hearing steps heading in his direction.
"Fuck," he cursed, wracking his brain for a solution.
He didn't have time…
He pointed his wand at the place where he remembered throwing the cloak and cast a charm.
"Repello Muggletum," he incanted and threw a glance at eleven GrimmauldPlace.
Throwing a softening charm on the ground of the neighbour's house, Harry levitated Sirius' invisible and muggle-repelling body and banished it.
Thankfully, no cracking sounds followed.
'The cloak could have muffled it,' he mused.
He didn't get to ponder on the chances of that being the case though as an auror entered his vision at last.
And then another one, and then…
'Shit, shit, shit,' he inwardly chanted.
He was surrounded.
Twelve whole aurors were forming a semicircle perimeter around him, and they weren't of the inexperienced kind he duelled with moments prior.
No.
Every single one of the red-robed law enforcers was older than the woman from before and looked like a battle-hardened veteran.
Except for a single wizard, no one fired any spells, albeit the rest had their wands pointing at him.
The said wizard kept firing the same spell over and over again at each of the downed aurors from the previous fight, not forgetting the redhead.
After that, he gave a firm nod to another red-clad individual.
They didn't appear to be in any haste at all.
'The bastards know that I can't escape…'
Where was his damn phoenix?
With half of his concentration, Harry slipped into his soul and tried yet again to contact his fiery avian…
His attempts amounted to nothing.
He could feel Fawkes' emotional state, which consisted of distress, but nothing more than that.
He then shifted his attention to his other familiar.
He could still contact Ash as they weren't that far away, but he didn't see the reason to do so.
He didn't need any distractions and besides…
'The bastard is sleeping.'
While Harry was inwardly cursing his innocent snake familiar, the aurors finally decided to act.
Fortunately, not with spells.
"We've been informed that you, along with Sirius Black, had just had a brief encounter with one of our units," an old man who showed an uncanny resemblance to a lion started saying.
His voice was loud, though not quite booming, and calm.
It was as if everything was under his control.
'How do I escape?' Harry wondered, half listening to the man, and glanced around.
He couldn't fight the aurors, there were simply too many of them for him to do anything.
"However, I do not see the escaped convict anywhere. It's just you here," the tough man continued and threw Harry an inquiring look that clearly demanded answers.
'So that's what the spell he cast before talking was for. It was probably homenum revelio,' he mused and met the man's ferocious gaze.
Slightly bothered by the keen yellowish eyes that seemed to gaze into his very being, Harry reached for his phoenix's bond in an attempt to feel the familiar comfort it provided; one of the many perks of having a phoenix familiar.
'I need to stall,' he thought and the despair that was previously trying to claim him halted.
A tiny, burning flicker of hope was born inside him.
"Ah, I'm afraid that Mr Black didn't quite like the atmosphere here and decided to take his leave," Harry said.
Thankfully, the insidious ring on his finger didn't just change his appearance. It made one wonder just how such an artefact was created…
The man frowned at Harry's sarcastic response and yet Harry didn't mind.
As long as the aurors didn't start shooting spells, all was good.
Fawkes was coming.
Even though the fiery avian couldn't use their soul radio just yet, Harry could feel his presence closing, albeit at a slower rate than he initially believed.
"Who are you?" the auror asked, not bothering to hide his annoyance.
"No, that's the wrong question. I'm sure you'll find that one out after you capture me," Harry answered, albeit he wasn't sure if they would be able to find the appearance-changing ring on him.
"And what's the 'right' question?"
He could practically feel the quotation marks in the old man's question.
"What do you know about… Sirius Black?" Harry inquired, hoping that the man wouldn't simply order his aurors to take him out.
That wouldn't end well at all…
He'd be thrown into Azkaban, none the wiser about his true identity, and when the time for the second task came, he'd forfeit his magic for not participating.
That scenario made him shudder.
Still, it was better than being found out and somehow landing in Dumbledore's custody…
"He's a black, a serial killer and the first escapee of Azkaban. What else is there to know about him?" the man asked, somewhat confused by the question, albeit there was a glimmer of curiosity in those piercing yellow eyes.
"What about his trial?" Harry fired.
He was immensely pleased by the bewildered look the man sent him.
He wasn't as happy to see many aurors slightly twitching.
'Come on.'
"What about it?" the team's commander asked.
Harry let out a dramatic sigh, drawing everyone's attention even more if possible.
He was also careful to not perform any sudden movements.
"There was none," he simply stated.
And there it was.
His hope.
For a moment, a single moment that was no longer than the blink of an eye, the old aurors, and Rufus Scrimgeour stalled.
They didn't expect that.
Worse, they knew that the young man's words were true. After all, all of them were on duty back in the first wizarding war…
How come no one realised that little fact until now?
What did it mean?
Did it even mean anything? Needless to say, Harry didn't let that minuscule window of opportunity pass by.
With how long Fawkes was taking, he had to act…
His best bet was a desperate but successful Phoenix flash. However, to attempt one, Harry would have to be outside of the aurors' field of view.
And so he acted…
It hadn't taken him long to decide on the spell.
No one managed to react in time as Harry raised his wand above his head and swished his wand in a semicircle-like shape.
'NEBULUS,' he inwardly shouted.
A thick and obscuring smoke quickly spread with Harry as a centre.
He immediately fell on the floor, trying to dodge the spells that would no doubt come, yet someone's surprisingly fast cast still managed to hit him…
"ARGH," he cried as a cutting curse tried and failed to cleave off his arm.
Despite the disorientation he felt due to his agony, Harry still followed his plan and phoenix flashed through the anti-apparition wards.
As he reappeared in a different space, Harry waited for the additional pain to come…
However, by some miracle, he didn't splinch himself.
He swiftly cast 'therapo' multiple times on his left arm, until it felt almost normal.
Rising slowly, Harry glanced around to determine his destination.
He wasn't sure where he wanted to go before he performed the flash.
He only wished to appear somewhere he felt safe…
"Oh, for fuck's sake," he cursed and slumped back on the floor.
He stayed like that until most of his dizziness passed…
Letting out the biggest and most woeful sigh he could manage, Harry pulled himself from the floor.
'Some men are lucky, and some men are unlucky… Does perhaps God hate me?' he wondered, looking around the drawing room.
It had large windows overlooking the street in front of the house, a large fireplace flanked by two ornate glass-fronted cabinets, and an entire wall covered with… a tapestry of the Black family tree.
He was back inside the house…
'I probably shouldn't have enjoyed threatening Dudley too much with my wand.'
Glaring at the offending family tree with disapproval, Harry's eyes landed on a blackened head and finally broke from his reverie.
'Sirius!'
"Kreacher," Harry trumpeted.
A moment and a cracking sound later, the demented elf appeared in front of him.
"Dirty young master called for Kreacher," stated the elf with obvious confusion.
"Yes, now listen to me. Sirius is unconscious and under an invisibility cloak on the next house's lawn. When you find him, take him to the house you two mentioned before," he ordered quickly, sensing the aurors closing on the house.
"Is nasty master on the house eleven or thirteen?" Kreacher asked with no small amount of irritation from being ordered around by Harry.
"Eleven," the said boy simply replied.
The elf, unwilling to stay in Harry's presence any longer than what was required, excused himself and went to find Sirius.
'Now that that's settled, I should try phoenix flashing ag-'
His thoughts were cut out by a sudden flood in his magical sense.
"Oh, you've got to be kidding me… Bloody hell, not another one," Harry muttered and let out a tired groan.
'Well, there goes that plan,' he thought dejectedly, sensing the new and reinforced anti-apparition ward covering him.
The youth quickly made his way out of the room, hoping to at least get into a good vantage point.
'I hope Fawkes makes it in time,' he thought just as he reached the entrance hall.
Luckily, no one made their way inside just yet.
"Shields up," a stern shout came from outside the door a moment before it got blown up, its splinters flying everywhere.
'Lucky my ass,' Harry thought mockingly and raised his wand.
"Bombarda maxima. Bombarda maxima. Bombarda maxima," he iterated while pointing his magical stick at the smashed-up door frame.
Had he aimed at the opening, there was a chance that his spells would have connected with someone and turned them into gory bits…
Harry wasn't planning on killing anyone though, the thought alone made shivers run down his spine. He simply had to stall.
Also, a bunch of enraged and vengeful aurors would be anything but slow…
A moment after Harry cast the last spell, the first one reached its destination.
Despite the deafening explosion sound, which was swiftly followed by two more, Harry managed to catch a couple of cries of pain.
'God, I hope no one's dead,' he thought dejectedly and gazed at the devastation he caused.
The entrance of the Black family house was no more.
There were pieces of marble, bricks and concrete lying all around and also a mundane dust cloud that covered both parties' sights…
The aurors were the good guys.
They were simply following their orders and trying to enforce the law by catching Sirius Black and his unexpected new accomplice.
There were partners and children out there who were anxiously awaiting for them to return safely back home.
And that's why Harry was at a disadvantage even before any spells were cast.
Speaking of the youth, he narrowly dodged two purple curses that flew towards him and wordlessly erected a shield to meet a fast-moving stunner.
'Stall,' he thought and threw back a few curses.
However, lacking the element of surprise, they didn't have the same devastating effect as before.
The auror force easily defended against Harry's spell barrage and made their way into the house.
The youth dropped his position and moved deeper, onto the great staircase, not giving any attention to the severed house-elf heads this time.
'Damnation. Except for the kitchen, I don't know anything about this house at all,' he thought inwardly, feeling the tendrils of desperation latching onto him.
He transfigured some obstacles that mostly consisted of living mammals with the sole intent of stalling the penetrators and briefly allowed himself to wonder what would happen if he revealed his identity.
Could he hide in a room, transfigure some chains and when found, spin a story of how he was abducted by the notorious Sirius Black?
'Probably not.'
The unrelenting man-force swiftly moved towards his new position and continued their chase.
They easily dispatched Harry's transfigurations and kept on their way, both parties moving up.
Harry had to admit that by limiting his spell arsenal as he was, he was making things incredibly difficult for himself.
Sadly, using powerful and esoteric curses and charms was a no-go.
He still had some non-fatal aces up his sleeves though…
'Now,' he thought with delight as the auror body took another step forward.
His last scheme, the transfigured hounds and a nice spell barrage was a ruse, meant to lower his aggressors' guard.
And it worked!
He watched giddily as the first of the rallying enforcers grew green.
The others quickly followed and after but a few seconds, every single auror was showing signs of being poisoned.
Harry was well only due to his bond with Ash and the dreadful basilisk venom that flowed inside him, unable to devour him.
Those two things together combined granted him a surprising resistance to most toxic and poisonous things.
'I can get out of this,' he thought with renewed determination and wordlessly cast more poisonous spells, this time not in parseltongue…
The aurors weren't an inexperienced bunch though.
One of the men who was previously tasked with firing spells at him took a step back, getting behind the shields, and as if to mock him, swirled his wand in an elaborate manner.
Harry felt a surprisingly heavy concentration of magic coming off the man. The only reason he didn't sprint to the top of the stairs was because he didn't feel any ill intent coming off him.
"Mundar," the man stammered and a white glow engulfed his comrades.
The man fell on the floor from exhaustion and the aurors' complexions immediately showed signs of improvement and they picked up their slackened pace.
Harry instantly stopped any further attempts to poison the men and kept raising shield after shield.
The only reason he had preserved so far was because of the protego's variations that he cast.
When a bombarding charm was fired his way, he'd conjure a tiny bit of wood to meet it followed by a shield meant to defend against shock-waves.
Unable to cope with the renewed pressure, Harry reluctantly moved up the stairs until there wasn't any further to go to…
He immediately moved into the floor's only room, throwing every bit of locking and surface-enhancing charms he knew at the door.
Needless to say, the aurors weren't going to be stopped by those feeble attempts of stalling.
Unwilling to see a repeat of the earlier incident, they swiftly blast the door down.
"Well, well, well… Put your wand on the floor and raise your hands. You have nowhere to escape," a voice mocked Harry from the end of the entourage.
The youth immediately recognised the man who while talking, moved to the group's front.
'Yellow-eyed bastard,' he snarled inwardly and wordlessly raised the most sturdy shield his battered reserves could manage.
The simple, yet impenetrable, protego was proven to be a correct choice as it materialised just in time to meet five different coloured beams.
'Bloody hell,' he cursed.
Somehow, the shield had managed to survive the first spell barrage, but it was obvious that it would not do so again.
Even if Harry wasn't able to sense magic as he did, the luminous, web-like cracks that decorated most of its translucent surface said more than enough.
Luckily, Harry didn't plan to do so, he didn't want to fight.
'Stall,' reverberated through his dense skull.
His wand, which was aiming at the floor between him and the aurors, let out a flash of light.
'Bombarda diabolica,' he inwardly chanted.
The blue, blazing charm flew at an astonishing speed and connected with the floor, effortlessly devouring every single spell that it met.
'Damn Salazar,' the youth cursed whilst examining the devastation the previously extinct spell caused.
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[p=a=t=r=e=o=n=.=c=o=m/Mr_0ne] - Chapter F16 - Date
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