Porcelain Perfection

Disclaimer : Nothing is mine; everything is J K Rowling's. Still.

AN : Today is the real update day, for those who caught the email yesterday, that was me fixing my own stupid blunder, I skipped a chapter while posting earlier, so there's now an extra one back at chapter 96!

Porcelain Perfection

Pink paper decorations and lacy white bunting hung in the windows of Madam Puddifoot"s. A handful of couples sat upon pink cushions and chairs over little white teacups and teapots. The light of the sunset gilded the china pink and orange.

Tasteless. Fleur turned her nose up.

"Last time I was here, it was Valentine's day," she said.

Katie laughed. "Who did you go with?"

"I did not go in." Fleur shuddered. "This was when Harry was moping." Harry shot her a betrayed look.

Sorry, mon Cœur, but you were. Fleur smirked at him and pressed a kiss to his cheek. I had to trap you in France.

Neville sniggered. "Moping, Harry? What happened to just asking her to Hogsmeade?"

"It's a long way to Hogsmeade from France." Harry gave Fleur's fingers a gentle squeeze.

"You weren't in France," Neville said. "You were right here."

"And I had a tournament of death to worry about." Harry raised his finger. "Which I won."

Katie grabbed Harry's other arm and tugged him into Honeyduke"s.

Fleur frowned at Katie's gentle grip on Harry's wrist. Are you testing my reaction now you know I know? She released Harry's hand and paused to rummage through the shelf of sweet crystals, one eye on Katie's reflection in the window.

"Some of these, I think." Katie pulled boxes of Firewhiskey chocolates from the stack at the end of the aisle and thrust them at Harry.

"Nope. I'm not your keeper." He sidestepped and they ended up in Neville's arms. "Nev can look after you, I'm probably going to have more than enough to carry as it is. Fleur in a sweets shop is more dangerous than a dementor in a primary school."

Fleur smiled and placed her armful of sugar crystals in his hands. "Hold these, mon Cœur."

"See." He weighed the sugar crystals. "That's actually not that much,

is this it?"

"Gabby gave me cake from home," Fleur murmured in his ear. "So I don't need lots."

Neville disappeared beneath a metre-high animated chocolate bowtruckle, wrestling with a dozen limbs as it pried its way free of the box.

"Don't let it get away," Katie ordered. "I want to eat it."

Harry sent the bowtruckle back into its packaging with a flick of his wand.

"It's worse than Trevor," Neville groaned. "Are you sure you want this, Katie?"

Katie beamed. "I'm going to eat it alive."

"We should move on," Harry said. "Nev's gran will come to apparate him back home for Christmas soon."

"She's still apparating at her age?" Katie enquired. "Really?"

"There's not much that will stop Gran," Nev replied. "We do need to move on to the Three Broomsticks if we're ever going to have this talk Harry's been promising all morning."

Katie's gaze lighted upon the free samples. "Or we could have it here…"

Fleur glanced up and down the aisles. "There's nobody else in this part of the shop."

"See." Katie helped herself to all the oval-shaped samples. "Fleur knows better than to pass up free sweets."

"She also has better sense than to eat all of the alcoholic ones," Harry remarked, plucking the last couple out of Katie's fingers and replacing them. "You need help." He glanced at Fleur.

A ward. She threw up a bubble of magic to suppress the sound of their conversation. Easy.

"So, you know I'm doing my NEWTs early, right?" Harry stacked Fleur's sugar crystals on the counter on top of Katie's box of chocolates and the bowtruckle. "I'm doing them in January, if things go to plan."

"Without doing any studying," Katie muttered. "It's outrageous."

Harry chuckled. "I did my studying over the summer. Fleur kept trying to distract me."

Fleur laughed. "You kept begging me to distract you."

"Liar." Harry grinned. "I would never do such a thing."

"So what?" Neville asked. "You're just going to do Advanced Arithmancy afterward?"

"I'm going to leave," Harry murmured. "When my NEWTs are done, I'm going to go home to Fleur."

Katie's last chocolate slipped through her fingers. "Leave?" Her voice wavered. "But-"

"Maybe not straight away," Harry said. "But I won't stay long."

Neville shrugged. "Fair enough, I guess. Are you going to help Dumbledore fight?"

"I'm going to fight." A small smile crossed Harry's face. "If you need me, send your patronus. I'll come back as soon as I can. The same over the Christmas holidays, Nev. If you're attacked, I'll come. I need to hunt down the remaining members of Voldemort's inner circle and… talk… to them."

Nev flinched, then drew himself up. "It's one thing to stop them doing more harm, Harry, but you can't torture them."

"Torture?" Harry raised an eyebrow. "I'm going to use legilimency,

Nev, not the Cruciatus Curse. It's what I did to help you learn Occlumency."

"Oh." Neville shrank back. "Sorry," he whispered. "I just thought-"

"You thought he would torture people?" Katie rounded on Neville. "Are you insane?"

"I'm sorry," Neville said. "What else was I to think?"

"You should know me better," Harry murmured. "I do what I have to, that's all." A bright smile spread across his face. "It's okay, don't worry about it, Nev."

Fleur scowled and reached for Harry's shoulder. Her fingers brushed Katie's; Katie snatched her hand away and squirmed as Fleur gave Harry's shoulder a soft squeeze.

He's mine. Fleur levelled a long stare at her. You can dream and hope, but he's out of your reach. I'll never let him go.

"I need to go," Neville said. "Gran's probably waiting for me."

And it's nearly dusk. Fleur glanced at the darkening sky. The full moon is tonight.

"I'll see you after Christmas, Nev," Harry said.

"See you, mate." Nev waved a hand at Katie and Fleur, then hurried from the shop.

"You can come and visit me whenever, Harry." Katie beamed. "You know where the café is."

"You're safer here," Harry said. "Voldemort will go after you if he gets the chance. Stay here for Christmas." He poked Katie in the side. "Besides, I'm leaving soon, you ought to stick about while I'm still around."

Mon Cœur. Fleur shot him a glare out of the corner of her eye.

Harry gave her a small, helpless shrug. "Katie?"

"I'll stay," she blurted. "I promise."

Of course you will. Fleur buried a flash of heat and ignored the prickle of feathers just beneath her skin. Even now, you still hope to steal him.

"We'd best go," she said, glancing up at the sky.

Harry nodded and counted out a handful of sickles and galleons. "We should." He patted Katie's stack of chocolates. "There you go, payback for that time we abandoned your café without paying."

Katie pouted. "Ditching your third wheel already?" She shook the bowtruckle in the box and giggled when it shook its chocolate fists at her. "Ah well, I've got this not-so-little guy instead. I'll see you soon!"

"Au revoir, Katie." Fleur took Harry's hand, apparating into their kitchen to grab the silver mask she'd enchanted, then onto the scree slopes of the Lake District.

Harry stumbled forward, then caught himself just before toppling down the hill. "Could've warned me."

"That's for encouraging her," Fleur said. "Using yourself as a bribe to get her to stay at Hogwarts…" She let the heat curl back up and her eyes darken. "Katie still wants to steal you. I don't like it when you give her hope."

"I want her to be safe," Harry replied, glancing up at the faint outline of the full moon as the last light of the sun faded. "She's never going to take me away from you, but she's still my best friend. I'd be upset if anything happened to her. Very upset."

Fleur sighed and slipped her fingers through his. "I know. I just don't like the way she's all over you. I'm the only girl I want to be that close to you."

"What about Gabby?" Harry shot her a grin. "I did promise that when she went through her veela majority I'd help her, even if it led to us becoming veela bondmates and being trapped into veela threesomes by the whimsical laws of magical romances."

Fleur laughed. "Gabby gets a pass."

"Awesome." He chuckled. "I can tick veela threesome off my bucket list, then."

"No you can't." She let a pout creep onto her face. "Not unless it involves a time-turner and two of me."

Harry cocked his head. "Now that is a thought. Salazar did want me to experiment with a time-turner and I honestly can't think of any better way than that."

"Something for you to look forward to."

"Definitely." A glimmer of mischief hovered in his eyes. "Worst case scenario, we get stuck in a time loop having that threesome forever. I could live with that."

Fleur sniffed. "There is virtually no chance of that happening. You'd have to deliberately mess with the enchantments on the time-turner to manage that."

Harry grinned. "And, just out of curiosity, how would I do that?"

She gave him a sweet smile. "You will never know."

"Siren," he accused. "I know your inherent sex-magic bird nature means you'd really like it."

"At least I can manage a proper beak without hopping around the room like an excited budgie and trying to grab anything shiny usually my hair." Fleur glanced up at the bright moon. "I think we've waited long enough, mon Cœur."

He sighed. "Yes, I think so."

Fleur raised the mask and rearranged the patterns to activate the portkey. "Now we just have to wait for him to say the word, but given the word I chose, it shouldn't be long. Anything he or his magic is touching will come with him when he does, but together, we'll be more than able to handle him."

"Okay," Harry said. "What word-"

A loud crack echoed through the dusk. Dark shadows thudded into the scree and spilt down the slope, sending shale slithering and scraping toward the gleaming lake below.

Harry took a deep breath and levelled his wand at the glimmer of silver beneath the hood of the standing figure.

The clouds slid past the bright moon.

Tangled blonde-hair tumbled over milk-white skin, pale lips, and blank blue eyes. Twenty corpses sprawled over the scree, cold and still as stone.

Fleur's heart stopped. They look like Gabby.

"Potter." The dark-robed figure above them held his wand between the thumb and forefinger of his left hand like it were a paintbrush and twirled it in a circle. "I will not make the same mistake as my fellows. This is not quite the spell I intended for you, my beauties, but I have no choice."

The corpses of the girls jerked and spasmed, then dragged themselves upright, clawing at the scree with torn, pink-varnished nails. Smeared lip gloss glittered on snarling lips about bared little white teeth. Bright-coloured bracelets hung on slim, dark-veined, pale-skinned wrists.

Travers's eyeholes fixed themselves upon Fleur. "You're a little older than I normally would like," he muttered, the fingers of his right hand groping at the air. "But you will make a fabulous addition all the same." Desire seeped from beneath the silver mask and hung hot and heavy in his loud rasping breaths. "When your skin is cold as porcelain, your eyes bright with death, I will make you mine. You will serve at my side until your perfection's tainted by time or you no longer please me."

Harry's wand snapped up, unleashing a gout of water up the incline.

Spears of ice lanced from the floor as the water splashed upon the stones, impaling the girls that hurled themselves down the slope. They tore free, ripping off limbs and wriggling through, lunging forward.

Fleur reached for the fire within and hurled a glob of blue flame at the first inferius to break free of Harry's ice. It staggered as the fire burst across its chest, then threw itself forward, trailing a blazing mane of hair, stumbling to a halt as the muscles and tendons burnt away. She banished it back up the slope, leaving nothing but a line of smoke and the reek of seared flesh and scorched hair.

Harry flicked his wand, sending a thin ribbon of purple fire slicing across the scree. Half a dozen inferii vanished beneath it, crumbling to ash, and the ice exploded in a rush of steam. A bright hail of curses hissed toward him, but Harry swatted them aside with a contemptuous flick of his wand and hurled a bright pinprick of silver light back through the steam.

A bright flash burst beyond, throwing the sharp shadows of young girls up against the steam. Travers let out a raw cry.

An inferius lunged through the white cloud. Fleur flinched and blasted it to pieces with an instinctive jab of her wand. The pieces glowed an eerie yellow and dragged themselves back together. Thick, raw, red lines stretched across the girl's face and limbs and the stub of her tongue stuck from between her gloss-smeared lower lip and the gaping hole stretching up to the bare, ragged cartilage of her nose.

The torso of a girl no older than eleven clawed its way uphill on her right, snapping at her calf. Fleur kicked its head away and set it alight with a swish of her wand, letting the fire in her bones bubble up to the surface and bathing her left palm in azure flame.

Travers howled within the fading steam and a bright flash of green burst into a wisp of dark mist before Harry's chest.

"Enough," Harry said.

A cloud of black butterflies burst from his wand tip, streaming around him and Fleur in a circle. He flicked his wand and they scattered from the swarm, streaking out to alight upon the remaining inferii. The little girls crumbled to dust.

"No," Travers moaned. "You destroyed all of them." A choked sob echoed from beneath the silver mask. "My precious collection…" "You disgust me," Harry snapped.

"Imperio!" Travers cried, directing his wand at the insects around Harry.

One small, black butterfly broke from the cloud, floating to burst against his chest with a small puff of ebony mist.

Harry laughed. "That's not how that piece of magic works."

"Fine," Travers hissed. "Taste the beauty of everlasting death; the perfection in which I will keep you and her until I am tired of you, or until your flesh has worn out too much to be of service to me." He thrust his short wand at the scree.

Shale crawled together, slithering and scraping into a great shivering cairn, then bursting into a great stone serpent.

"Contusio." Harry shattered the crude snake with an ear-splitting concussion and flash of bright light.

Sharp shards of slate sprayed off into the night.

Fleur threw up a shield and watched the bits of stone bounce away. A metallic ping echoed through the dusk and Travers ran the edge of his thumb along the bright groove in his silver mask.

The gravel swirled together into a rumbling mound, then coiled back into the form of a snake and lunged at Fleur. She cast a shield and watched it wrap itself around the outside, crushing the light of her shield inward.

A battering ram of a spell. Force is useless. Fleur slipped her magic into the threads of power that tied the stone serpent together, stripping away Travers's enchantments and rebinding the snake to her own will. It collapsed, writhing, and Fleur abandoned her shield, sending the gravel creation up the slope.

Stray spells batted aside by Harry and Travers bored smoking holes into the dirt and left dark, angry scorch marks on the stones. Her stone serpent lunged straight into a gush of cherry-red flame and burst into molten rock, spattering across the scree. Her magic melted away beneath the torrent of fire like snow from boiling water.

Smoking tears scattered Travers's robes and dark spots marked the ground beneath his feet. His breath came in hoarse, light gasps. "Avada kedavra," he spat, hurling a viridescent beam at Harry.

Harry side-stepped, his wand crackling with white sparks and giving off a strong tang of ozone. "Fulminis."

A crackling bolt of lightning flashed from his wand's tip, leaving a smoking hole the size of Fleur's hand in Travers's stomach and a web of raw, weeping burns. The short wand in Travers's hand exploded into splinters.

"Kill me then, Potter," Travers rasped. "Make me as beautiful as my girls were. Let pale, cold hands caress away my fears, feelings and future."

Harry thrust out his hand and ripped the spell-scarred, silver mask off Travers's face. A pale sneer twisted a matted tangle of ginger stubble and pale green eyes into ugliness.

Fleur strode up the slope and rested a hand on his shoulder. "He's good enough to know things," she murmured. "Perhaps one of these other horcruxes Dumbledore has identified is in his keeping."

Harry nodded and pointed his wand between Travers's eyes.

"Legilimens."

Silence hung upon the night as Travers's face twisted into a grimace, then spread into a broad grin.

Unease gripped Fleur. Is he good at mind magic, too?

A small smile curved Harry's lips and he dropped Travers to the ground. "Bellatrix Lestrange. Voldemort entrusted one of them to her, her husband, and his brother, the cup that Dumbledore discovered, and she placed it in the safest location she knew, her vault at Gringotts."

Travers let out a low moan. "Kill me," he pleaded. "Make me as perfect as they were, with white, cold skin, bright, brittle hair, and such wonderful, blank eyes. I want to be as I made them, my porcelain people."

"You can rot here," Fleur retorted. "They'll never find you. Your flesh will be picked clean by crows and rats and smothered in mould."

Travers flinched and his breath caught. "No!" He fell to his knees. "I don't want to rot! I don't want to change! Don't let me change!"

"Then you can burn." Fleur cast a fistful of blue fire into his face.

Travers screamed and writhed on the ground, clutching at his face and kicking his heels into the stones. The fire lit his robes, wrapping him up in a veil of flame, and his screams and spasms faded to stillness. A thick column of black smoke drifted off into the night.

Fleur wrinkled her nose at the stink of burning flesh. "Let's go home, mon Cœur."

Harry slipped an arm around her waist and tugged her tight against him. "Let's."

Discord is still a thing. Audiobooks are also still a thing. All the links are on my profile and on discord, including how to support me and read my original works! Discord is the best place to get updates and find about everything I do, so do check it out if you're interested!

But if you don't fancy hunting, there's always this one below.

discord. gg / 7D7dWjzKac

Sole Survivor

Disclaimer : Nothing is mine; everything is J K Rowling's. Still.

AN: Back to the conventional sort of posting where I add the chapters in the right order!

Sole Survivor

A slim, warm arm slipped around his shoulders. Harry opened his eyes and received a faceful of silver-blonde hair as Fleur tucked her head into his collarbone.

"It's cold," she moaned into his neck, snuggling against him. "I'm cold."

Spiralling patterns of frost spread across the window and a stiff breeze buffeted the long grass in the meadows.

"I'm sure there's some way to enchant the walls and windows to retain the heat better," Harry said, smoothing her hair out of her eyes. "No?"

"Dangerous," Fleur mumbled, tucking her ice cold feet into his legs. "You can destroy your house in any number of interesting ways if you make even a small mistake. Big risk of a fire."

"Speaking of fire." Harry smiled down at the bundle of silver hair tucked under his chin. "I'm sure there are easier ways to warm your feet."

"I like this way," Fleur said. "It is nice to have you here warming up the bed again."

"I feel so appreciated." Harry grinned and kissed her on the top of her head.

"You know you're appreciated." Fleur leant her head back and shot him a sultry smirk from beneath her lashes. Her fingers traced their way down Harry's stomach, leaving light, hot lines as they trailed lower and lower.

The wards thrummed and her fingers flinched away.

"I'll see who it is." Harry snatched his wand from beneath the pillow and conjured himself a set of simple dark robes from the air.

"Nobody's meant to be visiting today," Fleur whispered, scrambling for her clothes on the opposite side of the bed. "Sirius and the rest of the Order have been fighting "round the clock."

Harry crept along the landing and peered out the small window on the stairs. A silver griffin paced the edge of the Unyielding Shield Charm, clawing at the ground and shaking its head. "It's a patronus. Sirius's, probably, unless Gabby loves griffins?"

"Gabby's patronus is probably a smutty book," Fleur called back. "Or some kind of made up veela valkyrie."

"I'll go out and see whose it is," Harry said. "Get ready, just in case it's a trap."

He apparated out to the edge of the wards and peered into the trees. "Alright, then." He edged out of the wards.

"Harry." Sirius's voice emanated from the silver griffin. "Come to Azkaban. Come fast. It's all gone wrong."

His blood ran cold. Fleur's going to kill me for disappearing off without her. Harry flicked his wand at the house and set his anzu patronus soaring toward their bedroom and took a deep breath. But I can't take her with me, not if it's going to be dangerous. If Voldemort sees her, he'll try to take her away, just to see what I'll do. He pictured the images of Azkaban he'd glimpsed in Jugson's head and wrenched the world back past him.

The tower of Azkaban loomed over dark stone. Black water crashed upon whelk-studded, kelp-draped rocks as the sea swirled and surged around the island. Smoke rose from scorched craters, mingling with the salt-scented spray of the sea, and spells flashed back and forth between the tower and the low, domed building clinging to the cliff face above the waves. A ring of dark-robed figures hurled curses at the tower from behind a shield of shining, silver serpents and mounds of bodies. Scattered red-robed hit wizards returned fire from behind the ground floor windows, ducking and darting about inside.

Merde. Voldemort. Harry disillusioned himself and apparated down to a spur of rock overhanging the conflict, ignoring the cluster of dark-robed bodies upon it. At least he's lost a lot of followers.

A handful of huge figures sprawled upon the rocks beneath the dome, shuddering with the waves and dying the white foam red as it washed past them.

Dead giants. Dead Death Eaters. Dead hit-wizards.

Voldemort's shield vanished for an instant and the Dark Mark exploded above the domed building, sending eerie green light flickering across the sky as the smoke drew together into a serpent and skull. Screams echoed from within Azkaban.

He had some people on the inside. Harry's breath caught and he clenched his fists, watching little flashes of silver through windows of the tower's upper levels. No. Not people. The dementors.

The hail of curses showering down from the tower thinned and faded away with a series of loud cracks, then a swarm of skeletal figures burst from within the tower and poured into the windows of the lower levels. Voldemort's shield vanished and he thrust his wand in the air, sending out a ripple of magic; it settled over the entire island.

Wards… Merde. Where's Sirius? Harry cursed and peered across the field, searching for someone not in red amongst the huddle of hitwizards that now hurled themselves toward the domed-building and away from Azkaban's tower.

The crowd of red dwindled as Death Eaters apparated past them and threw spells from all directions. Bodies tumbled to the ground, red and black-robed.

"Black!" A dark-robed figure in a half-warped silver mask began a furious assault upon a red-robed wizard near the front.

There. Malfoy's found him. Harry reached out to test the strength of Voldemort's wards and grimaced. Not getting through those easily.

A gush of purple flame swept past Malfoy, immolating a handful of Death Eaters behind him. Malfoy disappeared with a loud crack, then reappeared down by the sea, standing amidst the spray. Sirius gave chase as the swarm of dementors exploded out of the upper levels of the tower and swooped down upon the hit-wizards.

Where's the snake? Harry scanned the rocks. No sign of it. Merde.

"Alastor Moody." Voldemort strode out into the open, swatting aside a couple of spells. "There's no escape. Death comes to embrace you."

The dementors drifted back.

Moody stood alone above a mound of red-robed corpses. "You gigantic cunt! I'm going to take a piece of you with me. More than one, if I can fucking manage it!"

Voldemort circled the grizzled auror, his robes whispering over the corpses. "You will have to take your pound of flesh. Come and see if you're able to land a single spell on me. Nobody will interfere." A cold grin curved his lips. "There's nobody left to interfere for you…"

Moody snarled and jabbed his wand at Voldemort, slashing and lashing it back and forth, sending spells of all colours hissing through the air. Voldemort flicked them all away, striding forward faster than Moody could limp back, unleashing a hail of his own spells. Moody deflected some, then threw up his shield, but the burning orange spells punched through the glowing silver light, shattering Moody's fake leg and a bright whip of green flame snaked from the end of Voldemort's wand, severing Moody's hand.

"Pitiful." Voldemort crunched Moody's wand beneath his heel. "I expected more."

"Fuck you." Moody let out a groan.

Voldemort thrust his wand out, twisting his wrist like he was unlocking a door. Moody writhed, then his skull and spinal column ripped themselves out of his back in a spray of crimson and he flopped to the ground.

The gleaming ivory skull and spine hovered in the air, dripping thick red down onto the blood-stained, scorched stone.

"Victory," Voldemort declared, tossing Moody's remnants aside.

"Amelia Bones and the few remaining hit-wizards have fled back to London. We will finish them soon." He crooked a finger at the dementors and pointed down to where Sirius and Malfoy staggered about on the rocks, grappling with one another through the crash of the waves. "Deal with the last one."

Two dementors swooped away down to the shoreline and the snake slithered from among the Death Eaters to swallow Moody's corpse.

The snake will have to wait.

Harry apparated down onto the rocks and slipped his wand from his sleeve. "Expecto patronum," he whispered, pouring a thick veil of silver mist out between the dementors and the island. He kept it up as he picked his way across the rocks, keeping one eye on the growing number of floating shadows hurling themselves against his patronus.

Malfoy shoved Sirius back off the rock and snatched a wand out of his robes. "Tristis Cancro," he hissed.

A bolt of teal light hit Sirius in the ribs, tearing a grunt from his lips. "That barely scratched me, Lucy. Do you have a little blue potion you'd like to take before we keep going?"

Malfoy pulled the silver mask from his face and sneered down at Sirius with charred lips and a twisted mass of scarred flesh. "You're dead, Black. And your family dies with you." He froze, grabbing at his forearm. "Good riddance."

Harry glanced at the swarm of dementors behind him and jumped across to Malfoy's rock, kicking him down into the sea. "Time to go home, Sirius," he quipped, abandoning his disillusionment.

Sirius sagged onto the rocks. "You're going to have to carry me."

Harry watched Malfoy flounder in the waves, clawing his way up the rock, and grabbed Sirius's arm, gathering all his magic. "You better hope I can break those wards or we're not going anywhere." He abandoned his patronus and wrenched at the bubble of magic, crushing it down until the world whirled past him and they staggered across the kitchen floor at the meadow.

Sirius sprawled onto the tiles, caked in blood, mud and worse, dripping water.

Fleur appeared, her eyes black as ink. "We're going to have a long talk later," she hissed at Harry, tugging her wand from her waist and running it over Sirius's injuries one at a time.

Guilt stabbed at Harry, twisting in his chest like a knife. "Fair enough," he murmured.

"What happened?" Fleur demanded.

"Voldemort went for Azkaban." Sirius dragged himself into a chair. "Scores of his followers died taking the harbour and so did a bunch of giants and werewolves. It's the only place you can magically travel to or from on Azkaban, and even then only by a portkey authorised by the Ministry."

"They had another spy, then," Harry said.

"Yes." Sirius stared at his hands, brushing grime from the worst of the scratches. "Voldemort and what's left of his inner circle punched through our counter-attack just when we thought we'd gained the upper hand. He killed Dawlish and Scrimgeour himself, and tore apart the rest of the aurors who were leading the charge. After that, we tried to hold the tower and let his forces dash themselves against the walls. It was working until the fucking dementors betrayed us." He sighed. "I take it Moody didn't make it?"

Harry shook his head. "Voldemort ripped his spine out."

Fleur winced. "Did anyone escape?"

Sirius shrugged. "I think some got out before the dementors got them and the wards went up."

"Amelia Bones got away," Harry said. "I don't know about anyone else."

Katie's father was stationed in London, so at least he's still fine.

Fleur let out a little hiss and tugged Sirius's tattered robes away from his ribs. A dark, crescent-shaped cut oozed thick, yellow pus down his side. "What is this?"

"It looks worse than it is," Sirius said. "It's just a small cut."

"What spell was it?" Fleur poked the inflamed flesh around it with the tip of her wand. "There's still magic in the wound." She tugged Sirius's robes down to his waist and traced swollen, dark veins down his side.

"No idea." Sirius winced and squirmed as Fleur prodded at the cut. "You know that hurts, right?"

She ignored him. "I can't stop the curse spreading by just taking it apart, whoever cast it intended it to kill slowly. I can fix it, but it won't heal for at least a month or two as the rest of the magic in you fades away."

"A small price to pay." Sirius shrugged. "Do it."

"This will hurt. A lot." Fleur pressed all five of her fingertips into the flesh around the wound and pinched, squeezing out a gush of redtinged, yellow pus. Sirius clenched his jaw and ground his heels into the tiles. She tightened her fingers until they went white and the trickle of pus slowed.

"That wasn't so bad," Sirius said, gritting his teeth.

"I haven't done it yet." Fleur raised her other hand and conjured a small blue flame on the tip of her finger.

"Shit." Harry's godfather paled and swallowed hard. "Just don't get the face. I'm finally prettier than Lucy is, don't ruin my chance to gloat."

Fleur thrust the tip of her finger inside the wound and held it there. Sirius writhed, sweating and twisting in the chair.

"Done." She pulled her hand back and stepped over to the sink to wash it. "That curse would've rotted you from the inside out over the next week if I'd not burnt away all the flesh affected by it."

"Will it have any permanent effect?" Harry studied the blackened, burnt flesh and web of grey veins. "It looks bad."

"He's not going to be up to dueling anyone for a month or two," she said. "And when it's healed as well as it ever will, he'll find the scar and the damage to his muscles will affect his movement."

"Doesn't much matter," Sirius whispered. "I'm the last. Moony's gone. Greyback tore him apart for interfering with the packs. He bragged about it at Azkaban."

"We'll get Greyback," Harry promised.

"I'll get him," Sirius said. "You need to find those horcruxes. There's not much of the Ministry left now, certainly not enough to stop a determined attack should Voldemort throw his full strength into it, and the Order is gone. It's just me, Minerva, Filius, the Weasleys, and Dumbledore left. We're almost out of time."

A cold shiver ran down Harry's spine. The locket. The cup. Nagini. We need to go to Gringotts as soon as possible.

Harry shared a long look with Fleur. "Go get some rest, Sirius."

Fleur cocked her head and waited until Sirius's steps faded away toward the spare bedroom, then snatched Harry's arm and dragged him into her arms. "Idiot," she hissed, her eyes flashing pitch black. "You run off like that again, mon Cœur, and I will go back to France!"

Harry's heart seized and the world ground to a halt. He stared into her huge, dark eyes as everything began to spin, swirling "round his head in a whirl of dizzying lightness.

The room lurched sideways.

"Breathe!" Fleur shook him.

He sucked in a gulp of air and groped for the edge of the table. A fist of panic clamped about his throat, hot as flame. "Don't go," he gasped. "Don't leave."

Fleur's eyes faded back to blue. "Ah," she whispered. "Pardon. I didn't mean that, mon Cœur." She slipped herself back into his arms and ran her fingers through his hair. "I will never leave. I will, however, be extremely angry."

"I couldn't leave Sirius," Harry said. "Pretty much ever since Pettigrew escaped, he's been there for me. And he's never let me down."

"I am not angry you went," she murmured. "I am angry you thought you could get away with leaving me behind. Don't even try to deny it. You went out there, you heard you had to go, then you deliberately sent me a message and apparated off without telling me where it was you were going!"

"It was going to be dangerous," Harry whispered. "I just - I couldn't do it…"

Fleur sighed into his neck. "It's a good thing we're going to get rid of them all and be free soon, mon Cœur. I may get quite angry if you keep doing this."

Harry winced. "We need to go to Gringotts. I don't know if you can forge an official Gringotts letter or something to lure the Lestranges there, too? That way we can use them to get into the vault and get rid of two of the last inner circle members." Harry frowned. "When school starts again, I'll sneak you in through the chamber to the Room of Requirement to help me plan with Nev and Katie."

But I've no idea how to get the Lestranges to go to Gringotts.

"We probably won't need to lure the Lestranges to Gringotts," Fleur said. "We just have to wait for them to come and try and sort out their frozen vaults. Now the Ministry is losing, the goblins will probably be inclined to listen and I bet none of the wealthy Death Eaters who've got out of Azkaban will wait too long to get their hands back on their fortunes." She narrowed her eyes. "What I don't see is why we need Neville or Katie involved."

"Katie will cover for me with everyone at Hogwarts." Harry weighed up his next words and resigned himself to more fury with a sinking heart. "Nev will have to be the one who comes in with me." Fleur's eyes darkened. "I trust there is a very good reason for that."

"Polyjuice doesn't work if you're not the same sex," Harry replied.

"And since Bellatrix is very famously dead…"

"I can come under the cloak if you and he are polyjuiced."

"We'll need the cloak to get into the vault."

She crossed her arms. "I don't like it."

"I know, but-"

" I don't like it. "

"Have you got a better way to sneak in than Polyjuice?" Harry asked.

Fleur's brow creased and she drummed her fingers on the table. "Non. And I don't like that, either."

"Well, you're really not going to like what else I'm going to have to do," Harry murmured.

"What?" Fleur's fingers tightened in his clothes, dragging him tight against her until he could feel every curve of her. "What are you going to do? Another ritual?"

"No more rituals." Harry kissed her on the tip of her nose. "I've nothing left to sacrifice for those. I don't need to be more powerful than Voldemort, I just have to kill him. I can't endure what he's endured, anyway. I need my perfect wish.

"We should go to France," Fleur said. "If we're out of time, then I'd like to see Gabby before we get stuck fighting here." Harry nodded. "We've time enough for that."

She laughed. "You just want to see the other half of your veela harem." Fleur sighed. "I can't believe I've sunk so low as to make those jokes myself."

The kitchen whirled away into a weak winter sun. The bare branches of the willow tree hung over frost-veiled white pebbles and a cold, clear rippling current.

"It feels a world away," Fleur murmured.

"I wish we could stay here." Harry released a long sigh. "I wish we never had to leave."

"One day." She cupped his face in her hands and kissed him hard. "Hopefully, the next time you come here, you'll never leave."

A soft snap echoed over the river and they appeared amidst Gabby's pile of shoes.

"Fleur! Harry!" Gabby scampered down the stairs and clapped her hands over her mouth. "Fleur! You promised to warn me before we tried the veela sisters threesome persuasion technique, I'm not wearing my sexy underwear."

Harry snorted. "That's okay, Gabby. Neither am I."

She snickered, darting forward and dragging them both into a tight hug. "I missed this feeling," Gabby breathed. "It's so beautiful."

"Is it the feeling of a blossoming veela bond about to happen?" Harry asked.

"Non." A soft laugh escaped Fleur's lips. "It's the anticipation of free clafoutis."

"Nuh uh." Gabby shook her head. "It's definitely a veela bond. However, it won't be permanent until after the veela sisters threesome, so…" She pointed upstairs, her eyes glowing with mischief. "Fleur?"

Fleur's father sighed from down the hall. "There are some things, as a father, you'd really rather you didn't hear." He shook his head, half a smile on his face. "I'm going to pretend that joke never happened."

"You're lucky maman didn't hear that joke," Fleur whispered in Gabby's ear. "Find your own boyfriend, you little harpy, before I toss you out of the nest and make an omelette of you."

Gabby giggled. "Fleur's a bird of prey. She snatches underage boys from their schools and seduces them, then pecks any other girl who gets too close."

"And I definitely didn't hear that," Fleur's father remarked, studying the ceiling.

Heat crept onto Harry's cheeks and Gabby's giggling grew louder.

"Non." Fleur pressed a hand over Gabby's mouth. "No more chirping from you, little chick. Not unless you don't want to come to Paris with us."

Gabby tugged Fleur's hand away from her mouth and extricated herself from the hug. "I'll be good."

"Sure you will, for about three minutes." Harry laughed, then bent to Fleur's ear. "We can stay for a little while, if you like? We have to wait for the Polyjuice and the Lestranges at Gringotts or for Dumbledore to find the other one…"

She flashed him a small, warm smile and watched Gabby tossing pairs of shoes out of her pile by the door. "I would like that a lot," Fleur murmured. "I missed that cheeky harpy."

Discord is still a thing. Audiobooks are also still a thing. All the links are on my profile and on discord, including how to support me and read my original works! Discord is the best place to get updates and find about everything I do, so do check it out if you're interested!

But if you don't fancy hunting, there's always this one below.

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