Harry moved through the forbidden forest silently, the thoughts of those who had died filling his head.
He knew what he had to do. He refused to let anyone else suffer because of him. This was the plan after all, Dumbledore's betrayal still stung deeply, but Harry could not say he was wrong. Harry reached the edge of the forest, and he stopped.
A swarm of dementors was gliding amongst the trees; he could feel their chill, and he was not sure he would be able to pass safely through it. He had no strength left for a Patronus. He could no longer control his own trembling.
It was not, after all, so easy to die. Every second he breathed, the smell of the grass, the cool air on his face, was so precious: To think that people had years and years, time to waste, so much time it dragged, and he was clinging to each second. At the same time, he thought that he would not be able to go on, and knew that he must. The long game was ended, the Snitch had been caught, it was time to leave the air...
The Snitch. His nerveless fingers fumbled for a moment with the pouch at his neck and he pulled it out. I open at the close.
Breathing fast and hard, he stared down at it. Now that he wanted time to move as slowly as possible, it seemed to have sped up, and understanding was coming so fast it seemed to have bypassed thought. This was the close. This was the moment. He pressed the golden metal to his lips and whispered, "I am about to die." The metal shell broke open. He lowered his shaking hand, raised Draco's
wand beneath the Cloak, and murmured, "Lumos."
The black stone with its jagged crack running down the center sat in the two halves of the Snitch. The Resurrection Stone had cracked down the vertical line representing the Elder Wand. The triangle and circle representing the Cloak and the stone were still discernible.
And again Harry understood without having to think. It did not matter about bringing them back, for he was about to join them. He was not really fetching them: They were fetching him.
He closed his eyes and turned the stone over in his hand three times. He knew it had happened, because he heard slight movements around him that suggested frail bodies shifting their footing on the earthly, twig-strewn ground that marked the outer edge of the forest. He opened his eyes and looked around.
They were neither ghost nor truly flesh, he could see that. They resembled most closely the Riddle that had escaped from the diary so long ago, and he had been memory made nearly solid. less substantial than living bodies, but much more than ghosts, they moved toward him, and on each face, there was the same loving smile.
James was exactly the same height as Harry. He was wearing the clothes in which he had died, and his hair was untidy and ruffled, and his glasses were a little lopsided, like Mr. Weasley's.
Sirius was tall and handsome, and younger by far than Harry had seen him in life. He loped with an easy grace, his hands in his pockets, and a grin on his face.
Lupin was younger too, and much less shabby, and his hair was thicker and darker. He looked happy to be back in this familiar place, scene of so many adolescent wanderings.
Lily's smile was widest of all. She pushed her long hair back as she drew close to him, and her green eyes, so like his, searched his face hungrily, as though she would never be able to look at him enough.
And one face that was still sensitive to the look, Tori. She stood with a smile upon her face, her long dark hair flowing down her back. Her face was young and filled with joy as if she had just been greeted with great news.
"You've been so brave." His mother began.
He could not speak. His eyes feasted on her, and he thought that he would like to stand and look at her forever, and that would be enough.
"You are nearly there," said James. "Very close. We are... so proud of you."
"Does it hurt?" The childish question had fallen from Harry's lips before he could stop it.
"Dying? Not at all," said Sirius. "Quicker and easier than falling asleep."
"And he will want to be quick. He wants it over," said Lupin.
"I didn't want you to die," Harry said. These words came without his volition. "Any of you. I'm sorry—" He addressed Lupin more than any of them, beseeching him.
"—right after you'd had your son... Remus, I'm sorry—"
"I am sorry too," said Lupin. "Sorry I will never know him... but he will know why I died and I hope he will understand. I was trying to make a world in which he could live a happier life."
"And you... Tori. You're only nineteen..."
"I knew the sacrifices going in, Harry. And... I can say I've lived a pretty good life for nineteen years."
"And Fred?"
"Currently pissed you hadn't told him Prongs was your father. He'll of course let it slide. It's alright to laugh. It's a joke. We're both happy, Harry."
A chilly breeze that seemed to emanate from the heart of the forest lifted the hair at Harry's brow. He knew that they would not tell him to go, that it would have to be his decision. "You'll stay with me?"
"Until the very end," said James.
"They won't be able to see you?" asked Harry.
"We are part of you," said Sirius. "Invisible to anyone else." Harry looked at his mother. "Stay close to me," He said quietly.
And he self off.
The dementors' chill did not overcome him; he passed through it with his companions, and they acted like Patronuses to him, and together they marched through the old trees that grew closely together, their branches tangled, their roots gnarled and twisted underfoot. Harry clutched the Cloak tightly around him in the darkness, traveling deeper and deeper into the forest, with no idea where exactly Voldemort was, but sure that he would find him.
Beside him, making scarcely a sound, walked James, Sirius, Lupin, Lily, and Tori, and their presence was his courage, and the reason he was about to keep putting one foot in front of the other. His body and mind felt oddly disconnected now, his limbs working without conscious instruction, as if he were passenger, not driver, in the body, he was about to leave. The dead who walked beside him through the forest was much more real to him now that the living back at the castle: Ron, Hermione, Ginny, and all the others were the ones who felt like ghosts as he stumbled and slipped toward the end of his life, toward Voldemort...
A thud and a whisper. Some other living creatures had stirred close by Harry stopped under the Cloak, peering around, listening, and his mother and father, Lupin, Sirius, and Tori stopped too. "Someone there," came a rough whisper close at hand. "He's got an Invisibility Cloak. Could it be—?" Two figures emerged from behind a nearby tree; Their wands flared and Harry saw Yaxley and Dolohov peering into the darkness, directly at the place Harry, his mother and father, and Sirius, Lupin, and Tori stood. Apparently, they could not see anything. "Definitely heard something," said Yaxley. "Animal, d'you reckon?"
"That head case Hagrid kept a whole bunch of stuff in here," said Dolohov, glancing over his shoulder. Yaxley looked down at his watch.
"Time's nearly up. Potter's had his hour. He's not coming."
"And he was sure he'd come! He won't be happy."
"Better go back," said Yaxley, "Find out what the plan is now."
He and Dolohov turned and walked deeper into the forest. Harry followed them, knowing that they would lead him exactly where he wanted to go. He glanced sideways, and his mother smiled at him, and his father nodded encouragement. He glanced to his other side where Tori winked at him.
They had traveled on mere minutes when Harry saw light ahead, and Yaxley and Dolohov stepped out into a clearing that Harry knew had been the place where the monstrous Aragog had once lived. The remnants of his vast web were there still, but the swarm of descendants he had spawned had been driven out by the Death Eaters, to fight for their cause.
A fire burned in the middle of the clearing, and its flickering light fell over a crowd of completely silent, watchful Death Eaters. Some of them were still masked and hooded; others showed their faces.
Two giants sat on the outskirts of the group, casting massive shadows over the scene, their faces cruel, rough-hewn like rock. Harry saw Fenrir, skulking, chewing his long nails; the great blonde Rowle was dabbing at his bleeding lip. He saw Lucius Malfoy, who looked defeated and terrified, and Narcissa, whose eyes were sunken and full of apprehension. He saw Edward and Eleanor Silvers standing next to their son, Avalon. Harry couldn't help but glance at the ghost of Tori once more.
Every eye was fixed upon Voldemort, who stood with his head bowed, and his white hands folded over the Elder Wand in front of him. He might have been praying, or else counting silently in his mind, and Harry, standing still on the edge of the scene, thought absurdly of a child counting in a game of hide-and-seek. Behind him head, still swirling and coiling, the great snake Nagini floated in her glittering, charmed cage, like a monstrous halo.
When Dolohov and Yaxley rejoined the circle, Voldemort looked up.
"No sign of him, my Lord," said Dolohov.
Voldemort's expression did not change. The red eyes seemed to burn in the firelight. Slowly he drew the Elder Wand between his long fingers. "My Lord—" Bellatrix had spoken; She sat closest to Voldemort, disheveled, her face a little bloody but otherwise unharmed. Voldemort raised his hand to silence her, and she did not speak another word, but eyed him in worshipful fascination.
"I thought he would come," said Voldemort in his high, clear voice, his eyes on the leaping flames. "I expected him to come." Nobody spoke. They seemed as scared as Harry, whose heart was now throwing itself against his ribs as though determined to escape the body he was about to cast aside. His hands were sweating as he pulled off the Invisibility Cloak and stuffed it beneath his robes, with his wand. He did not want to be tempted to fight.
"I was, it seems..." mistaken," said Voldemort.
"You weren't."
Harry said it as loudly as he could, with all the force he could muster. He did not want to sound afraid. The Resurrection Stone slipped from between his numb fingers, and out of the corner of his eyes he saw his parents, Sirius, Lupin, and Tori vanish as he stepped forward into the firelight. At that moment he felt that nobody mattered but Voldemort.
It was just the two of them.
hehe
i'm in danger
yes. there is a second book, and here's the title to it!
"The Ghost of You"
i will give you guys more information soon!
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