Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows hp-7 Read online

  “If you planned your death with Snape, you meant him to end up with the Elder Wand, didn’t you?”

  “I admit that was my intention,” said Dumbledore, “but it did not work as I intended, did it?”

  “No,” said Harry. “That bit didn’t work out.”

  The creature behind them jerked and moaned, and Harry and Dumbledore sat without talking for the longest time yet. The realization of what would happen next settled gradually over Harry in the long minutes, like softly falling snow.

  “I’ve got to go back, haven’t I?”

  “That is up to you.”

  “I’ve got a choice?”

  “Oh yes,” Dumbledore smiled at him. “We are in King’s Cross, you say? I think that if you decided not to go back, you would be able to… let’s say… board a train.”

  “And where would it take me?”

  “On,” said Dumbledore simply.

  Silence again.

  “Voldemort’s got the Elder Wand.”

  “True. Voldemort has the Elder Wand.”

  “But you want me to go back?”

  “I think,” said Dumbledore, “that if you choose to return, there is a chance that he may be finished for good. I cannot promise it. But I know this, Harry, that you have less to fear from returning here than he does.”

  Harry glanced again at the raw looking thing that trembled and choked in the shadow beneath the distant chair.

  “Do not pity the dead, Harry. Pity the living, and above all, those who live without love. By returning, you may ensure that fewer souls are maimed, fewer families are torn apart. If that seems to you a worthy goal, then we say good-bye for the present.”

  Harry nodded and sighed. Leaving this place would not be nearly as hard as walking into the forest had been, but it was warm and light and peaceful here, and he knew that he was heading back to pain and the fear of more loss. He stood up, and Dumbledore did the same, and they looked for a long moment into each other’s faces.

  “Tell me one last thing,” said Harry, “Is this real? Or has this been happening inside my head?”

  Dumbledore beamed at him, and his voice sounded loud and strong in Harry’s ears even though the bright mist was descending again, obscuring his figure.

  “Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean it is not real?”

  36. THE FLAW IN THE PLAN

  He was flying facedown on the grond again. The smell of the forest filled his nostrils. He could feel the cold hard ground beneath his cheek, and the hinge of his glasses which have been knocked sideways by the fall cutting into his temple. Every inch of him ached, and the place where Killing Curse had hit him felt like the bruise of an iron-clad punch. He did not stir, but he remained exactly where he had fallen, with his left arm bent out at an akward angle and his mouth gaping.

  He had expected to hear cheer of triumph and jubilation at his death, but instead hurried footsteps, whispers, and solicitous murmurs filled the air.

  “My Lord… my Lord…”

  It was Bellatrix’s voice, and she spoke as if to a lover. Harry did not dare open his eyes, but allowed his other senses to explore his predicament. He knew that his wand was still stowed beneath his robes because he could feel it pressed between his chest and the ground. A slight cushioning effect in the area of his stomach told him that the Invisibility Cloak was also there, stuffed out of sight.

  “My Lord…”

  “That will do,” said Voldemort’s voice.

  More footsteps. Several people were backing away from the same spot. Desperate to see what was happening and why, Harry opened his eyes by a millimeter.

  Voldemort seemed to be getting to his feet. Various Death Eaters were hurrying away from him, returning to the crowd lining the clearing. Bellatrix alone remained behind, kneeling beside Voldemort.

  Harry closed his eyes again and considered what he had seen. The Death Eaters have been buddled around Voldemort, who seem to have fallen to the ground. Something had happened when he had hit Harry with the Killing Curse. Had Voldemort too collapsed? It seemed like it. And both of them had briefly fallen unconcious and both of them had now returned…

  “My Lord, let me—”

  “I do not require assitance,” said Voldemort coldly, and though he could not see it, Harry pictured Bellatrix withdrawing a helpful hand. “The boy… Is he dead?”

  There was a complete silence in the clearing. Nobody approached Harry, but he felt their concentraded gaze; it seemed to press him harder into the ground, and he was terrified a finger or an eyelid might twitch.

  “You,” said Voldemort, and there was a bang and a small shrick of pain. “Examine him. Tell me whether he is dead.”

  Harry did not know who had been sent to verify. He could only lie there, with his heart thumping traitorously, and wait to be examined, but at the same time nothing, small comfort through it was, that Voldemort was wary of approaching him, that Voldemort suspected that all had not gone to plan…

  Hands, softer than he had been expecting, touched Harry’s face, and felt his heart. He could hear the woman’s fast breathing, her pounding of life against his ribs.

  “Is Draco alive? Is he in the castle?”

  The whisper was barely audible, her lips were an inch from his ear, her head bent so low that her long hair shielded his face from the onlookers.

  “Yes,” he breathed back.

  He felt the hand on his chest contract: her nails pierced him. Then it was withdrawn. She had sat up.

  “He is dead!” Narcissa Malfoy called to the watchers.

  And now they shouted, now they yelled in triumph and stamped their feet, and through his eyelids, Harry saw bursts of red and silver light shoot into the air in celebration.

  Still feigning death on the ground, he understood. Narcissa knew that the only way she would be permitted to enter Hogwarts, and find her son, was as part of the conquering army. She no longer cared whether Voldemort won.

  “You see?” screeched Voldemort over the tumult. “Harry Potter is dead by my hand, and no man alive can threaten me now! Watch! Crucio!”

  Harry had been expecting it, knew his body would not be allowed to remain unsullied upon the forest floor; it must be subjected to humiliation to prove Voldemort’s victory. He was lifted into the air, and it took all his determination to remain limp, yet the pain he expected did not come. He was thrown once, twice, three times into the air. His glasses flew off and he felt his wand slide a little beneath his robes, but he kept himself floppy and lifeless, and when he fell no ground for the last time, the clearing echoed with jeers and shrieks of laughter.

  “Now,” said Voldemort, “we go to the castle, and show them what has become of their hero. Who shall drag the body? No—Wait—”

  There was a fresh outbreak of laughter, and after a few moments Harry felt the ground trembling beneath him.

  “You carry him,” Voldemort said. “He will be nice and visible in your arms, will he not? Pick up your little friend, Hagrid. And the glasses—put on the glasses—he must be recognizable—”

  Someone slammed Harry’s glasses back onto his face with deliberate force, but the enormous hands that lifted him into the air were exceedingly gentle. Harry could feel Hagrid’s arms trembling with the force of his heaving sobs; great tears splashed down upon him as Hagrid cradled Harry in his arms, and Harry did not dare, by movement or word, to intimate to Hagrid that all was not, yet, lost.

  “Move,” said Voldemort, and Hagrid stumbled forward, forcing his way through the close-growing trees, back through the forest.

  Branches caught at Harry’s hair and robes, but he lay quiescent, his mouth lolling open, his eyes shut, and in the darkness, while the Death Eaters croed all around them, and while Hagrid sobbed blindly, nobody looked to see whether a pulse beat in the exposed neck of Harry Potter…

  The two giants crashed along behind the Death Eaters; Harry could hear trees creaking and falling as they passed; they made so mu
ch din that birds toes shrieking into the sky, and even the jeers of the Death Eaters were drowned. The victorious procession marched on toward the open ground, and after a while Harry could tell, by the lightening of the darkness through his closed eyelids, that the trees were beginning to thin.

  “BANE!”

  Hagrid’s unexpected bellow nearly forced Harry’s eyes open. “Happy now, are yeh, that yeh didn’t fight, yeh cowardly bunch o’ nags? Are yeh happy Harry Potter’s—d-dead…?”

  Hagrid could not continue, but broke down in fresh tears. Harry wondered how many centaurs were watching their procession pass; he dared not open his eyes to look. Some of the Death Eaters called insults at the centaurs as they left them behind. A little later, Harry sensed, by a freshening of the air, that they had reached the edge of the forest.

  “Stop.”

  Harry thought that Hagrid must have been forced to obey Voldemort’s command, because he lurched a little. And now a chill settled over them where they sood, and Harry heard the rasping breath of the Dementors that patrolled the other trees. They would not affect him now.

  The fact of his own survival burned inside him, a talisman against them, as though his father’s stag kept guardian in his heart.

  Someone passed close by Harry, and he knew that it was Voldemort himself because he spoke a moment later, his voice magically magnified so that it swelled through the ground, crashing upon Harry’s eardrums.

  “Harry Potter is dead. He was killed as he ran away, trying to save himself while you lay down your lives for him. We bring you his body as proof that your hero is gone.

  “The battle is won. You have lost half of your fighters. My Death Eaters outnumber you, and the Boy Who Lived is finished. There must be no more war. Anyone who continues to resist, man, woman or child, will be slaughtered, as will every member of their family. Come out of the castle now, kneel before me, and you shall be spared. Your parents and children, your brothers and sisters will live and be forgiven, and you will join me in the new world we shall build together.”

  There was silence in the grounds and from the castle. Voldemort was so close to him that Harry did not dare open his eyes again.

  “Come,” said Voldemort, and Harry heard him move ahead, and Hagrid was forced to follow. Now Harry opened his eyes a fraction, and saw Voldemort striding in front them, wearing the great snake Nagini around his shoulders, now free of her enchanted cage. But Harry had no possibility of extracting the wand concealed under his robes without being noticed by the Death Eaters, who marched on the either side of them through the slowly lightening darkness…

  “Harry,” sobbed Hagrid. “Oh, Harry… Harry…”

  Harry shut his eyes tight again. He knew that they were approaching the castle and strained his ears to distinguish, above the gleeful voices of the Death Eaters and their tramping footsteps, signs of life from those within.

  “Stop.”

  The Death Eaters came to a halt; Harry heard them spreading out in a line facing the open front doors of the school. He could see, even though his closed lids, the teddish glow that meant light streamed upon him from the entrance hall. He waited. Any moment, the people for whom he had tried to die would see him, lying apparently dead, in Hagrid’s arms.

  “NO!”

  The scream was the more terrible because he had never expected or dreamed that Professor McGonagall could make such a sound. He heard another women laughing nearby, and knew that Bellatrix gloried in McGonagall’s despair. He squinted again for a single second and saw the open doorway filling with people, as the survivors of the battle came out onto the front steps to face their vanquishers and see the truth of Harry’s death for themselves. He saw Voldemort standing a little in front of him, stroking Nagini’s head with a single white finger. He closed his eyes again.

  “No!”

  “No!”

  “Harry! HARRY!”

  Ron’s, Hermione’s, and Ginny’s voices were worse than McGonagall’s; Harry wanted nothing more than to call back, yet he made himself lie silent, and their cries acted like a trigger; the crowd of survivors took up the cause, screaming and yelling abuse at the Death Eathers, until—

  “SILENCE!” cried Voldemort, and there was a bang and a flash of bright light, and silence was forced upn them all. “It is over! Set him down, Hagrid, at my feet, where he belongs!”

  Harry felt himself lowered onto the grass.

  “You see?” said Voldemort, and Harry felt him striding backward and forward right beside the place where he lay. “Harry Potter is dead! Do you understand now, deluded ones? He was nothing, ever, but a boy who relied on others to sacrifice themselves for him!”

  “He beat you!” yelled Ron, and the charm broke, and the defenders of Hogwarts were shouting and screaming again until a second, more powerful bang extinguished their voices once more.

  “He was killed while trying to sneak out of the castle grounds,” said Voldemort, and there was a relish in his voice for the lie, “killed while trying to save himself—”

  But Voldemort broke off: Harry heard a scuffle and a shout, then another bang, a flash of light, and grunt of pain; he opened his eyes an infinitesimal amount. Someone had broken free of the crowd and charged at Voldemort: Harry saw the figure hit the ground. Disarmed, Voldemort throwing the challenger’s wand aside and laughing.

  “And who is this?” he said in his soft snake’s hiss. “Who has volunteered to demonstrate what happens to those who continue to fight when the battle is lost?”

  Bellatrix gave a delighted laugh.

  “It is Neville Longbottom, my Lord! The boy who has been giving the Carrows so much trouble! The son of the Aurors, remember?”

  “Ah, yes, I remember,” said Voldemort, looking down at Neville, who was struggling back to his feet, unarmed and unproctected, standing in the no-man’s-land between the survivors and the Death Eaters. “But you are a pureblood, aren’t you, my brave boy?” Voldemort asked Neville, who stood facing him, his empty hands curled in fists.

  “So what if I am?” said Neville loudly.

  “You show spirit and bravery, and you come of noble stock. You will make a very valuable Death Eater. We need your kind, Neville Longbottom.”

  “I’ll join you when hell freezes over,” said Neville. “Dumbledore’s Army!” he shouted, and there was an answering cheer from the crowd, whom Voldemort’s Silencing Charms seemed unable to hold.

  “Very well,” said Voldemort, and Harry heard more danger in the silkiness of his voice than in the most powerful curse. “If that is your choice, Longbottom, we revert to the original plan. On your head,” he said quietly, “be it.”

  Still watching through his lashes, Harry saw Voldemort wave his wand. Seconds later, out of one of the castle’s shattered windows, something that looked like a misshapen bird flew through the half light and landed in Voldemort’s hand. He shook the mildewed object by its pointed end and it dangled, emtpy and ragged: the Sorting Hat.

  “There will be no more Sorting at Hogwarts School,” said Voldemort. “There will be no more Houses. The emblem, shield and colors of my noble ancestor, Salazar Slytherin, will suffice everyone. Won’t they, Neville Longbottom?”

  He pointed his wand at Neville, who grew rigid and still, then forced the hat onto Neville’s head, so that it slipped down below his eyes. There were movements from the watching crowd in front of the castle, and as one, the Death Eaters raised their wands, holding the fighters of Hogwarts at bay.

  “Neville here is now going to demonstrate what happens to anyone foolish enough to continue to oppose me,” said Voldemort, and with a flick of his wand, he caused the Sorting Hat to burst into flames.

  Screams split the dawn, and Neville was a flame, rooted to the spot, unable to move, and Harry could not bear it: He must act—

  And then many things happened at the same moment.

  They heard uproar from the distant boundary of the school as what sounded like hundreds of people came swarming over the out-of-sight wall
s and pelted toward the castle, uttering lowd war cries. At the same time, Grawp came lumbering around the side of the castel and yelled, “HAGGER!” His cry was answered by roars from Voldemort’s giants: They ran at Grawp like bull elephants making the earth quake. Then came hooves and the twangs of bows, and arrows were suddenly falling amongst the Death Eaters, who broke ranks, shouting their surprise. Harry pulled the Invisibilty Cloak from inside his robes, swunt it over himself, and sprang to his feet, as Neville moved too.

  In one swift, fluid motin, Neville broke free of the Body-Bind Curse upon him; the flaming hat fell off him and he drew from its depths something silver, with a glittering, rubied handle—

  The slash of the silver blade could not be heard over the roar of the oncoming crowd or the sounds of the clashing giants or of te stampending centaurs, and yet, it seemed to draw every eye. With a single stroke Neville sliced off the great snake’s head, which spun high into the air, gleaming in the light flooding from the entrance hall, and Voldemort’s mouth was open in a scream of fury that nobody could hear, and the snake’s body thudded to the ground at his feet—

  Hidden beneath the Invisibilty Cloak, Harry cast a Shield Charm between Neville and Voldemort before the latter could raise his stamps of the battling giants, Hagrid’s yell came loudest of all.

  “HARRY!” Hagrid shouted. “HARRY—WHERE’S HARRY?”

  Chaos reigned. The charging centaurs were scattering the Death Eaters, everyone was feeling the giants’ stamping feet, and nearer and nearer thundered the reinforcements that had come from who knew where; Harry saw great winged creatues soaring the heads of Voldemort’s giants, thestrals and Buckbeak the hippogriff scratching at their eyes while Grawp punched and pummeled them and now the wizards, defenders of Hogwarts and Death Eaters alike were being forced back into the castle. Harry was shooting jinxes and curses at any Death Eater he could see, and they crumpled, not knowing what or who had hit them, and their bodies were trampled by the retreating crowd. Still hidden beneath the Invisibility Cloak, Harry was buffered into the entrance hall: He was searching for Voldemort and saw him across the room, firing spells from his wand as he backed into the Great Hall, still screaming instructions to his followers as he sent curses flying left and right; Harry cast more Shield Charms, and Voldemort’s would-be victims, Seamus Finnigan and Hannah Abbott, datted past him into the Great Hall, where they joined the fight already flourishing inside it.