In one swift, fluid motion, 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 the stampeding 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 Invisibility Cloak, Harry cast a Shield Charm between Neville and Voldemort before the latter could raise his wand. Then, over the screams and the roars and the thunderous stamps of the battling giants, Hagrid’s yell came loudest of all.
“HARRY!” Hagrid shouted. “HARRY — WHERE’S HARRY?”
Chaos reigned.
Maddie Savage v. Divya Vaisey
Maddie should not be out of bed.
Her spinning head and the pain despite the potions she’d taken were trying to tell her that, but instead of listening to her body she’d just bolstered the spells keeping her from bleeding out and pushed herself to her feet. She’d never really believed that Harry was their only hope, and she wasn’t about to stay in bed while the fight continued. She was still breathing, so she could fight. She flung hexes and arresting charms left and right, not engaging a particular opponent as yet.
“Divya?” she exclaimed when she saw her former colleague, the woman who had been a mentor and a friend. Maddie was surprised she was here, that she had actually chosen come out and publicly fight.
Madeline, was what Divya wanted to say, but the remnants of the Imperius lingered, even though none of the Dark Magic she had tried to throw at people seemed to be working. So all that came out instead was, "Stupefy!"
Maddie's reflexes weren't what they should be, but the rough shield she pulled up still managed to block the stunning spell from Divya. Which seemed as wrong as the spell to begin with. She adjusted, pulling up a stronger shield as she took a wary step towards Divya, eyebrows drawn.
"It's me. Maddie," she clarified, since Divya seemed confused. "Not actually one of the bad guys." Maybe staying at the DMLE had addled her brain somehow.
Divya heard the words, she registered them somewhere in that part of her mind that was fighting desperately to regain control — but her movements wouldn't align with her consciousness. She maintained an offensive duelling position and this time threw a slashing hex at her former co-worker.
Maddie’s shield absorbed the damage, shattering as Maddie stared in disbelief. After a moment she threw a disarming spell at Divya, her aim not as precise as she would usually prefer.
“Did he Imperius you too?” Maddie demanded, grasping for some explanation for Divya’s bizarre behaviour. “Why are you fighting for them?”
“Confringo!”
The curse crashed into Maddie, bursting into flames upon contact as she stumbled back a few steps.
Okay. So she wasn’t going to be getting through to Divya. She cast a quick fire extinguishing charm, wincing as she discovered the burns that had been left on her exposed skin.
“Immobilus!”
Divya may have been under Imperius, but her instincts as an Auror were intact. She dodged the spell and levelled up to the bone shattering curse.
Maddie wasn’t quite as with it, the world spinning around her. Pain and potions and something unfamiliar clouded her head and she barely deflected the curse, sending down to her foot rather than blocking it entirely.
“Depulso!” She yelled desperately, pouring whatever sliver of rationality she had into the spell. She couldn’t do this by herself. She needed some space to figure out what to do. She couldn’t think.
Flung backwards, Divya landed heavily against the floor, the back of her head thudding against an abandoned shield from a dismantled knight's armour. Crack. Blood oozed from the back of her head and she could see — for a moment — the world without the haze of Yaxley's Imperius.
"Maddie," she began. But whatever other words were on her lips in that moment died with her.
Maddie blinked a few times, trying to figure out if she had heard her name or not. She took a couple of steps towards Divya, terrified when she realised the other woman wasn’t moving.
But the blood loss and dark magic in veins conspired with her fresh injuries and she crumpled, oblivion taking over before she could reach her former mentor.
Angelina Johnson v. Thea Travers
Abstaining from duelling in the Great Hall along with the rest of the Death Eaters she no longer cared for, Thea deftly seized the opportunity to run. She ducked under the line of fire, pausing as a chunk of stone was gauged out of the wall and flung over her head towards someone else's opponent. The main double door entrance to Hogwarts wasn't that far.
All she had to do was flee down the stairs, then out across the grounds, all the way to the Gates and there, freedom.
One of the double doors — which had been hastily reassembled during the interim just in case — was flung open and Angelina, out of breath, darted inside, closing the door behind her. There was a thud and then another and then silence outside as whatever had been giving her chase seemed to give up. She wheeled around, intent on joining the action again, when she found herself meeting Thea’s eye.
Recognition flickered across Angelina’s features and her posture changed, became more alert. “What are you doing here?”
Oh, Merlin. This was the last thing Thea needed. Shoulders tense, she stared down defiantly at Angelina. “I’m just leaving,” she explained. “Don’t worry.”
Angelina took a step back, her spine against the seam of the two doors leading outside, blocking Thea’s escape. “I said, what are you doing here?” she asked again, matching the other girl’s defiance.
"And I said I was leaving," Theodora reiterated, pulling her wand out instinctively. She didn't want to fight, but she wasn't going to let Johnson stand in her way again. "Petrificus Totalus."
Wand already drawn from her excursion outside, Angelina cast a quick shield charm and stared at Thea in open surprise. She’d had about enough of this night. “Well, you’re definitely not leaving now,” she said, aiming a disarming charm at Thea.
Thea countered with a shield charm and then a knockback jinx. "Johnson, just let me go," she tried once more, hoping to plead with the Gryffindor towards some semblance of reason. "I haven't hurt anyone, I couldn't. Just let me go."
Another shield caught the jinx and Angelina shook her head, not budging from her position in front of the doors. “You haven’t hurt anyone tonight,” she corrected. And then because old habits die hard, added, “Or so you say.” She didn’t cast anything else just yet, but she kept her wand pointed at Thea. “But I’d bet you’ve hurt someone or you wouldn’t be here. You don’t get to just leave.”
“I didn’t! I jinxed that Macmillan kid with a tickling charm,” Thea said hotly. She cast a blasting charm at the doors behind Angelina, trying to prove that she wasn’t going to hurt her, but not giving in to Angelina’s refusal to let her go.
The blasting curse flew by Angelina and her shield, but the force of the blast threw her forward and off her feet, peppering her with splinters of wood and metal fastenings from the door. She threw an arm over the back of her neck and whatever she’d been about to say in Ernie’s defense was knocked out of her with her breath. Her wand was out, though, and she aimed a tripping jinx at Thea’s feet before the dust could settle.
“You bitch!” Thea spat out from the ground, humiliated by a mere trip jinx. “Why can’t you just leave me alone? I have done nothing to you! Or any of your stupid friends. I didn’t do anything and was never going to do anything to Cai and you made him kick me out because you’re a prejudiced, controlling asshole.”
Angelina didn’t care about anything Thea said the moment Cai’s name passed her lips. Her face screwed up, both in grief and fury, and she balled her fists against the floor as she started to push herself up again. “SHUT UP about Cai,” she yelled thickly. “You’re a Death Eater. You don’t get to be mad about that!” She hesitated for a beat and then sent arresting chains at Thea.
The charms broke against Thea’s shield charm. She laughed — a short, hollow bark. “You want to know why I’m here, Johnson?” She threw the bone breaking curse at Angelina, wanting her to hurt as much as she hurt. “Because of shits like YOU. Never. Leaving. Me. Alone. You wanted to think the worst of me and — here it is.”
There were tears in her eyes. She didn’t want to be a Death Eater anymore. She didn’t want the stupid tattoo she’d had to reducto a man for. She didn’t take pleasure in the memory of his blood and guts all over her, the numerous showers she had to take in the weeks afterwards, never feeling clean.
She didn’t want anyone’s love or approval or to give in and become what everyone thought she was anyway. She just wanted to a rewind button. She wanted to choose differently, but Johnson was standing in her way. Stopping her from being different. Reminding her that she wasn’t different. Blocking her from a path where she could breathe easy for once.
“Reducto!”
Any other night Angelina might’ve felt vindicated that she’d been right about Thea all along. But Harry was dead and she couldn’t find Fred and she wanted to go home, but every place she’d called home had been taken away from her. And then there was Thea, trying to blame Angelina for her being a Death Eater.
The bone breaking curse cracked the bones in Angelina’s wrist, not enough to render her hand useless, but enough that she cradled her wrist to her chest as she shouted, “That’s BULLSHIT,” at Thea. The reducto slammed into a shield she’d hastily cast and sent her scrambling back a few steps. “Don’t blame me for you deciding to turn to murder just because I knew your stupid nice act was fake. I didn’t think the worst. You are the worst.” A few frustrated slicing hexes were volleyed back at Thea, punctuating her words.
The first slicing hex hit Thea in the thigh before she got a shield charm up.
“You treated me and my friends like shit well before I’d ever considered just giving up and doing whatever everyone thought I was doing.” And then, because she was on the verge of tears and just wanted to leave and couldn’t understand why there had to be yet another obstacle in her way, Thea cast a crucio.
The cruciatus seemed to just miss Angelina, a flash of red flying over her shoulder, but she still gaped at Thea, furious. It made her even more furious that Thea looked like she was about to cry.
“You and all of your friends are manipulative pieces of shit,” Angelina spat, her wand clenched tightly in her fist. “That’s why you get treated like shit. This —” She gestured between them with her wand. “Isn’t my fault! I can’t believe you’re — you just tried to crucio me, you COW!”
“BECAUSE YOU WON’T LET ME GO, YOU CUNT!” Thea gave up on using magic to make her point. Nothing was stopping her from passing through that threshold and onto the grounds. She ran towards Angelina, trying to push her out of her way.
Angelina stood her ground, though, as solid as the doors behind her had been before Thea’s blasting curse and pushing back with her shoulders squared. “That’s a STUPID REASON FOR TORTURING SOMEONE!” And now that Thea was in reach, she quickly passed her wand to her other hand and hauled her arm back to aim a slap at Thea’s face.
It struck her cheek heavily enough Thea was sure it was going to leave a mark. “It missed you!” She protested, stepping back and gaping at Angelina. “And you’re a fucking hypocrite, your Order lot set off a bomb and I almost died? I hadn’t even wanted to learn Crucio by then!”
“Oh no, you almost died,” Angelina said with a mock pout. “I’m so sorry you finally had some insight into how the rest of us live every day!”
“Stupefy!!” Thea screamed, falling into rage at Angelina’s mocking.
“I can’t b—” But the stunner necessitated a quick shield charm and Angelina’s wand snapped up to catch it. “Stop trying to — to incapacitate me!” She aimed a blasting curse at Thea, wanting that distance between them back.
The blasting curse smacked Thea right in the middle of her chest, breaching her hastily thrown up shield charm. Her eyes widened, mouth forming a scream —
Blood, sinew, bones, chunks of Theodora Travers splattered against the walls and the floor and the door she’d tried so hard to pass.
And Angelina, too.
A punch of sound tore out of Angelina’s throat and she stared at the spot where Thea had just been standing. She hadn’t meant to — She’d only wanted — Her wand slipped out of suddenly numb fingers, clattering against the floor, and her stomach clenched painfully. She looked down at her wand, but caught sight of herself, covered in someone else.
Angelina finished Thea’s scream.
Terry Boot v. Clement Max & Victoria Mulciber
Despite them being at a school, Clement hadn’t expected to be facing off against kids. He’d thought, assumed, hoped that someone would have been smart enough to get all the kids out of there first.
But Potter himself was only a child. He shouldn’t have been surprised that the Dark Lord didn’t care how old anyone who stood in the way of victory was. Despite this, Clement had still been avoiding children — he’d always imagined he’d be a father one day and he wasn’t sure he could reconcile that with orders to kill anyone who was in the way.
His luck had run out though, suddenly face-to-face (and wand-to-wand) with a teen whose familiarity it took him a moment to place. “Boot,” he sneered, in what he hoped was a terrifying enough tone for the boy to decide to leave him alone, wand pointed but no shots fired yet. “Trying to make your poor mother go through another loss so soon?”
It took Terry a moment, too, to place the face of the man stood before him, but his blood was already boiling the moment Clement opened his mouth. He clenched his fists tightly, his wand digging into his palm. “Don’t talk about my mum,” he said through his teeth. Instead of doing the smart thing and using his wand, he hauled his arm back and aimed a fist at Clement’s face.
Clement was expecting a low level jinx or curse from the child and was caught off guard by the punch, which connected solidly with his nose. He could feel the blood trickling towards his mouth, stomach already turning. He wiped at his nose with the back of his hand, determined to keep the metallic taste from his mouth.
“I thought you were meant to be smart,” he sneered, casting a pepper spray potion at the boy. “But then, I thought your father was smart too and look at the decisions he made.”
Terry flung his arm over his eyes to protect them from whatever Clement had cast and reeled back, realizing that it had been a stupid move to punch him. But there wasn’t much time to dwell on that mistake when he had his dead father to defend. Eyes still stinging and watering from the pepper spray, he threw his arm to his side and glared at Clement. He wanted to punch him again and again. But he didn’t.
“My dad was smart,” Terry shot back, wand aiming a blasting curse at Clement, “but I don’t think Death Eater scum has much room to judge anyone’s decisions.”
“He wasn't that smart,” Clement replied as he blocked the blasting curse. “He clearly couldn't even figure out a condom.”
“That was eighteen years ago and I’m an only child,” Terry said sharply, shooting a slicing curse at Clement now. “Your dad’s the one that shoulda used a condom.”
The slicing curse hit his leg, tearing through his robes and drawing warn, sticky blood that dripped down towards his shoe. Clement’s stomach turned, and he forgot any thoughts of doing just enough damage to get the boy to leave him alone without permanently scarring him Physically, at least. Killing his dad had likely already emotionally scarred him for life, but he hadn’t wanted to kill any children. He’d always seen himself as a father some day.
But Terry was no longer a child, and no longer his friends’ son. He was an enemy in battle who needed to be taken care of.
“Avada Kadavra.”
Another spell hit Terry directly in the chest first, propelling the boy backwards and away from the killing curse.
From where she’d fired the spell, Vic stared, barely believing she’d done it.
Clement spun around to see which Order member had spared the boy’s life, only to instead come face to face with one of his friends.
“What are you doing?” he hissed.
Vic’s mouth worked soundlessly before she snapped it shut, jaw flexing as she clenched it defiantly.
“Kettleburn was enough. Leave it, he’s a stupid kid.” Like they hadn’t spent the last several hours cutting down exactly those on the order of some crackpot.
“You know,” Clement turned to face the boy again, “I’m sure your mother and her friends all think I killed your father, but this,” he gestured at Vic, “Is his real murderer.” He turned his attention back to her. “Do you want to make it two for two, Victoria?”
An ‘I’m not a stupid kid’ died in Terry’s throat at Clement’s revelation and something complicated flickered across his face before he spat a rueful laugh. “I don’t care,” he said, though he was doing a poor job of sounding as though he really didn’t. “My parents shouldn’t have trusted either of you.” But his next spell was a Tarantallegra he sent at Vic.
Momentarily absorbed with glaring at Clem, Vic was slow to defend herself and the spell hit. Her legs, one of which had already been badly damaged by Tonks began to flail about wildly, and Vic cried out in pain even as she lost balance, head slamming into the ground.
You save a kid whose father you murdered in cold blood and this is how they repay you. “Confringo” she managed to fire back.
Clement couldn't help but laugh as Victoria danced herself onto the ground. “Get up, Victoria,” he instructed, still smirking. “I didn't realise you wanted to make Boot’s death slow and painful. But if that's what we’re going for…,” he aimed a blood boiling curse at the boy.
“Yeah, get up, Victoria,” Terry said mockingly. He blocked the blasting curse with a shield, but the spell couldn’t hold against the next curse. It smashed through his shield and — to his utter surprise — flew right over his shoulder, so close to his ear that he could hear it go by. He blinked, having thought he was a goner, but he furrowed his brow in concentration and sent a severing charm at Clement.
“Shut the fuck up, Clem.” Her own blood boiling, Vic stumbled painfully to her feet, taking advantage of Terry’s focus on Clem to send ropes of fire spinning towards the younger boy. If one managed to hit Clem too, well oops.
Clement blocked the severing charm but the fiery ropes lashed him. “Watch your aim, Victoria,” he hissed, the boy briefly forgotten about as he stared down Vic. “We’re on the same side, remember?”
The fiery ropes also lashed Terry and he grit his teeth against the sting of one of them across his arm. His gaze flicked between Vic and Clement and he decided, while Clement was distracted, to send a silent Furnunculus at him.
“Ooooh,” Terry said, his tone still mocking, “looks like she’s a shit friend across the board.”
“Shut up,” Clement spat, pimples popping up all over his face. “Not knowing when to keep his mouth shut got your father killed too,” he added with a bone twisting curse.
Vic grit her teeth, the constant reminder of what kind of friend she was, was an open wound enough. She’d done a lot to put herself first, why should she deviate now?
And Merlin fucking hell this was Byron’s son all over. Did he want to die? “Fuck this,” she said as Clem volleyed another spell at the boy. She didn’t have to confront this, be here. She pointed her wand at the ground, the floor shaking, cracking apart before pieces were wrenched up violently.
The floor under Terry’s feet wrenched up and knocked him back towards the Great Hall and out of the curse’s path. He pushed himself to his feet and glared at the rubble blocking him from confronting Clement and Vic. He could still make out one of their elbows through chunks of rock, but unless he took another corridor, he was stuck.
Frustrated, he called out, “My dad thought you were both lame!” before turning on his heel and heading back to the Great Hall.
“What the fuck?” Clement asked, bewildered by Victoria’s actions. “You’re just going to let the kid get away? He attacked us.”
Vic’s jaw ticked, the only sign she’d heard Clem as she slumped back against some rubble, her leg growing more useless every second she put weight on it.
Her ears burned with indignant anger, but she ignored the question. She had no answer that made sense. She just couldn’t—
“You want to kill the kid that badly? We’ve d — Whatever. I’m out of here.”
“I didn’t want to kill him, but he was fighting for them,” Clement explained, unsure how Vic wasn’t getting it. “Just like Byron was, and everyone else any of us have killed. They want us dead too.” Even Madeline, showing up at his house, wanting to kill him. “It’s them or us and I pick us.”
“Us?” Vic choked on a laugh, and looked around at the rubble around him, the sounds of fighting from the great hall, sounds that did not sound so triumphant for one group in particular.
“I drank that pumpkin juice for long enough. There was never an ‘us’, not for some halfblood,” she sneered, “that’s been made very clear and I’m not wasting any more of my time on that-that noseless loser. I pick me and if you had a brain cell left you’d choose yourself too. It’s over.”
“You’re making a mistake,” Clement told her, momentarily lowering his wand, though his voice was cold and without concern. “How do you see this working out for you? You desert us, we win, he kills you. You desert us, they win, they kill you. Your only option is to keep fighting with us, we win and we’re rewarded. If you marry well enough, your family’s blood will be pure eventually. You’ll rise above being a halfblood.”
Vic’s jaw flexed as she listened to him, the truth ugly. She’d made her bed, painted herself into the corner so what did she fucking expect? She wouldn’t grovel, she knew what she deserved.
But she would do what she wanted, go where she wanted and they could choke on it.
“Oh fuck you,” she spat. “It shouldn’t fucking matter how I marry, have I not proven myself, time and time again? I have given everything, done everything and it’s chin up Vic, if you bag yourself a pureblood it might mean something in the end.” Her nostrils flared, eyes burning as she stood.
“Tell my mother I got lost. Bye.”
“Victoria,” Clement snapped, hitting her with a stinging hex to stop her from going. “You can't leave now. It's almost over.” His eyes pleaded with her. “We both gave up a lot for this. Our friends. But it will be worth it when we win.”
Unprepared, the stinging hex landed, immediately causing her forearm to swell into a painful red mess. “Asshole, what the —“ Vic stopped when she met his pleading eyes.
Swallowing hard she turned away and flung a banishing charm at him. “I doubt that. Goodbye Clem.”
Clement was thrown backwards by the charm, feeling the pain shoot through his tailbone as he landed heavily.
“Ossisquasso!” He shot a bone shattering curse at her, seething at her attack. “You’re going to regret this.”
Vic barely deflected the curse, the suddenness, the vehemence catching her off guard and off balance enough that she stumbled into the wall.
“You going to twirl your moustache too?” She snarled and a blast of fire burst from her wand. “Are you seriously going to try to stop me? Why the hell do you even care?”
The fire caught the edge of Clement’s already singed robes before he put the flames out. “You don't get to just walk away. That's not how this works.”
Oh yes it was, and no one was going to fucking stop her. “Watch me, diffindo!>
Vic’s spell cut Clem deeply and in the choice between focusing on the warm blood he could feel trickling down his torso and his anger, his anger won out. Victoria was no longer a friend, she was no longer fighting alongside him.
“Since you’ve clearly decided that Byron is the friend you’re siding with,” he started, pointing his wand in the direction that his son had disappeared off in, “I think it’s time you face the same fate.”
He couldn’t be serious. She was some halfblood, an annoyance, a failure as he’d told her enough times. She was removing herself from the equation, why couldn’t he just let her continue to be such a fucking disappointment?
She was leaving, she thought frantically, desperation clawing at her throat. She was fucking leaving, she was going to live the way she wanted and if Clem was going to get in her way then she would cut him down if she had to.
“I’m going,” she warned him. “If you stop me I’ll do what I have to. Ossisquasso!”
His non-wand arm shattering only increased Clement’s anger. Who did this half blood think she was to attack him? To try be the hero that saved Terry after killing his father? To judge him for trying to kill Rhys when it was the former aurors who had gotten Keats killed?
“Avada Kedavra”
Vic barely deflected with a piece of stone, falling back and out of the way of the spell’s trajectory with a look of dawning horror.
He really fucking meant it.
“Cr—Crucio”
Expecting his spell to hit, the Crucio caught him off guard, pain shooting through his body. “You love torturing your friends, don't you, Victoria,” he barely got out through gritted teeth, sending the same spell back at her.
Slumped over from her clumsy dive, the curse hit directly. Vic cried out, body contorting even as she tried to fight against it, teeth red from a bitten tongue.
When it stopped, her laugh was manic. “Just you, Clem,” she spat blood onto the ground and tried to heave herself up. She couldn’t, however bad her leg was before, Vic could tell there was no moving it now.
“You’re just so pathetic—deprimo!” Knowing he’d be easily distracted by the spell, she followed it with burst of knives.
Each knife hit its mark, Clem screaming out in pain as his body was torn open by the blades. He pressed his hand below one of the wounds, legs feeling like jelly beneath him when he saw the blood on his hand.
He shot back a bone breaking curse, weakened but still with precise aim.
It hit Vic right in her left side, her ribs snapping one after another, puncturing her lungs and tearing into the muscle and tendon of her armpit and collar. Vic’s scream was strangled from her, lungs unable to expand. Wheezing, she desperately grappled for her wand.
There was something wet and sticky running down her side, hot under her arm. Vic didn’t bother to look as she pointed her wand at Clem.
“Avada Kedavra.”
Clement was already struggling to maintain consciousnesses, between the blood loss and his habit of fainting at the sight of blood, his body already falling to the ground when the killing curse hit him, guaranteeing that he would never get up again.
Vic watched his body hit the ground. Another friend to add to her collection of the ‘02 dead.
Vic’s laugh was a delirious and ragged sounding thing, and she slumped back against the rubble, face wet from tears.
ShewasleavingShewasleavingShewasleaving
The blood from her severed artery soaked the stone beneath her.
“It’s not fair,” she whispered to Clem. It wasn’t fair. “Mum,” she choked out. It wasn’t fucking fair. But she supposed this was what she deserved, bleeding out on some dirty floor. Vic spared one last thought for her mother before she followed Clem into the dark.
Katie Bell & Aberforth Dumbledore v. Gerald Avery
In the midst of the cease fire, Gerald had held onto a shred of hope. He’d believed that the death of the Potter boy finally spelled peace for their way of life. But learning of the betrayal and his life, his desperation now reached fever pitch. It was life or death.
He turned at the first back he saw and fired off a curse. While he had meant it to be a killing curse and even formed the first syllable on his tongue -- Ahhhh -- it didn’t work. “Anapneo!”
Bruised but not beaten, Katie’s own hope seemed to be doggedly remaining despite the fight starting again. She heard Gerald Avery’s spell rather than saw it, with her back facing him, and ducked quickly to try and avoid whatever he was throwing at her. She turned on her heel and raised her wand at him.
Aberforth was hurting, but it hadn’t stopped him or really slowed him down either. His wand flicked and he banished a masked Death Eater into the wall, knocking him unconscious, before he turned and caught sight.
Striding forward, his voice boomed: “I’ll take more than your arm this time, Avery.” Because that was Bell. Katie, that Avery was after. His wand flicked, preemptively granted Katie another shield at whatever retaliation was coming.
Dumbledore’s words, amalgamating in all the confusion and hatred he felt since the intruder was found in his home, melted into one moment. And instead of firing on either of them, he laughed. He laughed heartily because of course it was another fucking Dumbledore.
Oh, but … “Aberforth!” he chirped. He had new energy now. “Is this your new Ariana?” His wand flourished again. And whilst he thought that he cast a spell to learn more of Dumbledore’s secrets via Legilmency, the Dark magic banked and instead manifested in a blasting curse.
He turned on Katie. “He didn’t tell you, did he? His precious young sister, driven to madness by ugly Muggle boys. And yet he’s now a friend to them. A friend to the boys who drove Ariana to death.” What would Katie do if given the opportunity? His wand flourished at her.
“Imperio!”
“Of course he told me,” Katie snapped angrily. Her annoyance, both for herself and that Avery was trying to antagonise Aberforth, was enough to distract her from copying Aberforth and shielding herself from the spell. But instead of the unforgivable that he'd tried casting, she was hit with a tickling curse. Undaunted, she carried on talking, more breathless by the second. “OW — Of course he bloody told people, she got caught up in your kind of bullshit.”
Katie’s body convulsed involuntarily and she let out another annoyed “OUCH,” before she fired her own tripping curse at the Death Eater.
But Aberforth wasn’t listening to Katie’s inspired defense of him or Ariana; Aberforth had stopped listening to everyone after Avery’s quipped ‘Is this your new Ariana’, as if she could ever be replaced. But that didn’t mean Katie wasn’t fiercely important to him as well, and like hell he would let a lifelong Death Eater like Avery curse her.
His rage was unfettered as the spell that tore from his wand, angry and vengeful, a violet arc hurtling towards the Death Eater’s body designed to rend and tear flesh and bone.
The spell meant to keep Gerald upright (thanks to Katie’s tripping curse) meant that the Shield charm Gerald erected was hasty and -- no. The magic was faulty. He watched, horrified, as Aberforth’s rage cut through his magic and splintered it at its core.
There was still so much to do. There was so much to make up for -- Dante, Valkyrie -- and he had hoped to hold onto his life. But three wars? Three? It seemed to much to hope for; he continued to hold the shield. Continued to fight until there was simply no magic left. He closed his eyes. Time.
The hurtled bolt hit Gerald in the chest and with a concussive pop, neatly exploded him onto the floor, the wall, and whoever happened to be standing near.
Katie screamed the moment that Aberforth’s spell hit, the force alone just enough to terrify her. She’d seen so much else in that day, but the sight of Aberforth lashing out was something different entirely. She turned to him just as something hit her, shaking as she slowly realised that she was no longer under Avery’s spell. “Aberforth?” Katie asked, suddenly hoarse, suddenly very much afraid. She could barely see for the blood.
But Aberforth was still transfixed upon the remains of Avery’s obviously unmoving corpse. His wand was still outstretched, ready to cast a second spell should the Death Eater not have gone down or stayed down. Whether he was aiming to explode the man’s chest or not there was no denying the horrid ferocity with which he had been dueling.
Even covered in gore and viscera from Avery, Aberforth moved to sweep the area for another opponent, but the Death Eaters were taking losses in droves. Katie’s voice cut through his battle-induced fugue, shattering the rage he’d felt towards Avery as a culmination of ninety years of anger. His shoulders slumped, he exhaled, and he turned to face the younger woman. With a flick of his wand he cleaned the blood from her face, but still said nothing.
Katie hadn't seen her face but she could see her hands. Shuddering, she raised them up to look at the blood. Avery’s blood. She was rooted to that spot and that thought for a moment, silent in her horror at what had happened. But the more rational side of Katie Bell kicked in, pushing past that debilitating fear as she reached out to touch Aberforth’s arm. He was covered in it too.
“Let’s get away from here. Find someone we can help,” she instructed softly, no longer looking at the body. “They've not all lost yet.”
“Right,” Aberforth agreed, gruff voice returning after his moment of weakness. As Katie had said there were other duels still going on, more opponents to apprehend. “Let’s get to it.”
John Dawlish & Demeter Wiggleswade v. Thorfinn Rowle
Finally being in the situation to apprehend a Death Eater wasn’t going to be something that Demeter Wiggleswade took lightly. Yaxley’s orders be damned, she’d finally crossed that line and hopefully it was at the point where it could make an impact and wasn't just a big mistake. All around her there were fights, people pairing off and taking on one another, and she was keen to get involved and quickly.
“Impedimenta,” she raised her wand and cast the jinx at the nearest Death Eater.
A blasting curse had just left his wand when the jinx hit his shoulder. Immediately, he felt his body start to slow. It didn’t take long for it too feel like he was moving through a vat of caramel, which wasn’t going to help him in any way, shape, or form in this moment. Still, Thor raised his arm and the moment it was remotely facing upwards, he cast a spell that cause a flurry of knives to explode from the tip of his wand.
Demeter was quick to use a banishing charm on the knives, ducking as she missed one of them and it flew over her head. “You'll have to try a little harder, Death Eater,” she couldn't resist calling out at him, sending a couple of the knives back towards Thor.
His shield charm was quick, but not quick enough for the flurry of the former Auror’s knives. One managed to pass by Thor’s attempt at cover and lodged itself just below his right shoulder. Grunting, he turned his attention back to Demeter, smiling beneath his mask.
“I think I can manage that,” Thor answer as he rapidly fired off a blasting charm followed by more knives.
Again, she tried to deflect them. This time with less success, as the blasting spell had thrown her balance enough that her wand missed some of the knives. She felt the sharp, agonising pain in her gut just as she heard another one clatter to the floor next to her. Demeter’s spare hand pressed against the knife that was embedded in her stomach, but the damage had already been done. She gasped, feeling rather seeing the blood that was already issuing from the wound.
For the third time that evening, John Dawlish arrived on the scene to see a former colleague in a very compromising position. He didn’t need much time to assess this particular situation, as he shot Demeter a quick look. He whispered a low Episkey at her, hoping the Healing spell would help in the meantime. But his attention diverted to the Death Eater and he studied the frame, hoping to match it up with any one of the frames he had studied over the years.
He quickly sent an arresting spell at the Death Eater, then followed with a severing charm, aimed at the masked murderer’s wand arm.
Though the arresting spell was easily deflected, it distracted Thor just enough for the severing charm to do its work. The light green beam of energy effortlessly cut through the flesh of his lower right arm down to the bone with the tail end of it managing to severe his thumb almost completely off. Unable to ignore the pain, he screamed as the blood began to pour out of the jagged wound, over the fabric of his robes, and onto the stone floor. The Death Eater did his best to maintain his grasp on his wand, but judging from the poor aim of his subsequent blasting curse, it wasn’t working.
John’s Auror instincts instantaneously kicked in (not that it needed much prodding) and he easily threw up a Shield Charm, the blasting curses from the Death Eater ricocheting as they made contact with the shield. They headed back towards the Death Eater, and one hit him right in the mask, sending the pieces of the mask flying everywhere, revealing…
Thorfinn Rowle had a momentary look of surprise on his face before his lips curled into a small sneer. “Well,” he started before a sudden cough shook his body and brought up enough blood to stain the inner rim of his lips. “Good aim, John.”
John shouldn’t have been surprised, and yet, seeing that insufferable smirk on Rowle’s face left him aghast and disgusted at once. He could have retorted, he could have heckled, he could have been immature, but John opted to do none of the above. Instead, he drew in a long breath and gave Demeter a glance to make sure she wasn’t further hurt, and focused on Rowle again. He forced another Severing Charm at the Death Eater’s hand again, following it with a Stunning Spell.
This time the severing charm completely separated his thumb from the rest of his hand and took the top half of his pointer finger with it. Maintaining a hold on his wand was useless now and it unceremoniously dropped to the floor as Thor fell to the side, which put him mere centimeters out of the way of the former Auror’s second spell. He wasn’t an idiot. His blood loss was increasing by the minute thanks to his injuries and he wouldn’t be able to maintain consciousness much longer, let alone fight back against a trained Auror.
“It’s been fun, John,” the Death Eater said as he frantically reached with in his shirt as he grasped around with his bloody hand for something. “But I don’t look good in stripes.”
And then Thor was gone.
John didn’t know what he expected, but to see the Death Eater disappear from view and to not have captured him. He put together that it must have been a portkey: one couldn’t simply Apparate from here. He cursed loudly, but trotted over to Demeter a moment later. “Hey, you alright?” he asked gently, attempting to help her up.
She'd slumped to the ground, unable to focus on the fight before her. The healing spell that John had cast had done nothing but attempt to close the wound that still had a knife lodged in it, and the blood loss was starting to make her feel dizzy. Demeter’s breathing was shallow, she could feel a cold sweat creeping on her as she struggled with the pain. “Tell me — tell me you got him,” she insisted, the words worth the effort.
A disappointed shake of the head affirmed that John Dawlish had, in fact, not been able to get him. But at least he knew who he was, and Thorfinn Rowle could run, but he sure as hell couldn’t hide… at least not forever.
“No,” he replied. “Probably portkeyed from here.” John frowned, but ignored his own pain from his injuries and concentrated on Demeter’s. “Let’s get you to a proper Healer.”
“We’ll get him later. Then I can give him this — this fucking knife back,” angry, she took John’s arm to try and stand up again.
John instinctively helped her up and nodded. “We’ll make our grand plans later. Come on,” he urged her, trying to lead Demeter away from all of the chaos and to somewhere safe.
Owen Dearborn v. Rabastan Lestrange
A flash of orange light whizzed by Rabastan’s ear as he strode through the hall. An irritated expression flickered over his face as his head whipped around to find the source of the spell. The children couldn’t make this easy, could they? His eyes narrowed as he noticed a plucky young Hufflepuff with his wand at the ready. The smile that unfurled across his face was anything but pleasant.
“And everyone says Hufflepuffs are spineless,” he sneered, flinging a body-bind curse at the student. He raised his wand again, the Cruciatus curse on the tip of his tongue, only to pause when he heard a familiar voice—
"Merlin, I thought you liked more of a challenge than that," Owen glared at the back of Rabastan's head, keeping his wand aimed at the Death Eater's back in case, ready in case the Death Eater tried anything against the kid. "Binding him up before you curse him? You chucklefuck."
“Dearborn!” was Rabastan’s warm reply. There was a flash of amusement as he swiveled around, honing his attention on the former Auror. “Feeling bold enough to fight me without your brother’s help? I’m surprised. I—”
His words came to an abrupt halt as he noticed the Hufflepuff boy scurrying off down the hall. Confusion passed over his face ‐ what the hell had happened to his bodybind curse? — before he hurled a stunner in the boy’s direction.
"And where's yours? Off fucking a horse?" Owen huffed in response. The comment did hit a nerve for Owen; Jeremy was the only reason that Owen had survived those last two times, and the idea of facing off against the man who'd murdered both his parents, who'd abducted his wife, was beyond frightening.
But then, this way he wouldn't have any distractions. "Hey, Death Eater, leave those kids alone," he said, firing off a lightning curse at Rabastan when his attention was pulled back towards the Hufflepuff.
The incantation for the Cruciatus was halfway out of the Death Eater’s mouth as the lightning found its mark. Rabastan went rigid as white-hot heat coursed through his veins, but he grit his teeth through the pain. “You’re going to regret that,” he snarled, sending a pair of flaying curses toward Owen.
A shield spell flashed up in front of Owen, blocking the brunt of Rabastan's flaying curse, with the second just edging enough to slice up his shoulder as if he'd just gotten a particularly burdensome papercut. "Nah, don't regret that at all," he shrugged off the injury. (And then winced a little, because the injury was on his shoulder and it did still hurt.)
"Where's my wife, Lestrange," Owen demanded, the humour draining out of his eyes, following up the question with an incarcerous and a blasting curse. "What floor? Which room? Tell me where she is and maybe you'll get to walk away from this."
One well-timed arc transformed the chains hurtling toward Rabastan into sand, and the blasting curse was deflected by the Death Eater’s shield charm. “Are you planning on breaking into Azkaban?” he laughed, sending a nearby suit of armor flying toward Owen. “That would be a waste of time. She’s already had an intimate encounter with a dementor.”
To the unskilled eye, it would have seemed that Owen wasn’t catching what Rabastan was throwing, or that he simply didn’t care. Those who knew what to look for would know better: His breath had stammered for a moment, though, and his grip on his wand tightened just enough for his knuckles to fade to a lighter shade.
“I don’t care. You broke out. It must not be that hard if you managed,” Owen replied as he jerked the blasting curse he’d intended for Rabastan toward the armor, the attempt to keep his voice steady sounding much more like a growl than he wanted. A flurry of wand movements transfigured the metal armor into several arrows, which went flying straight toward Rabastan’s face.
Rabastan deflected most of the arrows, but he hissed as one caught him in the shoulder. “That was a mistake,” he snarled, punctuating his words with the red flash of the Cruciatus.
There was no blocking the cruciatus, no matter how powerful a person's shield spells were, and Owen's frantic attempt to pull some rubble into the spell's path instead was too little too late. The spell brought him to his knees almost immediately, gritting his teeth together to try to keep from screaming from the pain of the curse coursing through his body. Unlike the other times that he'd been on the other end of a Lestrange Crucio, though, the spell started to fade after only a few seconds. There was still pain, but it was something he could work through, rather than the incomprehensible agony that it usually felt like.
He kept up the act, though, as if it was just as bad as before; with Rabastan focused on the curse, Owen fired off a knee reversal curse and a severing charm at the Death Eater.
The flash of confusion in the Death Eater’s eyes quickly turned to pain as both the knee reversal curse and the severing charm struck true. A deep gash split his torso in half, and blood quickly soaked through his cloak. With an arc of his wand, he sent Owen flying back into the nearest stone wall. “Angor,” he hissed.
With a loud thud, Owen smacked against the wall, his head, cracking against the stone. The world was spinning around him, and before he could blink away the multiple Rabastans swimming in his vision, that swimming started to feel a lot more like drowning. He gasped several times, trying to catch his breath from air that didn't seem to be there. Just like with the cruciatus, though, the spell gradually began to fade, and a manic smirk spread over Owen's face. "Something the matter with your wood, Lestrange?" he laughed, even though his breathing was still a little on the haggard side. "Old age must be tough for you. Maybe you should retire," he said, following up with a reducto and an incarcarous.
Rabastan only just managed to block the reductor curse, sending it careening off into the distance with a flick of his wand. He quickly cast a vanishing spell to deal with the ropes, intent on following it up with a killing curse—
But the ropes continued to hurtle toward him, winding around his legs and up his torso. His confusion was plainly evident as he struggled against the constraints.
Owen hurled more ropes at Rabastan, making sure that he wasn't going anywhere as he slowly approached the bound man, a million different things swirling through his mind. He had the upper hand, finally. He could have his revenge, he could avenge his parents, Zef, everything that he'd done to his family, to everyone. Maybe this would be the time that the cruciatus curse would work for Owen. Maybe he could just kill him now. Maybe he could spirit Rabastan off to some hidden cave somewhere to be tortured for the rest of his life, to experience every horror that Owen had ever imagined that his father was living out his days going through after he'd vanished. Owen just stood there for a few moments, looking Rabastan in the eye, completely still and silent amongst the chaos of the rest of the battle. "You're done, Lestrange. It's over. You're over," he promised him, shooting the angor spell at Rabastan to let him feel just a moment of that panic of not being able to move, of not being able to breathe. The Death Eater’s eyes went wide as he gasped, struggling to take in air.
And then he let the spell drop, instead shooting a stick-fast spell at the Death Eater to make sure he wasn't going anywhere in addition to the ropes. "You wait here. You're under arrest."
Panic didn’t settle in until those final words: you’re under arrest. Rabastan wanted to believe there was no way the Dark Lord would lose this fight, but his fear of returning to Azkaban overrode that belief. He couldn’t move, his shoulder ached, but his fingers were still wrapped around his wand. If could just angle it slightly…
“Bombarda,” he snarled, wand pointed at the back of his opponent.
Owen should’ve taken the wand right away; somehow with the way the spells had been acting weird, and with how secure the ropes seemed, it had slipped his mind, sending him right back to Auror training amateur hour. The cannon spell slammed Owen in the back, sending him sprawling down the hall and his wand flying somewhere under the rubble.
While his wand was gone, though, the sword from the suit of armor that Rabastan has thrown at him earlier was right there within reach. Owen hoisted it up, carried by some sort of tunnel-visioned adrenaline he didn’t know he had left, and stormed back to where he’d left the Death Eater and drove the point of the blade straight through Rabastan's stomach.
The sword pinned the Death Eater in place as if he was a specimen on a naturalist’s card. Rabastan stared up at Dearborn, the color drained from his face and his mouth open as if for a scream. He struggled against the ropes, desperate to cast a spell, to clutch his stomach, to do anything.
But he was too weak to maintain his grip on his wand. There was nothing he could do.
A rivulet of blood trailed down from his open mouth. “I’ll kill you,” Rabastan promised, his voice barely audible. He stared up at Owen with wild, hate-filled eyes. “You and your brother and your son.”
Owen's hands dropped from the hilt of the sword and he stumbled back, his eyes wide as he curled his fingers into fists to stop them from shaking. "No you won't," he replied simply, his own voice just as quiet. Never taking his eyes off of Lestrange, for fear that somehow he'd still manage to get out or disapparate or portkey away, Owen carefully bent down to pick Rabastan's wand up off the floor, then cast "Accio my wand" to bring his own back into his hand. "My son is going to grow up knowing he never has to be afraid of you again."