Categories > Books > Harry Potter > Find a Way

Turning the Tables

by Quillian 0 reviews

Harry's duel with Voldemort in the graveyard...

Category: Harry Potter - Rating: PG-13 - Genres: Drama - Characters: Harry - Published: 2005-05-16 - Updated: 2005-05-16 - 2800 words

2Original
DISCLAIMER: See Ch. 1.

IMPORTANT NOTE: In some of the earliest copies of GoF (including my own), there was an error where James' "echo" came out of Voldemort's wand before Lily's did. This is a mistake, since Voldemort killed her after her husband. I took the liberty fixing that part on my own; otherwise, the first part of this chapter has been written verbatim from GoF. (Oh, that and the fact Cedric is alive and not part of this event, of course.)

WARNING: This chapter is why this story is now rated PG-13, mainly for the fighting. However, it is for the sake of this story and for the entertainment of you, the readers, that I write the battle scene which appears towards the end of this chapter. And let's face it - when isn't it entertaining to see bad guys die?


Chapter 3: Turning the Tables

Voldemort was ready. As Harry shouted, "Expelliarmus!" Voldemort cried, "Avada Kedavra!"

A jet of green light issued from Voldemort's wand just as a jet of red blasted from Harry's - they met in midair - and suddenly Harry's wand was vibrating as though an electric charge were surging through it; his hand seized up around it; he couldn't have released it if he'd wanted to - and a narrow beam of light connected the two wands, neither red nor green, but bright, deep gold. Harry, following the beam with his astonished gaze, saw that Voldemort's long white fingers too were gripping a wand which was shaking and vibrating.

And then - nothing could have prepared Harry for this - he felt his feet lift from the ground. He and Voldemort were both being raised in the air, their wands still connected by that thread of shimmering golden light. They glided away from the tombstone of Voldemort's father and then came to rest on a patch of ground that was clear and free of graves... The Death Eaters were shouting; they were asking Voldemort for instructions; they were closing in, reforming the circle around Harry and Voldemort, the snake slithering at their heels, some of them drawing their wands-

The golden thread connecting Harry and Voldemort splintered; though the wands remained connected, a thousand more beams arced high over Harry and Voldemort, crisscrossing all around them, until they were enclosed in a golden, dome-shaped web, a cage of light, beyond which the Death Eaters circled like jackals, their cries strangely muffled now...

"Do nothing!" Voldemort shrieked to the Death Eaters, and Harry saw his red eyes wide with astonishment at what was happening, saw him fighting to break the thread of light still connecting his wand with Harry's; Harry held onto his wand more tightly, with both hands, and the golden thread remained unbroken. "Do nothing unless I command you!" Voldemort shouted to the Death Eaters.

And then an unearthly and beautiful sound filled the air... It was coming from every thread of the light-spun web vibrating around Harry and Voldemort. It was a sound Harry recognized, although he had heard it only once before in his life: phoenix song.

It was the sound of hope to Harry... the most beautiful and welcome thing he had ever heard in his life... He felt as though the song were inside of him instead of just around him... It was the sound he connected with Dumbledore, and it was almost as though a friend were speaking in his ear...

Don't break the connection.

I know, Harry told the music, I know I mustn't... but no sooner had he thought it, than the thing became much harder to do. His wand began to vibrate more powerfully than ever... and now the beam between him and Voldemort changed too... it was as though large beads of light were sliding up and down the thread connecting the wands - Harry felt his wand give a shudder under his hand as the light beads began to slide slowly and steadily his way... The direction of the beam's movement was now toward him, from Voldemort, and he felt his wand shudder angrily...

As the closest bead of light moved nearer to Harry's wand tip, the wood beneath his fingers grew so hot he feared it would burst into flame. The closer that bead moved, the harder Harry's wand vibrated; he was sure his wand would not survive contact with it; it felt as though it was about to shatter under his fingers-

He concentrated every last particle of his mind upon forcing the bead back toward Voldemort, his ears full of phoenix song, his eyes furious, fixed... and slowly, very slowly, the beads quivered to a halt, and then, just as slowly, they began to move the other way... and it was Voldemort's wand that was vibrating extra-hard now... Voldemort who looked astonished, and almost fearful...

One of the beads of light was quivering, inches from the tip of Voldemort's wand. Harry didn't understand why he was doing it, didn't know what it might achieve... but he now concentrated as he had never done in his life on forcing that bead of light right back into Voldemort's wand... and slowly... very slowly... it moved along the golden thread... it trembled for a moment, and then it connected...

At once, Voldemort's wand began to emit echoing screams of pain... then - Voldemort's red eyes widened with shock - a dense, smoky hand flew out of the tip of it and vanished... the ghost of the hand he had made for Wormtail... more shouts of pain... and then something much larger began to blossom from Voldemort's wand tip, a great, grayish something, that looked as though it were made of the solidest, densest smoke... It was a head... now a chest and arms... the torso of an old man.

If ever Harry might have released his wand from shock, it would have been then, but instinct kept him clutching his wand tightly, so that the thread of golden light remained unbroken, even though the thick gray ghost of the old man from one of Harry's dreams nearly a year before (/was/ it a ghost? It looked so solid) emerged in its entirety from the end of Voldemort's wand, as though it were squeezing itself out of a very narrow tunnel... and this shade of the old man stood up, and looked up and down the golden thread of light, and spoke.

"He was a real wizard, then?" the old man said, his eyes on Voldemort. "Killed me, that one did... You fight him, boy... Hold on..."

Its voice was distant and echoing. Harry looked at Voldemort... his wide red eyes were still shocked... he had no more expected this than Harry did... and, very dimly, Harry heard the frightened yells of the Death Eaters, prowling around the edges of the golden dome...

Now, yet another head was emerging... and this head, gray as a smoky statue, was a woman's... Harry, both arms shaking now as he fought to keep his wand still, saw her drop to the ground and straighten up like the old man's, staring...

The shadow of Bertha Jorkins surveyed the battle before her with wide eyes.

"Don't let go, now!" she cried, and her voice echoed like the old man's as though from very far away. "Don't let him get you, Harry - don't let go!"

She and the other shadowy figure began to pace around the inner walls of the golden web, while the Death Eaters flitted around the outside of it... and Voldemort's dead victims whispered as they circled the duelers, whispered words of encouragement to Harry, and hissed words Harry couldn't hear to Voldemort.

And now another head was blossoming from the tip of Voldemort's wand... and Harry knew when he saw it who it would be... he knew, as though he had expected it from the moment when the old man had appeared from the wand... knew, because the woman appearing was one of those he'd thought the most of tonight...

The smoky shadow of a young woman with long hair fell to the ground as Bertha had done, straightened up, and looked at him... and Harry, his arms shaking madly now, looked back into the ghostly face of his mother.

"Your father's coming..." he said quietly. "He wants to see you... it all be all right... hold on..."

And he came... first his head, then his body... a tall man with untidy hair, the smoky, shadowy form of James Potter emerged from the end of Voldemort's wand, fell to the ground, and straightened like his wife. He walked close to Harry, looking down at him, and he spoke in the same distant, echoing voice as the others, but quietly, so that Voldemort, his face now livid with fear as his victims prowled around him, could not hear...

"We know what happened... you pushed your classmate out of the way so he went back to Hogwarts with the Portkey... you're going to need to defeat Voldemort... kill him..."

"But how?" Harry whispered back. "He has years more experience with magic than I do; even Dumbledore was never able to kill him!"

"He never had the power to kill Voldemort," James elaborated, "/but you do/... In addition to your mother's sacrifice, you have a power no one else has..."

"Shortly before you were born, Harry," Lily explained, "a prophecy was made... by Sibyll Trelawny... it is as follows..."



Voldemort was getting tense on his end of the battlefield as a few more of his past victims emerged from the tip of his wand to haunt him some more and obscure that wretched Potter boy from his view.

'Having a nice little family reunion, are they?' he thought maliciously. 'A few more moments mean no difference to me, not after how long I've waited to finally kill the last of the Potters...'



Harry felt just about ready to drop what his wand after hearing the full contents of the prophecy. He felt even less likely to defeat Voldemort now that he heard it. At least it explained why the Killing Curse which Wormtail cast on him didn't work.

"We have confidence in you, son..." echoed his father's voice. "We couldn't be more proud... however, we know you can do it..."

"We and the other shades of Voldemort's other past victims can remain for a while, to block you from his view and those of his minions..." his mother explained. "Hopefully, you will find the following spells useful..."



Voldemort had had just about had enough of this. It was taking so long just to kill that damned Harry Potter, his wand was acting in a way it never had before, roughly two dozen of his past victims were now coming back to haunt him...

While he hated everything Muggle, he couldn't help but think of that blasted Murphy's Law in this situation: Whatever can go wrong, will go wrong, and at the most inopportune times.



Harry committed all their advice to memory, and thanked his parents one last time for everything they had done for him, both past and present.

"It is our job, Harry..." his father's shade said solemnly. "Always is, always was, and always will be..."

"Good luck, Harry..." his mother wished him. "On the count of three... One... Two..."

"Three!" Harry yelled, breaking his wand away from the golden beam connecting his wand and Voldemort's. The golden thread was broken, the web of light faded, and the phoenix song died... but the shades of Voldemort's past victims did not disappear. Instead, they moved in on the Dark wizards, obscuring their views so they couldn't see Harry.

"Don't kill him!" Voldemort ordered. "Stun him! He is mine alone!"

Harry used a second or two to heal his wounded leg with a Healing Spell his mother taught him, but it would cost him temporarily. By some evil miracle, Avery was able to see between two shades obstructing his view and yelled, "I have him! Crucio//!"

Harry screamed in pain, but with a seemingly unearthly amount of determination, pointed his wand at Avery and yelled, "Spiculae Argentae!"

A barrage of silver darts shot from the tip of Harry's wand at Avery, which hit him in his abdominal and nether regions and made him howl in pain. As Crabbe blindly blundered forward, he pushed Avery forward, causing the latter to hit his head on a headstone; there was a sickening snap, and Avery did not get up after that.

"Expelliarmus!" Harry yelled, causing Crabbe to fly backwards into a blundering Goyle. Both of them would prove their own stupidity then and there, for the next moment, they both pointed and yelled simultaneously, "Avada Kedavra!"

They both ended up hitting each other; after that, they both slumped to the ground, dead.

'Dumb arses,' Harry thought. Behind him, MacNair roared and charged with an executioner's axe which he conjured, and Harry dove out of the way as he yelled, "Impedimenta!"

The jinx glanced off MacNair's axe and hit the tip of an angel's wing on a nearby headstone. MacNair then turned to lunge at Harry, but something smaller got in between them.

It was Wormtail.

"Move, Harry!" the small man screeched; unable to believe what he was seeing, Harry got out of the way without question.

The ex-Marauder swiped at MacNair's neck with his silver hand just as the larger Death Eater swung his axe; a moment later, both men fell as life left their bodies.

Out of a distant corner of his mind, Harry remembered something about a wizard's debt; the next moment, he was snapped out of his small memory by a shout behind him.

"Crucio!"

Nott shot a Cruciatus Curse at him, but Harry ducked and sent a few Stinging Curses at him; he even overcharged them to the point where they burned into the Death Eater's flesh, causing him to howl in pain. Now merely a couple of feet away from Nott, Harry roared, "EXPELLIARMUS!"

Nott was thrown through the air as though shot from a cannon; he sailed in an arc and collided headfirst with a big monument.

"Imperio!" shouted Lucius Malfoy's voice from behind him.

Submit to my authority... the man's voice said in his head.

"When hell freezes over!" Harry defiantly shouted, throwing off the curse.

"Avada Kedavra!" screeched Voldemort's voice from behind him.

Harry and Malfoy both ducked; by some strange twist of fate, it hit Nagini, who was lunging at Harry to strike at him in an attempt to assist her master, Voldemort.

As the giant snake dropped dead to the ground, Voldemort had what appeared to be a look of sadness on his face, it but it seemed to pass before the Dark wizard went at Harry again.

"I don't know how you can keep surviving Killing Curses, Potter, but surely there are other ways of killing you!" he shouted. Gathering up energy, Voldemort roared, "ORBIS UMBRAE!"

The Dark Orb, which was about three feet in diameter, shot from Voldemort's wand, leaving a small tail of shade behind it, which trailed all the way back to the tip of Voldemort's wand.

With quick reflexes, Harry countered with the opposite spell, the Light Orb. "ORBIS LUCIS!"

As the two spells met in midair, something strange happened. Perhaps it was owing to the same strange occurrence which had happened earlier with their wands, or maybe because of the opposite spells being used against one another, but whatever it was, it caused something even more unexpected to happen.

The two spells merged into a swirling something... it was a bigger orb, which spun madly, with random splotches of light and dark all over it... it snapped and cackled, sending small lighting bolts all over the ground and nearby tombstones... the wind moaned as it engulfed the three remaining wizards in the graveyard...

...And then, without warning, its surface expanded to engulf both combatants.



Malfoy ran for his life, not caring about it anymore; a moment later, he was thrown forward by an earth-shaking blast which let off massive amounts of light which nearly blinded him, even though his back was turned to the two combatants.

A moment later, when the rumbling faded and the light ceased, Malfoy slowly got up and turned around.

The spot where Harry Potter and Voldemort had been was now devoid of both wizards.


TBC...

Does this count as a cliffhanger?

Next chapter, we go back to see what's going on with Cedric at Hogwarts... -Quillian
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