The Glorious Battle

Dumbledore's eyes swept over Chris and then over Harry and their friends. He was speeding past them when the man nearest realized Dumbledore was there and yelled to the others. One of the Death Eaters ran for it, scrabbling like a monkey up the stone steps opposite. Dumbledore's spell pulled him back as easily and effortlessly as though he had hooked him with an invisible line —

"Chris, are you alright?" Jason hugged her tightly.

"Ye — yeah," Chris was staring at Dumbledore, who had most of the remaining Death Eaters grouped in the middle of the room, seemingly immobilized by invisible ropes. Mad-Eye Moody had crawled across the room to where Tonks lay and was attempting to revive her. Behind the dais there were still flashes of light, Sirius and Aurelia were duelling with Bellatrix.

"Let's go," said Ginny and they resumed walking, though, this time the situation was less threatening. Dumbledore was there.

They all finally made it to the brain room and from there to the hallway out to the lift. As Jason pushed the button marked Atrium and the door of lift shut, all of them except Chris sank down. No one said anything but thousands of messages passed among them in silence.

The grill opened as they reached the Atrium, they walked out, took four or five steps and saw Voldemort, Malgino and Stormy standing in front of the fountain.

All of them froze. Chris' first instinct was to push her friends back to the lift and kill Voldemort, Malgino and Stormy right there but then she stopped. Malgino's creepy smile and her friends' fearful faces floated in front of her eyes.

Then Harry screamed clutching his head. Chris felt her legs glued to the floor and something pulled her towards those three monstrous figures. Within a second Chris, Harry and all of her friends were standing six feet away from Voldemort and Malgino.

"So you smashed my prophecy?" said Voldemort softly, staring at Harry with those pitiless red eyes. "Months of preparation, months of effort . . . and my Death Eaters have let Harry Potter thwart me again . . ."

"I told you, my friend," said Malgino quietly as the entire situation had saddened him. "I told you what was going to happen but you chose not to believe me. But it doesn't matter now, he is in front of you." He then turned to Stormy. "I wouldn't like to see these children suffering anymore, Stormy. Bring me the keys and finish her."

Stormy stepped forward but then looked at Voldemort expectantly and waited for him to say anything.

"I have nothing more to say to Potter, Kzeal," Voldemort said quietly. "Potter, you have irked me too often, for too long. AVADA KEDAVRA!"

"Harry!" 

Ginny, Luna, Colin, Neville, and Ron, all of them screamed. But the golden statue of the wizard and witch in the fountain sprung to life, they leapt from the plinth, and landed on the floor with a crash. The wizard in front of Harry and the witch in front of Chris, then the Goblin, Centaur and the House-elf came to life too and defensively stood around Jason, Colin, Neville, Ron, Ginny, Luna and Hermione's body.

"What — ?" said Voldemort, staring around. And then he breathed, "Dumbledore!"

Chris looked back with everyone else and saw Dumbledore was standing in front of the golden gates.

Voldemort raised his wand and sent another jet of green light at Dumbledore, who turned and was gone in a whirling of his cloak; next second he had reappeared beside Harry.

"Are you not going to help your friend, Malgino?" said Dumbledore as he sent a spell towards Voldemort, there was no amusement in his voice.

Voldemort disappeared and Stormy tried to move in front of Malgino but failed to move. She was also tangled by invisible ropes. 

"I am an observer, Dumbledore. Also, I don't think my friend needs help," said Malgino smiling. "The Dark Lord stands alone."

"So you will wait?" said Dumbledore to Malgino as Voldemort reappeared.

"There is no talent like patience, Dumbledore," said Malgino as he stepped back. "Don't you agree?"

"Yes, that I do," said Dumbledore as he advanced on Voldemort.

"You will be dead today, Dumbledore," spat Voldemort sent another Killing Curse at Dumbledore but missed, instead of hitting the security guard's desk, which burst into flame. "You have created enough obstacles for you. The world will know today that the Dark Lord never fears anything."

"Everyone fears something, Tom, and I know what you fear the most," said Dumbledore flicking his own wand. The force of the spell that emanated from it was such that Chris, though shielded by her stone guard, felt her hair stand on end as it passed, and this time Voldemort was forced to conjure a shining silver shield out of thin air to deflect it. The spell, whatever it was, caused no visible damage to the shield, though a deep, gonglike note reverberated from it, an oddly chilling sound. . . .

"You do not seek to kill me, Dumbledore?" called Voldemort, his scarlet eyes narrowed over the top of the shield. "Above such brutality, are you?"

"We both know that there are other ways of destroying a man, Tom," Dumbledore said calmly, continuing to walk toward Voldemort as though he had not a fear in the world, as though nothing had happened to interrupt his stroll up the hall. "Merely taking your life would not satisfy me, I admit —"

"There is nothing worse than death, Dumbledore!" snarled Voldemort.

"You are quite wrong," said Dumbledore, still closing in upon Voldemort and speaking as lightly as though they were discussing the matter over drinks. "Indeed, your failure to understand that there are things much worse than death has always been your greatest weakness —"

Dumbledore had drawn back his wand and waved it as though brandishing a whip. A long thin flame flew from the tip; it wrapped itself around Voldemort, shield and all. For a moment, it seemed Dumbledore had won, but then the fiery rope became a serpent, which relinquished its hold upon Voldemort at once and turned, hissing furiously, to face Dumbledore.

Voldemort vanished. The snake reared from the floor, ready to strike — 

There was a burst of flame in midair above Dumbledore just as Voldemort reappeared, standing on the plinth in the middle of the pool where so recently the five statues had stood.

"Look out!" Harry yelled.

But even as he shouted, one more jet of green light had flown at Dumbledore from Voldemort's wand and the snake had struck — 

Fawkes swooped down in front of Dumbledore, opened his beak wide, and swallowed the jet of green light whole. He burst into flame.

"Fawkes!" screamed Chris, almost forgetting the fact that he was a Phoenix. 

Fawkes fell to the floor, small, wrinkled, and flightless. At the same moment, Dumbledore brandished his wand in one, long, fluid movement — the snake, which had been an instant from sinking its fangs into him, flew high into the air and vanished in a wisp of dark smoke; the water in the pool rose up and covered Voldemort like a cocoon of molten glass —

For a few seconds, Voldemort was visible only as a dark, rippling, faceless figure, shimmering and indistinct upon the plinth, clearly struggling to throw off the suffocating mass — 

Then he was gone, and the water fell with a crash back into its pool, slopping wildly over the sides, drenching the polished floor.

Everything was silent but Dumbledore looked alert and Malgino's smile widened. 

"Stay where you are," said Dumbledore as Harry and Jason tried to move.

For the first time, Dumbledore sounded frightened. Then Harry screamed.

"Kill me now. . . Dumbledore. . ." said Harry reluctantly and his voice seemed pain and joy. "If death is nothing, Dumbledore, kill the boy . . ."

And then Harry pointed his wand at Chris and Chris soared up, ten feet about the ground. Chris felt someone was pulling her but she didn't want to go. Every part of her body fought. It was a tug-of-war inside her body. They are going to rip her apart. Chris shrieked in pain, pain beyond imagination. She screamed and screamed and screamed and then suddenly —

The pain was gone, slowly she was falling down. Her body was weightless as a feather. She fell on the ground but didn't feel like falling on wood, it was like falling on a soft bed, slowly Chris closed her eyes as someone clutched her hand and whispered, "I am so sorry. Please, please be okay."

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To be continued. . .