Chapter 216: Contraction

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I would like to thank my beta, Akisu, for his help in this chapter.

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1 May 1994, Unknown Place

Harry felt like shit. His body was sore, he had the worst headache in his life, and his magic circuits were burning like crazy. He hoped that it worked. He had exactly one shot at getting out of the hellish garden and hoped he hadn't scattered himself into oblivion with his portal.

Even opening his eyes was straining, but when the white light faded, he saw some kind of building. He saw something different than the garden and that was far more reassuring than it used to be. He quickly raised his hands and watched them with fascination.

He quickly smiled and touched his legs. Great, they were still there. He palmed his eyes, his ears, nose and chin and his mouth turned into a large grin, "I'm back!"

The last Potter looked around and grinned as he saw the golden shards of metal scattered around the floor. The artifact, his hell was officially destroyed. However, when he took a better look at where he was, he stiffened, "Huh, and not in a friendly place at that."

And wasn't that an understatement? Dozens of wizards and witches were pointing their wands at him. He noticed more than a few vampires ready to attack him at every second, that's not even mentioning the two giants looming over him.

He kept turning around until he saw a familiar face, "Sirius Black. I didn't expect you to be involved in this… I was pretty sure that it was Dumbledore who put me in this place."

The older wizard's face shifted into dozens of different expressions, ranging from incredulous surprise and rage, "How did you escape? I was told that leaving the Garden of Avalon was impossible."

"So that's what it's called. The Garden of Avalon. I supposed it's an apt name. As for how I escaped, I just did my thing. It wasn't easy by any means, but I have to say that it was worth it."

"Stop being vague and just go on with it!"

Harry gave the serial killer a cheeky grin, "I will if you tell me who put me there. I was pretty sure that it was Dumbledore's doing. But I do know that he wouldn't have willingly given the artefact to someone like you, and you wouldn't willingly work with the old man. Oh, you're insane and everything, but the headmaster had a hand in James' death. You wouldn't work with someone like that."

"We distracted Dumbledore to stop him from getting the artefact and stole it ourselves."

"So, you knew that I was going to get captured beforehand. You were planning to use my magic for some reason. Interesting indeed. You're definitely not the mastermind, Black. There's someone else… I wonder who it could be?"

Sirius seemed to get angrier and more agitated the further Harry spoke, "That's enough! How did you escape."

"And look at you, my dear godfather. You're looking a lot better, especially without that dreadful mask of yours. I wanted to ask you something, by the way. What's the meaning of the symbol, the smiling face drawn in blood? You didn't come up with it, that's for sure. I've seen it before when the Heir of Slytherin attacked the castle. I thought it was just a taunt, a challenge of some sort, but now, I recognize that it's something else. Something more."

"You know what, I don't care how you got out anyway. You're not getting out of this place alive."

He motioned for the wizards to start attacking and Harry's world froze in a single moment as he analyzed his condition. He wanted to keep Sirius talking as his circuits settled down from the trip. He was physically and magically exhausted and that meant that every drop of magic was important. He needed to use it perfectly.

First, he looked at the wards using his Arcane Hearing. It wasn't anything fancy. It just stopped people from entering if they weren't keyed in, nothing more. But Harry was already there. He was brought in using the Garden of Avalon. Sirius consented to bringing him in. So, they weren't of any concern.

Now, onto his opponent. Black was, by far, the worst threat. Space and Ice magic were good ways to delay him but defeating him completely was out of the question in his condition and without any preparation. So, he needed to get away from him until he dealt with the rest.

As for the rest of the attackers. Over twenty mages of different talents, but definitely used to conflict. The fact that a few of them were werewolves didn't pose any extra challenge since it wasn't a full moon. The vampires and giants were worrying. There were dozens of vampires, but most of them were just thralls, nothing special. However, three vampires were Lords of various powers. That meant that he would definitely have to deal with some form of blood magic from them, perhaps even shadow magic. There were two giants, and handling them was hard since they were immune to most spells.

Yeah, things didn't look good.

Still, this was better than the garden. Far better. His chances were higher than the ones he had to escape his hellish prison, yet he did it.

Back to the situation. Their advantages were their numbers, Sirius' invulnerability and phasing ability, and Harry's exhaustion. Harry's advantages were his mind and the fact that the attackers had obviously never fought together.

To conserve his magic, he would need to use his enemies' attacks against them. A spell wheezed towards him, and he redirected it towards one of the distracted werewolves on his left. He let out a large grin, "Do you know why even though Dumbledore keeps saying that I'm a dark lord in the making, and that the people of magical Britain aren't terrified of me? That answer is very simple. I try to be subtle whenever I can. And when I can't, when I can't hide what I can do, then I make sure that there are no witnesses."

Seven vampire thralls ran with enhanced speed towards him, but Harry simply raised his wand and yelled out, "Lumos Solemn Maxima!"

An explosion of sunlight sent them flying back, and Harry redirected one of the cutting curses coming at him and enhanced it to cut off their heads. He saw Sirius coming at him, with an enchanted blade in his hand, ready to decapitate him, and suppressed a grin.

He warped the space around him as Sirius tried to swing and he decapitated one of the vampire lords. Just before the dog Animagus realized what he had done, Harry sent an exploding charm at the ceiling, making the roof destabilize and fall down.

With a flick of his wand, the giant stones were telekinetically thrown at his opponents. Wizards tried to rally and combine their shield charms to better defend themselves, but more than a few wizards were crushed in their surprise. The two giants were hit squarely in the head and were visibly holding their heads in pain. 

A warning from his Arcane Hearing made Harry duck as a giant blade made of blood was swung where his head used to be moments ago, "I have a feeling your blood will be powerful indeed."

One of the two vampire lords and their thralls encircled it, having escaped the falling roof thanks to their enhanced physiques. And yet, Harry wasn't afraid, "It probably would be but I'm afraid you will not live to experience it. I apologize for the inconvenience."

The other vampire lord gathered a ball of shadow in his hand, ready to unleash it, "Your arrogance is misplaced."

"Oh, I'm not arrogant or anything. I just pay attention to my surroundings."

And just like that another piece of the ceiling fell far away, allowing some sunlight to enter the room. The vampires paled and cringed, just enough to let Harry cast two cutting spells enhanced using space magic, decapitating both of them. He then conjured a wall of fire and burned the rest of the thralls to cinders.

He shook his head in amusement, "Morons! It's the middle of the night."

The illusion he had put over the ceiling vanished, letting the night sky show itself. Now all that remained were the surviving mages, the two disoriented giants, and Sirius. That was a lot better, but he had strained his magic circuits even further when fighting the vampires.

Harry redirected an explosive charm from his left and cast it in the part of the ceiling above one of the shielded groups of mercenary mages. As they tried to fortify their shield charm from above, it left the bottom slightly underpowered, letting Harry carve a small explosive rune on a stone and slip it underneath. The explosion contained within the shield charm made it shatter and allowed the rest of the rubble to fall off the mercenaries.

He felt Sirius trying to phase through the rubble and he warped the space in front of him making him phase through the rubble, but also through one of the giants' heads, killing them instantly.

The second giant tried to hit Sirius in his rage, and Sirius phased through the attack, but Harry warped the space between them once more and the dog Animagus' knife found itself flying through one of the giant's eyes, killing him instantly. Well, that was the Giants dealt with.

Feeling slightly proud, the last Potter turned his wand on the remaining mages, "Who do you work for?"

They were all trembling in fear, but Harry had no pity left for them, not after being trapped on his own for so long. He had no choice. He was weakened, tired, and exhausted. He had to go for the kill because he just didn't have the luxury of mercy at the moment.

"We can't. He'll kill us!"

Harry tilted his head, "And you think I wouldn't?"

He tilted his head as Sirius tried to stab him once more – he must have retrieved the knife from the corpse of the giant – and warped the space around him to make his stab at his allies one more, killing him, before sending the dog Animagus away into a circular space trap. The trembling mercenaries shuddered at how unconcerned Harry looked at the event, "Do I need to repeat myself?"

After another second of hesitation, Harry noticed that one of the wizards tried to discreetly attack him. Harry altered the trajectory of the spell for the curse to hit the woman on his left. As the man looked horrified at what he had done, Harry sent a piercing curse towards him and ignored his groans of pain.

Harry slowly walked towards his downed opponent and noticed that the curse put a hole near his shoulder. He stopped on the mercenary's shoulder, "I asked you. Who hired you?"

The man screamed in pain as he yelled out, "Grindelwald!"

Harry froze and let the man go. However, the mercenary was impaled by the blade in Sirius Black's hand. The man must have escaped Harry's space trap somehow, "I do not like traitors."

The younger wizard nodded, "So, it's just you and me now, huh? Can't say I'm surprised."

Harry dodged the incoming attack and created even more space between them, "You asked me how I escaped, so let me tell you a little story instead."

He ducked under a swing and sent a blast of coldness around him. He sent a wave of cutting space towards Sirius, only for the dog Animagus to phase through it, "This is not the time for stories."

"It's always time for stories. This story is one I particularly like. There's this emperor and he asks a shepherd's boy how many seconds there are in an eternity. The shepherd boy says to imagine a mountain of pure diamond. It takes an hour to climb it and an hour to go around it. Every hundred years, a little bird comes and sharpens its beak on the diamond mountain! And when the entire mountain is chiselled away, the first second of eternity will have passed!"

"What's your point?" Sirius couldn't help but ask.

"You must think that this is a hell of a long time. But personally, I think that's a hell of a bird. You have no idea how long I waited to say that..."

"I'm done with your riddles, brat. We both know that you're at the end of the road. You're exhausted and you still can't kill me. I will not pretend that I will not enjoy this, but I will mourn, the boy you could have been. James' child, without any corruption from Lily. I have to stop you."

Harry couldn't but smile sadly at his godfather, "I look at you, Black, and I can't help but pity you. You're so obsessed with Lily. Everyone is, for some ungodly reason. You're all alluding to this mysterious thing that I'm supposed to do about her, and I tried to ask, many times. All I get in return is riddles and pathetic attempts at misdirection. And you know what, I'm done. I don't care anymore, and I'm done asking. You know, Sirius. I tried looking for many ways to kill you, find spells to hit both dimensions you exist in, but I couldn't even find anything in months."

The former Black Scion grinned, "I told you, I'll always win, in the end."

Instead of answering Harry simply took something out of his jacket, pulled out the colt and fired it in less than a second. The moment he did, energy hummed through the air, and a beam of light, quick to the point of nearly being invisible, surged ahead. Following its path, a shower of iridescent particles left behind a fleeting trail of beauty, suggesting the complex, multi-dimensional nature of the attack.

The shot made a hole in Sirius Black's chest and Harry watched as the light left the eyes of the man who could have once been his godfather, "Goodbye, Sirius Black."

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If you want to support me check out my patréon at https://www.patréon.com/athassprkr

I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions of them so you can read up to 20 chapters ahead as a bonus.

Thank you guys for your support in these hard times.