Capítulo 1582: 44
Chapter 44: The end is nearNotes:
Good morning everyone, here is this week's chapter. We finally get to see Avalon and in addition to that a confrontation between one of our heroes and Ronald Weasley. We'll see how that ends.
Have fun reading :)
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
The three duellers Harry requested arrived within five minutes, and while Amy suggested getting more help, Harry declined. First of all, five was the top number the portkey could take, that he knew for sure, and besides, there would be just Dumbledore. Maybe his two Death Eaters too. So they outnumbered them.
And if the old meddler really had followers and associates, then the auror force would be needed to take down any potential groups of them trying to topple the government.
Everyone was putting on combat robes, either made from dragon skin or basilisk hide, and Harry was for example wearing all three of his wands (his, Ignotus' and the Elder Wand) as well as his Gryffindor dagger. Okay, the latter he always carried, but disillusioned when at school. Everyone else had at least two wands too, but only Sirius had another weapon on him, a one-handed sword the Black Patriarch traditionally owned.
When a team of aurors, led by Frederick Fawley (the man who got sent to get Sirius from Azkaban back then, by now a Senior Auror), arrived at the ward line of the McLaggen Manor, they noticed that something was wrong. All aurors were trained to feel and analyse wards at the academy, and these wards here were not at a default setting.
And since they had the order to search the homes of the leading Dumbledorians to look for the fugitives, they drew their wands and crossed the first ward line. This was usually just a notification ward, the actual defences came a few metres later. And in front of those they had to wait as the defences were raised and active.
The Lord himself apparated in front of them (yet behind the wards) just moments later.
"What do you want? You're trespassing on my ground."
"Aurors, we have orders to search for fugitives on your grounds and in your home."
"What fugitives, and who allowed that?"
"Ronald Weasley, Nathaniel Parkinson, Augustus Rookwood and Albus Dumbledore. The Minister and the Head of the DMLE ordered it. Let us enter."
Lord McLagged didn't even seem fazed by that, acting surprised was pointless. But he also didn't seem like he wanted to open the wards.
One of the aurors - while Fawley was still arguing - cast a detection spell at the house, which told him that there were four people on the grounds - Lord and Lady, as well as two minors. But the McLaggens only had one son.
"Boss! We have two minors in the house."
"Two? And, Lord McLaggen, who's there aside from your son? Maybe Mr. Weasley?"
And since Lord McLaggen actually flinched a little at that, Fawley interpreted that as a "yes", so he gave his aurors the order to breach and inform HQ about it.
Problem was, they didn't have any professional curse breakers with them, just aurors, and it would take eternity to breach on their own. So what they had to do was wait and weaken the wards while surrounding the whole premises so no one could escape on foot.
Escaping via magical transportation wasn't too hard to block, every auror carried a runestone with him, which could be used to put up anti-apparition and anti-portkey wards if no one was a warding master. They placed their stones around the premises and activated them, while Fawley sent a patronus message to the Department of Magical Transportation ordering a shutdown of the floo in the house.
Harry and the others were just finishing up their planning for the upcoming fight on Avalon as a patronus reacher Amelia.
"Minister, we have Weasley. He's at the McLaggen Manor behind defensive wards. Curse breakers are on their way and we'll be storming the building once we're through the wards."
This message caused Hermione to reconsider. McLaggen was an unbearable idiot, and Ronald…well, she wouldn't mind taking him down. So that was exactly what she was going to do.
"I'll go there and take him down, you know I'm better than most curse breakers. Besides, I still have a score to settle with Weasley."
She turned to Harry and kissed him.
"I love you."
"I love you too, Mione. Be careful."
"I will. You too?"
"I promise."
Hermione first flooed to the DMLE offices to join the curse breakers with their portkeys. She was greeted by the lead curse breaker, Felix Selwyn, with whom she had trained a bit during the last summer holidays. Unofficially, her mastery in Runes and Warding was already finished, meaning that she was probably better than most of the ministry personnel as they usually just went through an apprenticeship but not up to master level.
Upon their arrival at the Manor they all followed Selwyn's orders to spread out and position around the wards with consistent distances between them. The four strongest of them, including him and Hermione, were positioned on the northern, southern, eastern and western side of the wards, since that was the most effective way to break a normal Manor Ward (Voldemort's attack at Hogwarts had been different due to the giant ward structure, he basically punched a hole into a giant ward, with normal Manors it was more efficient to take down the whole ward)
And then the wardbreaking began.
The four main ward breakers were chanting long spells with complex wand movements while the rest of them just poured all their energy into shattering the ward. Both methods - carefully destroying the basic structure and just overloading and shattering it - were efficient on their own, but applied together they were hardly stoppable (Black and Potter properties were warded with ancient wards, Hogwarts was strengthened due to the ambient magic and a few other ancient families too had special wards, there it'd be much more complicated, but generally speaking they could get in everywhere).
The team of sixteen curse breakers just needed four minutes to break the entire ward structure, to the shock of Lord McLaggen. He hadn't expected them to be so quick, and all their ways out were closed, so they had to fight.
Well, not him, because Frederick Fawley was standing behind Hermione as they broke the wards, and so she gave him a warning seconds before the wards fell. That meant McLaggen was hit with a stunning spell the instant the wards fell, causing him to be thrown back several metres and collapse on the ground.
Mione turned around to Fawley and raised one eyebrow.
"Oh come on, I just overpowered it a little bit, he'll be fine."
Now, that was standard protocol, the curse breakers (excluding Hermione) put up a new ward, one that wouldn't let the targets escape (stronger than the stone-based anti-apparition and anti-portkey ward, but also blocking them from leaving on foot or broom now that the aurors weren't guarding the premises anymore) while the aurors and Mione moved in to storm the building.
Cormac had seen his father collapse and the wards fall, so now they had to fight. And this was now his and Ronald's job, since his mother was - as expected for a pureblood Lady - not trained to fight.
The two young wizards decided to use the house to their favour, facing the aurors outside on an open field would be absolutely stupid. The idea that Cormac then had was very unusual for any pureblood, because he ordered the elves to attack the aurors. And while they couldn't kill or even directly attack them - that was against the bond elves had, magic forbade it, they could hinder them from entering and attacking the young master and his friend.
And so most of the aurors were actually busy with defending them from elves and their traps, while Frederick, Hermione and two others went on the hunt for Ronald and Cormac.
"Bombarda!"
Mione just managed to throw up a shield to deflect that curse coming from the left side and saw the very familiar red hair at the end of the corridor.
And so she did what she could do best.
Do something stupid.
While Cormac then began (those idiots actually had some sort of a plan) to fire at them from the other side to keep the aurors busy, she ran after Ronald, throwing spell after spell.
Ronald was running for his life, because that stupid Granger mudblood was after him. Every time she sent a curse after him he either did his best at deflecting it or he jumped around the next best corner so the spell hit a wall. Downside of that was though, that after a few minutes of running he reached a dead end and the bitch was coming for him. But he had a plan. If her shields were too strong - and he expected they were - then he'd do the same thing as with father. Blast the window and cushion his fall so he could try running away.
Yes, it was a stupid plan, but a plan.
Hermione grinned as she saw the dead end and Ronald standing there. Magnificent.
She didn't know how good he was - he did study a lot the past years - so she was a bit more careful and sent a few heavy stunners at him, but those he blocked. Okay, so let's go for something stronger.
Due to all the duelling training with Filius she was pretty quick when it came to throwing spells, but Ron had a strong core and so a strong shield. Yes, he was getting exhausted quickly and had no chance of attacking by himself, but he was keeping up his defence.
The next thing she went for, after the bludgeoning curse bashed into the wall behind him and shattered the big window due to dodging from Ronald, was a fire whip. To explain this spell, it was basically a stream of angelic fire which was still connected to the wand, up to several metres long if the caster could hold it. It was incredibly hot and could cut through most things, including shield charm.
Ronald had just deflected the bludgeoning charm, dodging it into the wall behind him and starting to create an opening for him to escape through as fire began to stream out of Granger's wand. At first he thought that she would try burning him, but then he saw the whip form and damn that scared him. He had tried angelic fire a few times around the OWL exams in secret, but never managed to keep it under control. Thank god that faded, other than fiendfyre which just had a life of its own.
He saw the whip coming and prepared himself for the impact on his shield while ducking.
The whip just cut through his shield like a hot knife through butter and even ripped apart parts of the wall, but it missed him, and before Granger had another shot at killing him, he sent a quick depulso at the wall so the hole in it was big enough for him to leap out. Yes, it was a bit stupid, because there were aurors out there, and it was a jump from the third floor, but Hermione Granger was positively scary.
Ronald slowed his descent and got back onto his feet, but then he saw movement up there.
That crazy girl just dived out of there, but it didn't seem like she did anything to slow the fall.
What he had totally forgotten was that Hermione Granger had been taking animagus classes with the Headmistress for years now and apparently Potter and Granger helped her teach. That this meant they achieved a transformation he never realised, and other than the people in Harry's social circle, he didn't know what she could turn into.
And so he was shocked that the girl turned into an eagle to stop her fall. She spread her wings, screeched and dove towards the ground, where she - in the smoothes motion he had ever seen - turned back during the landing so she was standing on her feet with her wand drawn.
Only the fact that he had landed seconds before her saved him from the cutting curse, which nearly broke his shield and caused him to stumble, but not fall.
If he wouldn't have any idea, then he'd be caught or dead any moment now, so he did something reckless and stupid.
" Avada Kedavra!"
The green stream of light flew towards Hermione Granger, who just moved out of the way with a quick movement while conjuring a giant rock to stop the curse.
Now she was upset.
"Ronald Weasley, you bastard! You should not have done that."
She flicked her wand a few dozen times, looking scarier than Minerva McGonagall or Bellatrix Lestrange could ever appear. So many spells flew towards Ronald that he could never block all of them, and once they had shattered his shield, broken his shoulder (bludgeoning charm), given him some painful burns and several deep gashes all over his body, she slowly walked up to him with his wand drawn.
"Now I got you, you son of a bitch."
Hermione didn't want to kill him, no, but she wanted him to rot in prison. But Ronald wasn't too happy about that and did - once again - something stupid,
Another auror was running towards Hermione to portkey Weasley into a holding cell, but before he could reach them, he heard the redhead cast another spell.
"Bombarda Max…!"
Mione never let her guard down, so she had her shield charm still ready and while running backwards cast a silent Sectumsempra with her second wand, though that was just instinctual.
Her spell actually hit fast enough so Ronald had no chance of finishing the incantation, because once Hermione's spell landed his torso got split into two parts.
And so Ronald Weasley died within seconds on the grounds of McLaggen Manor, by the hand of Hermione Granger.
The girl fell onto her knees and gasped for air while the auror secured Weasley's wand and cast diagnostic spells on Hermione. She wasn't hurt, just exhausted, so he ordered her to report to St. Mungo's and get thoroughly checked out.
She nodded and got up again, getting handed a portkey and was about to leave as she saw Fawley escorting an injured Cormac and an uninjured Lady McLaggen out of the house.
That was a relief. If her headcount was correct, then they didn't lose anyone and there were no injuries worse than a few bruises and cuts.
Just minutes after Hermione had left Potter Castle, the others were ready. Amelia was kissing Sirius goodbye while Harry took a big sword which was hanging over the fireplace.
"Everyone ready?"
"Do you know where we'll be going, Harry?"
"Yes, Filius, but that's going to be a surprise. Let's just say there is a reason the Lord Gryffindor is Avalon's protector."
He showed his marauder-worthy grin and held out the sword. Sirius, Remus and Filius all put a hand on the blade and looked at Harry.
"Alright. Passage to Avalon!"
The reason why Augustus Rookwood had immediately started laughing once they arrived was their current location. All three of them were at a spot they knew.
And damn, Albus Dumbledore was upset.
Then Augustus had another revelation.
"Hah! That's hilarious. Oh and now I understand why there's one of the strongest concentrations of energy lines here. And I was already wondering why it wasn't under the castle itself but the lake. Avalon is in the middle of the fucking Great Lake. And you have been staring at the last resting place of Merlin's wand for decades every day from your office. Gosh, that is incredible."
Nathaniel couldn't help but grin, and while Dumbledore led the way down to the small pier at the shore, he whispered to Augustus.
"What do you say, the Lady of the Lake is the Queen of the Merepeople?"
The two scholars and former Death Eaters continued to laugh quietly while the former Leader of the Light led them onto the boat, which started to go towards the island once they were all seated.
The boat ride took about fifteen minutes, which was the amount of time Harry and his friends needed to arrive via portkey on the same pier.
"There! They have just reached the island. It's all three of them."
"Damn it, let's hurry guys!"
"Don't worry, padfoot, I'm Lord Gryffindor. If the family magic isn't wrong, then I have a faster ship."
And yes, once his feet touched the wood of the pier, the small rowing boat turned into something more like a sailing boat with the Gryffindor coat of arms on the sail.
Yes, the boats were all magical, that's true, Dumbles and co didn't have to row the rowing boat for example, but the big boat was much, much faster. Harry estimated that they'd be at the island in half the time, and other than Dumbles he knew where the grave and the wand was.
"This boat that I am rowing
Will take you where I'm going
To peaceful waters flowing
On the shores of Avalon
There lies within each troubled heart
The special time and place apart
No storm is ever raging
On the shores of Avalon
This boat that I am rowing
Will take you where I'm going
To peaceful waters flowing
On the shores of Avalon
Clear dreams shall always guide our eyes
A ray of hope before us lies
Where all is calm forever
On the shores of Avalon"
(The Seekers - The Shores of Avalon)
Once the boat started going towards the island, he just had to think of that song, and yes, he did sing it during the whole trip while Sirius just grinned. Remus though, knowing that song thanks to Dan Granger, joined in, putting his arm around his "nephew's" shoulder and singing with him until they arrived at the island.
Albus was the first one to leave the boat and step onto the island of Avalon. That it was in the middle of the Great Lake did make a lot of sense, now that he thought about it. Lord Gryffindor's castle had been here for centuries before it became Hogwarts, and rumours had it that they were descended from Lord Galahad. That the one finding the Holy Grail was the one protecting Avalon made sense, that must have been why the Gryffindor family had this land since Arthur's time. And now it made sense why neither Helga nor Rowena left the castle' grounds at the year of Merlin's funeral. He was put to rest here.
The island wasn't very big, relatively speaking, just the size of the Great Hall. A few small buildings were still standing, and a paved path led them from the pier up the small hill where the small huts were located. In the middle of them there was a small pond with a magical aura, an ancient apple tree directly next to it. Those small buildings, one of them clearly a healer's home (where Arthur must have been treated by a magical healer if the stories were true), didn't interest Albus at all, but the tall stone statues at the north end of the island caught his attention. A duo of them were clearly Arhur and his wife, one was a noble Lady, and one was obviously Merlin Ambrosius himself.
"I think we're at the right spot, Dumbledore. Those two are Arthur and Guinevere, that's probably the Lady Morgan Le Fay and the third grave is for the old man himself. Merlin Ambrosius, Myrrdin Emrys, or however you want to call him. But I suggest you hurry, because we're getting company."
Augustus pointed at the ship displaying Lord Gryffindor's coat of arms, which caused Albus Dumbledore to swear.
"Damn it, I should have guessed that Lord Gryffindor would come to protect Avalon. Well no, I didn't know but anyway. Potter is coming, let's hurry."
Totally ignoring all the other graves he walked up to the statue of Merlin, which was about six or seven metres high and depicted the elderly wizard in his robes, though his age barely showed. He must have been at least five centuries old by the time of his death yet looked a bit younger than Albus. They weren't so different to be honest (Albus thought, that was good for his ego), ignoring the lack of glasses and taking into account that his beard was longer than Albus' current one yet shorter than his beard a few years back. And yes, he wore ancient robes and carried a sword, while Albus wore a three piece suit in dark blue right now, but that's besides the point. He was the one worthy of Merlin's wand. The statue too carried a wand, holding it out high as if he was about to cast something.
At the feet of the statue there was a set of stairs leading underground which the three carefully began walking down, before Albus told Nathaniel to wait and if necessary cover them. Albus and Augustus encountered barely any spells or wards on the area, probably due to the assumption that getting to Avalon was nearly impossible.
And then they were there.
A crypt with a big - and warded - sarcophagus made out of stone standing in the middle.
"Here lies Merlin Ambrosius, greatest wizard that had ever lived. A bit very over the top, don't you think, Dumbledore?"
"Who knows? Let's open that thing without killing ourselves."
And while Augustus and Albus began dismantling the wards on the sarcophagus, Nathaniel Parkison was waiting for Potter and his friends to enter the island. On the boat he couldn't reach them, they were too far away.
But that would change any moment now as they left the boat with their wands drawn, they knew he was standing there.
What he hadn't expected was that it was not just Potter, but Black, Lupin and Flitwick. Well, the last one was unexpected, he would have guessed that his brilliant soulmate would accompany Potter. But no.
Sirius was the one to use the homenum revelio spell, telling them that there were three people on the island, and one of them was waiting.
"Let me guess, one of the Death Eaters, ready to ambush us while the old meddler and the other are in the crypt? Any volunteers to take him out, I've got to get the wand."
Before they could start arguing about that, Filius jumped off the ship and sent a few spells into the direction of Nathaniel while he made his way up the path.
"Okay, seems like that's the way to go. Come on Moony, we can't let him have all the fun!"
And with that Sirius was gone too while Remus just sighed - and followed.
Once the three men were off the boat, Harry jumped off too, but in his snow leopard form, and he didn't follow the path but stayed close to the shore and ran around the isle until he was just below the statues. From then on he used the strong muscles Frosty had in his legs to jump up the rocks until he was directly next to King Arthur's statue. He smelled the old meddler down under Merlin's statue, making his way into the sarcophagus, but there the old meddler wouldn't find what he was looking for. Harry knew that.
Dumbledore couldn't believe it as the last ward fell. It hadn't been too complicated to unseal the sarcophagus, and now Augustus used the levitation spell to open it.
Just to reveal a skeleton between what seemed to be the rest of rotting fabric. No wand and no sword in there.
"What?"
Both men couldn't believe it. The history was clear. Merlin was laid to rest with wand and sword, showing that he was both mage and warrior. But neither was in here.
"I don't think anyone had been in here before us, Dumbledore. Those wards were authentic."
"I know, but…oh."
"What?"
"They were brilliant. Why basically throw away a powerful wand and an almighty sword if you can brag with it, show it and its strength. It's a symbol."
Augustus still didn't get it, but Dumbledore did. The statue of Merlin was a very big symbol, and it held both wand and sword. Why not hide the most powerful objects of their time at the most obvious spot? It wasn't hard to do it, and a simple finite would reveal it.
Albus rushed out of the crypt and looked up at the statue. There it was, the wand, hidden in plain sight.
But what he hadn't expected to see was a snow leopard sitting on Merlin's right, outstretched arm.
Since the statue was pretty big, it wasn't too hard for Harry (as Frosty) to sit on the arm of it, it was wide enough. It would even be wide enough for him to stand on it - as a human.
And once he transformed back, Albus Dumbledore froze. Harry Potter was an animagus, and he was already up there. He couldn't cast a spell, the risk of destroying parts of the statue and the wand with it was too high so…
The first-best plan that came to mind was self-levitation, a discipline barely anyone knew these days. But it was slow.
Harry saw an elderly man in a blue three-piece suit rushing out of the crypt, and while he looked very different, Frosty could smell it. That was Albus Dumbledore. And yes, Harry saw it, different glasses, a trimmed beard and shorter hair combined with new clothes…that was one hell of a scary dark lord, so much was obvious. His once so twinkly eyes were now hard and cold…
Actually, Harry had no time to think about all of that, he told himself. So he transformed back and crawled forward the last few centimetres until his hand touched the wand of Stone-Merlin.
Albus Dumbledore was levitating himself up here so there was no time to wait.
" Finite!"
And the big stone wand shrank down and turned into a twelve inch English oak wand. He had it.
His hand enclosed the wand and he did the only right thing.
He broke it into two pieces.
Notes:
So, that's it for today. Yes I know, cliffhangers are mean, but next week you'll get the finale and afterwards the epilogue.
That little bit of song text I included in this chapter is a song of my favourite band and it was too perfect to not mention it.
I do hope you liked this chapter, please let me know in the comments. Until next week :)
Status de energia semanal
-- Ranking de
Poder 
-- Pedra de
Poder