บท 415: Starfall

"The marks are gone!" Tracey cried out in horror.

The crosses and the circles that Hermione and Theo had inscribed on the doors to tell which ones had already been visited were gone. The marks had either expired on their own, or more likely, they had been dispelled by one of the Death Eaters, to keep Harry and his friends from escaping with the prophecy…

"Which one should we try first?" said Astoria, unnerved. "The door I broke is back to normal, too…"

It's not as if they had the luxury to test each and every one of them. Any one of these twelve doors might possibly have Death Eaters behind them, but only one led to the exit… Furthermore, Astoria, Tracey and Harry were still carrying on their backs the unconscious bodies of Hermione, Luna and Ron, respectively, and they were beginning to weigh heavily on their shoulders.

"This one," said Harry, sounding unsure of himself, as he picked one at random.

But before he could take even one pace towards the door that he had singled out, Harry heard the sound of a door bursting open behind him.

"There he is!" called out yet another masked Death Eater. "I found him, he's in the—"

"ACCIO SWORD!" Astoria shouted, letting Hermione slide off her back and fall to the floor, in order to draw her wand.

The Sword of the Lake, which had remained embedded in the wall all this time, suddenly came loose, as if it had been greased up, and flew into Astoria's hands. Freed from the foreign object that had been blocking its magical cogs, the mechanism that made the circular room's walls rotate suddenly jerked to life with a vengeance…

The room had gone through many cycles of opening and closing of doors without being able to reset its configuration, which had caused an ungodly amount of pressure to build up within it— which it was now free to let off!

The Death Eater's sentence was cut short, as he was flung back into the room from which he had emerged by an invisible force. The wall-mounted candles and the doors turned into blurs, seemingly turning into straight lines as the room kept revolving faster and faster; faster than it had been designed to spin…

"We're safe, for now," said Astoria, as she gazed warily at the walls blurring around her. "At least, I think…"

As long as the room kept spinning, the doors wouldn't open— but eventually, the room began slowing down its revolutions, before finally grinding to a stop after an agonisingly long wait. Nine doors simultaneously swung open, and each one had a Death Eater behind it; like some nightmarish version of an Advent calendar.

"That one!" cried Tracey, upon spotting a planet floating above a Death Eater's masked head. "There's the Space Room!"

There was no time to guess at which one of the three unopened doors led to the exit, because the Death Eaters immediately began launching Curses in their direction.

"Thursaz!" Tracey exclaimed, curling her fingers into the OK hand sign and pointing them at the Death Eater who stood in her way.

The magic of the room resonated with Tracey's rune, and the man was blasted off his feet and into the Space Room; the strange gravity of the room causing him to float up to the ceiling, following a parabolic curve.

"Quickly!" Harry hollered, but with each one of them carrying a person on their back, this was really much easier said than done.

"Ingwaz, Elhaz, Dagaz, Gebu!" Astoria shouted, running her fingers along the flat side of her blade. "Grant me Now Divine Protection!"

Astoria held the Sword of the Lake aloft, its runes shining softly, bathing her in a pure white light.

"Go!" Astoria shouted. "I'll cover your escape!"

Tracey and Harry didn't need to be told twice— they both ran for the Space Room, while Astoria parried each spell coming her way with grim determination. Each deflected Curse would bounce right back at its caster without her needing to aim, but these Death Eaters were anything but layabouts— they knew to dodge when a spell was reflected back at them.

"Accio Hermione's clothes!" Tracey incanted.

Dragged by her clothes, Hermione's body shot into the Space Room— everyone had now made it inside but Astoria.

Astoria twirled, ducked and pirouetted, her keen senses allowing her to dodge where any ordinary Wizard would have been hit. But she was now surrounded, and the Curses were coming from every direction at once…

"Confringo!" came the screeching voice of a female Death Eater behind her.

"ASTORIA!" Tracey cried out in vain.

This was it— there was no way that Astoria would be able to dodge or deflect this one.

"ELHAZ!"

There was an explosion of harsh light, causing everyone present to shield their eyes. As their eyes slowly grew accustomed to the light, they saw a small figure stepping out of the light, showered by the multicoloured droplets of magic that had been generated by the Blasting Curse colliding with the rune of protection.

"Daphne!?" Astoria gasped in surprise.

There she was, all fifty-six inches of her, assuming the full body stance of Elhaz.

"RUN!"

Without waiting to ask for her opinion, Astoria picked up her older sister by the scruff of the neck and dashed into the Space Room. The Death Eaters, though surprised by Daphne's appearance, soon resumed firing at them— only this time, using less harmful Curses, to avoid hurting Daphne.

"Impedimenta!" shouted Tracey, providing covering fire.

"Petrificus Totalus!" Harry yelled, slamming the door shut once Astoria and Daphne had got in, before locking it with a, "Colloportus!"

But before they could take a minute to catch their breath, the door exploded into a cloud of dust, pulverized by a Reductor Curse. Daphne's hand immediately flew to her right shoulder, where she had tattooed the Constellation Spell based on the Pleiades star cluster that she had devised.

"Argh!" Daphne screamed. "It… it burns!?"

The Seven Sister stars tattoo had turned incandescent, and her skin had begun smoking and turning black— a clear sign that she was channelling magic beyond her means. It was the power of the Space Room, resonating with the magic of the stars, which had never been meant to be used this close to actual stars— even facsimiles!

"Losing… control," Daphne groaned. "I… I…!"

The Space Room's illusory stars were falling from the sky, more and more of them, growing larger and larger in their field of view. It was a veritable star shower— it was as if the entire Milky Way was about to fall on their heads!

And then, the Space Room exploded, shaking the Ministry to its very foundations.