Chapter 31 - Life and Death
Snape was sure that whatever the headmaster's plan was, it would happen as soon as Voldemort tried to kill Potter.
It couldn't be the real Harry Potter, though. Snape wasn't able to read his mind at all and only the headmaster and the Dark Lord could hide their minds that effectively from him. For some time he had wondered whether it was Dumbledore masquerading as Potter and someone else masquerading as Dumbledore, but this theory was disproved as soon as the Dark Lord uttered the Killing Curse.
The green light hit Potter square in the chest and he collapsed on the ground without even the slightest attempt to defend himself. At exactly the same moment, two other things happened. Voldemort stumbled backwards as if hit by a curse almost as strong as his own, a look of confusion distorting his white face. And from somewhere to Potter's right, someone sent a Patronus into the air. No one could fake a Patronus and the phoenix shape of the silvery magic left no doubt that it was cast by the headmaster.
The Dark Lord swayed, something Snape had never seen before, and everyone else who saw it gasped and was startled. The slit-like pupils of Voldemort's red eyes became wide and unfocused and his gaunt face a mask of death. Was he dying? What could possibly have hit him so hard?
A movement on the ground diverted Snape's attention. No one was even close to Potter, and yet someone had driven a dagger into his chest, right where his heart was. Snape remembered seeing that dagger before, on the Hogwarts Apparition Point, in Aberforth Dumbledore's hands. What was going on?
Someone grabbed his arm and tried to restrain him. "Traitor!" Lucius Malfoy hissed hoarsely. "This time you won't –"
But Lucius didn’t finish his sentence as a Stunning Spell from the same direction the Patronus had originated from hit him and he fell to the ground behind Snape. Snape decided that it was time to defend himself, in the absence of any other orders from Dumbledore. He whirled around, turning his back to Potter's body and with the same motion he brandished his wand against the two unsuspecting men behind Lucius and took them out with a powerful Slashing Hex. Around him, all hell was breaking loose within seconds.
**
The world consisted only of Voldemort and the blinding blaze of pain in his scar. Tom couldn't feel his weakening limbs. He didn't hear the words of Voldemort's triumphant speech. He didn't see the people around them, but Voldemort he saw sharply and brightly. Didn’t Voldemort feel his presence? He was looking right into Harry's face. He had to know who stood before him; had to sense that something was wrong.
The tantalizing closeness of his rightful body was breaking Tom apart. He couldn't help it, he would give himself away, but he needed to get closer…
Lord Voldemort broke into a high-pitched laughter and uttered the Killing Curse. Green light flashed from his wand, hitting Tom like a wave of ice, but it didn't hurt like it had when his own curse had rebounded on him. The force of the curse was only the final bit of strength he needed to break the bounds of a body that wasn't his own. All his longing and need dissolved into a glorious sensation of freedom. Clarity and lightness transcending anything he had ever felt flowed through him and he was extending and growing into all directions, until he was infinite in size.
For a small fraction of a second, Tom was dead, his soul severed from Harry's body and yet he was still conscious. Then he felt his own body and Voldemort's essence tugging at him like a vortex. Tom hurled himself towards the source of his pain. His old body welcomed him, dragged him in by digging claws of power into his soul. With the heat and brightness of a hundred suns he clashed with Voldemort's essence. Their essences mingled like melting ice cubes … and suddenly it stopped and they repelled each other like two magnets. But what was started was irreversible; he was back within his own body and bound to it. Only a killing curse could sever them now.
With each passing second he felt heavier and more solid. Until he regained his senses, he only saw blurred shades of grey and black through inhuman eyes and heard the noise of a fighting crowd. The blurred images grew sharper and turned into black-robed people in the grey court of Azkaban. He felt his body sway and he was stumbling but he couldn’t yet figure out how to balance himself. It seemed that Voldemort had been thrown back by Tom's attack and was now confused.
Shimmering white light passed through the air above him and took on the form of a silvery bird flapping its wings against the hovering Dementors. Tom recognised it as Dumbledore’s Patronus.
“Dumbledore! He’s here!”
Tom noticed that none of the Death Eaters reacted to his copy’s voice, but then he realised that it had been a mere thought.
This was new as Tom had never been able to hear his copy's thoughts before, at least not that clearly. But other things were different as well. They were repelling each other and there was something that felt like uncomfortable friction between their minds. They had grown into two truly separate and different personalities. Voldemort had become a cursed and twisted unloving creature, as far from being human as he could be, while Tom was infused with the love and protection Harry's mother had given her son. Just like Harry he could resist Voldemort's possession, he could fight him and hurt him with this power the Dark Lord could never understand.
Tom could hear the Dark Lord's racing thoughts as he tried to grasp the situation. Voldemort didn't comprehend yet what happened, he knew that there was something inside him, a powerful presence that was not his own and that felt like Potter's and yet not…
Have you forgotten me already? Tom asked angrily.
What? What is this? This can't be…!
I am the rightful owner of this body and this name. I am the man whose shadow, whose copy you are. Do you know me yet?
The wordless exchange happened much faster than any spoken dialogue. Through Voldemort's eyes he saw the chaos around them unfolding.
Harry's lifeless body had fallen to the ground. A space of several feet around him was suspiciously vacant, as if defended by an invisible shield and there was a knife sticking out of his chest.
The silvery phoenix cast a flickering brightness onto the gloomy court as it battled the Dementors. A couple of Death Eaters were trying to get to Harry's fallen body, but most of them were still staring at Lord Voldemort who had made several unbalanced steps backwards since he cast the Killing Curse.
My soul! Voldemort's mind howled. It cannot be, it had been gone for years, gone since I severed it from the rest of me!
I was not gone, Tom replied grimly. I was there all the time, until the day you tried to murder Harry Potter. And now I have returned to vanquish you. You are a faulty creation of mine, nothing more!
He felt Voldemort's thoughts racing, but now they were more focused and analytical.
It has resided within the Potter boy. That is how the connection formed and that is why Potter shared so many of my powers.
Voldemort looked down at Harry. His eyes raked over the fallen body and stopped at the knife sticking out of his chest. He didn't know its purpose, but he knew that this was a trap. Dumbledore was present and trying to trick him. How did Dumbledore convince the former soul part of him to do this?
Dumbledore didn’t convince me, Tom said. I have convinced him that I wanted to be allied with him
How can the soul be sentient? It wasn't before it lived inside Potter! How can it be so strong now?
Give up. This body is mine. I created you and not the other way round. The creation of you may have weakened me, so when you took control, I could not fight you. But in the last fifteen years I have grown beyond anything you'll ever be. I have the same power that enabled Harry to resist your possession.
Maybe you do, Voldemort thought calmly, addressing him for the first time. If so you are human and mortal. I am superior. You have no control over me.
As if to demonstrate his complete control over their shared body, Voldemort opened his mouth and yelled at his Death Eaters: "It is Dumbledore, you fools! He's tried to trick us! Don't let him escape!"
He flicked his wand at the spot right above Harry's body, intending to cast a Revealing Spell but Tom was ready to battle the copy.
With all his willpower he tried to force the wand down. It was like grappling with slippery hands; every time he thought he had a grip on his body it slipped way from him like the undulating body of a snake. The curse misfired and a blast of fiery light hit one of the Death Eaters trying to get to Harry's body. The man was flung several feet through the air and knocked over a second man before hitting the ground, either dead or unconscious.
In a fit of rage, Voldemort regained full control and slashed his wand through the air like a whip. A curtain of shadows, like a patch of night transported into the day, rushed through the court in front of him. It rippled in the space above and around Harry's body, revealing only for a second the outline of a tall, kneeling man next to Harry's shoulders.
Tom knew it was Aberforth, ready to pull the knife as soon as possible. He had to wait a few moments for the ritual to work, especially under these chaotic conditions. But Voldemort, who couldn’t read Tom’s mind thought it was Dumbledore and was caught unaware when a curse hit him from his right. Threads of golden light crawled over his body too fast for human eyes to follow. Quickly they wrapped around him like a spider's web at first and then like a golden cocoon, immobilizing him completely.
Are you sure you're in control? Tom taunted.
**
"No, no, no, that won't work, he can't do magic down here, how many times more do I have to tell you?"
"How can we know that? Harry isn't really dead! He could be able to do things that we can't!"
"He doesn't even have a wand!"
"There is plenty of magic he could do without a wand!"
Sirius' and Alphard's argument over what Harry could do to return to the world of the living had been going on for ages. Harry was sitting glumly on the stairs of Number Twelve Grimmauld Place and tried not to listen to them. He knew he should be more enthusiastic about getting back into his body, and really, he didn't want to be dead, but he wasn't very eager to leave Sirius, either. When he returned, he would have to face Professor Dumbledore, who would be terribly disappointed in him. How much detention did you get for sneaking out of the school and into the Department of Mystery in order to get yourself almost-killed and sent behind the Veil? And if he knew Dumbledore at all, the old headmaster would not give him detention at all, but merely look very sad and talk to him about choices and responsibility and that was even worse.
The headache he had from thinking about that suddenly hurt much more. It reminded him of the headaches he usually got from his scar aching. He felt overwhelmingly sick to his stomach.
"Hey, Harry! Are you listening to me?" Sirius asked. Harry looked up to see them both staring expectantly at him.
"Uh, what?" he said weakly, before suddenly doubling over in a wave of unexpected pain. It felt like his heart had suddenly burst into a thousand pieces and now life was draining out of him. He was cold, dead, and empty yet aching…
Someone grabbed his shoulder and he realised that he was lying twitching and convulsing on the floor. They tried to hold him down and rolled him over and when they finally succeeded, they both gasped in surprise.
As Harry finally managed to open his eyes, he saw what they were looking at: the ghostly knife was sticking out of his chest again.
**
Voldemort was still caught in the net of golden filaments and his efforts had turned from the cocoon and fighting around him to battling Tom inside him. Trying to possess and control each other had become a contest of willpower since they were both equal in skill.
Did you think I'd just surrender this body to you? You cannot win!
Voldemort was right. This fight wasn't physical and they would never tire. If they wanted to, they could continue for all eternity.
You cannot win either, Tom thought, trying to sound calm even though the idea of being caught in an eternal deadlock with his copy scared him immensely.
But together we could rule the world. Nothing could stop us. There'd be nothing we couldn't do, Voldemort said and his mind tempted Tom with vivid dreams of what could be.
This vision of power would have appealed to the old Tom, the one who used to despise love. It would be so easy to return to that way of life. Tom understood now that he truly had a choice on how to live the rest of his life. He made a decision.
You're right, Tom thought. There'd be nothing we couldn't do. But we can't rule the same world; you and I. Tom threw mental images of Hogwarts, of the Burrow, of Harry and his friends back at Voldemort. A world in which you rule is a world in which Harry can't live.
Why do you care about the boy? He's nothing! Voldemort raged. His hatred and contempt were living things lashing out at Tom's mind.
Harry is the part of me who will live the life I have thrown away. He is much more who I am, who I have become, than you are. If he lives, I live. There are many great things you and I could do. He'll never do these great things. But he can be happy in a way you could never understand. I may never be that happy again, but I have known and felt what it is like. No great deed, not even immortality can compare with a single day of living that way, loving and being loved, purposeful, happy as the person you are. He can live that way. That is why I care.
He could not hope to explain to Voldemort who had no soul and no capacity for any of these emotions. Tom had had to live through these feelings in order to understand it himself.
Voldemort's reply was a fit of fury. His mind attacked Tom's like a rabid animal, with no sense or finesse, overwhelming him with brute force. Voldemort regained control and broke the golden cocoon they had been caught in. The sight of the court momentarily distracted them from their struggle.
Still at the centre of all the chaos lay Harry's body, impaled with the knife. A few feet to his right stood Severus Snape, deflecting the curses of at least a dozen Death Eaters who tried to overwhelm him. His black cloak had been torn by a badly aimed hex. His robe was singed and smoking over his left calf, where he was bleeding badly. He was losing the fight but far from giving up.
At Snape's feet lay two bleeding and unconscious Death Eaters and the crumpled form of Lucius Malfoy with his face in the sand.
On the far left of the court, Bellatrix Lestrange was engulfed by a whirlwind of the same sand that had risen from the ground and was attacking her like a sentient creature. The grains of sand were lashing against her skin and she was covered in blood and dirt. Shrieking and cursing she tried to escape, her husband and his brother trying to help her, but none of them had any chance against Dumbledore's magic.
In the air, a slowly weakening Patronus had been joined by a real phoenix. But some of the Dementors had gotten past the two birds and were now closing in on Harry, Snape and Voldemort.
Tom noticed that Professor Dumbledore was still invisible and defending his brother and Harry from the curses that the Death Eaters flung at them. Every now and then, one of them dropped into the sand when a spell that seemingly came from nowhere hit him. It was impossible to tell who would win if Voldemort didn't intervene.
**
Sirius and Alphard, both kneeling at Harry's sides, stared at the spectre of a knife sticking out of Harry's heart. Harry had been staring, too, but the sight made him dizzy and faint. With a groan he let his head fall back against the wooden floor. Harry had no idea what any of this meant. Was he dying again or was this a signal to go back to the world of the living? He was scared and didn’t know what to hope for.
"Is this the knife you told us about, the one used in the ritual?" Alphard asked. He was much calmer than Sirius, who was whispering frantically to Harry, saying his name over and over again. Harry nodded, right before he convulsed in pain. He rolled to his side and Sirius grabbed one of his hands.
"This could be the sign that it is time to return," Alphard informed them.
"Still … don't … know … how," Harry panted.
"Shut up if you can't stop this," Sirius snapped at his uncle. He bent over Harry, stroking his hair. Harry calmed down. The pain was still there but he was terribly weak. Everything was losing substance. It was at once like falling asleep and like waking up.
"I think I'm leaving… going back," he murmured. "Sirius …"
Sirius gripped his hand more tightly, as if he could hold him here by doing so. "Harry. Harry, I'm here. I'll be waiting for you. Don't hurry, alright?"
"I'll come back…" Harry wasn't quite sure if Sirius had heard him, but even as everything else was slipping away, he could hear Sirius' voice one last time.
"We'll meet again. Here or elsewhere."
**
Dumbledore worked desperately deflecting curses that were aimed at his brother and Harry. Fortunately most of the Death Eaters didn’t see Aberforth when he was accidentally revealed, so Dumbledore was able to incapacitate a few Death Eaters as well. But between all this and trying to maintain his Patronus he was tiring and missed something important. Unnoticed by everyone, Wormtail had turned into a rat. The small grey rodent darted over the court, closer to Harry and the Dark Lord. Once or twice he stopped, sniffing the air with quivering whiskers and then he found what he was looking for. Aberforth Dumbledore was hidden by the invisibility cloak, but his scent was easy to follow. When he found the silky fabric of the cloak, Wormtail did one of the unexpectedly clever and risky things he sometimes did – he dug his small teeth into the cloak and ran away, tearing it partly off the kneeling wizard.
"There!" someone yelled. "Another one!"
Two curses were fired, one flashed past Aberforth's grey head and hit the sand some twenty feet behind him, the other one was deflected by a Shield Charm that had to come from his brother.
Lord Voldemort still had enough control over his body to raise his wand. He realised that it was not Dumbledore by Harry’s body. Suddenly he knew the significance of the knife sticking out of Potter’s chest. He had to act soon to make sure that Harry stayed dead.
But it was too late. When Aberforth noticed that he had been uncovered, he decided that he couldn't risk waiting for the ritual to work any longer. In a swift motion he grabbed the hilt of the knife and pulled. And it was none too early – three other Death Eaters attacked him, and their curses hit him with full force. Without a sound he dropped to the ground.
Tom didn't care. All that counted was that the knife had been pulled. Harry would wake up soon and everything would be ok.
'But how long would their luck last?' Tom wondered. Snape, whose skin was sickly pale and clammy from the loss of blood messed up his Shield Charm and was hit by a Reductor Curse and a Choking Hex at once and went down with a painful stifled gasp. It was a strategical disadvantage, but Tom couldn't quite feel bad about it.
Dumbledore's invisibility no longer deterred the Dementors and five or more of them crowded around a seemingly empty spot.
Harry lay still and showed no signs of waking. Cold panic gripped Tom's soul. If this didn't work they lost the gamble on their only chance to get Harry back into his body. If Harry's soul didn't return now, he was dead, the ritual could not be repeated once the body had truly died, which it would without a soul or the knife in its chest.
Tom knew that if Harry died, he had lost, no matter what else happened. He had fought Voldemort only for Harry…
Harry showed no signs of movement.
Never in his life had Tom wanted anything so badly as he now wanted Harry to live. He felt tears on his inhuman face. He didn’t care what happened to him or the world or anything in it. He seemed to exist only through his despair and his need, his burning, all-consuming need for Harry to live.
But Harry wasn’t waking up.
Voldemort was losing the complete control over his body now that Tom's raw emotions were breaking down all of the Dark Lord's defences - the very same ones that Tom travelled over the world to perfect. These defences against all kinds of magic dark and light didn’t work against the simple emotion of grief at the death of a loved one. Voldemort was now dying inside him, his soulless essence breaking apart and being reabsorbed by Tom's essence from which it had been made. But the destruction of Voldemort did not make him happy or even satisfied. He would not even miss his copy certainly no more than he would miss his Astronomy notes from first year. Tom felt that life had no meaning. Harry was dead, regardless of what happened to Voldemort.
Tom knew he didn’t have the happiness to conjure a Patronus. He was certain that he would never be happy again. But being the Dark Lord did have a few advantages.
"Leave!" he commanded the Dementors, blasting a few of them away from Dumbledore with a swing of his wand. It was so easy but it was way too late to mean anything. The headmaster's invisibility had flickered and faded while he fought the Dementors and when they backed off he became completely visible, his eyes resting tensely on Tom.
The Death Eaters who were attacking Dumbledore in the hopes of killing or Stunning him stopped as soon as they heard their master's order. "All of you, leave!" he said in a tone promising death at the slightest disobedience. Those who were still on their feet backed off like the cowed minions they were, leaving behind only those who were dead or unconscious or otherwise unable to move.
Dumbledore didn't budge, his wand still half raised and his blue eyes concerned. He looked dishevelled and Tom could tell that he was exhausted.
Dumbledore hadn't saved Harry, but Tom didn’t have the energy to be angry. He hadn't saved Harry either, had he?
"Tom?" Dumbledore asked as soon as they were alone. His voice echoed strangely between the high walls of the prison around them. With the bodies strewn all around it them it looked like the remnants of a battlefield. Fawkes landed on the ground, crooning softly.
"You failed," Tom said. He turned away from Dumbledore and walked over to Harry's dead body. The scar that had been so prominent on his forehead was gone as if it had never existed and gone with it was the bond they had shared. "We failed."
"I lost," he said numbly. Everything inside him was quiet and tired. "And I won. It's all the same…"
The words just came out of his mouth because they were true, not because they had any meaning.
Dumbledore came over to him, close enough to touch Tom, but he didn't. Instead he looked down where Tom was looking. Harry looked like he was sleeping. Then Tom suddenly felt ill and weak and his tall, gaunt, strange body gave away and he was on his knees. His fingers looked thin and white like bones around Harry's arm. In that moment, death seemed like mercy to him. He wanted to be with Harry, to forget that he ever existed.
Dumbledore's hands were on his shoulders in a second, the old wizard crouching next to him on the ground.
"Tom. Tom, listen to me. Harry is – are you listening to me?"
"'s not fair," Tom murmured. "I'd die to save him! I vanquished the Dark Lord! Why can't I save Harry?"
Dumbledore lowered his eyes wearily. His silence was resigned and apologetic. He had no answer for Tom's question and no words to soothe him.
Tom loosened his grip on Harry's arm in defeat, wanting nothing more than to lie down next to him and close his eyes.
And then he realised that his fingers were touching warm skin and a pulse was beating faintly.