Chapter Thirty-Eight of 'Seasons of War'- Final
Chapter Thirty-Seven.
Title: Seasons of War (38/40)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairings: Harry/Draco, Ron/Hermione
Rating: R
Warnings: Violence, torture, sex, angst, profanity, ignores the DH epilogue.
Summary: The war against Nihil enters its final stages, Harry and Draco train as partners, and they may actually survive to become effective Aurors. Maybe.
Author’s Notes: This is the final part of the Running to Paradise Trilogy, sequel to Ceremonies of Strife, and won’t make much sense if you haven’t read the first two stories. I don’t yet know how long this one will be, but based on the others, I’m guessing 45 to 50 chapters.
Chapter One.
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Thirty-Eight--Final
They hadn't told him that what he would have to do was fucking impossible.
Harry stood in the forest that Portillo Lopez had Apparated him to, his arms wrapped around himself. He could just have used a Warming Charm, but then he would probably get overheated. He knew that the chill didn't come from the mild summer night around him; it came from the thought of what Portillo Lopez and her Order of necromancers thought he would be able to accomplish.
Harry shivered and paced in a circle. He would have liked to be with Draco, but Portillo Lopez had explained why that was impossible. Draco was the one sending the distracting vision; Harry had to be in another place so that he could weave the snake illusions around a different part of Nihil. Nihil's ability to divide himself and make tendrils meant that Portillo Lopez didn't think he would go himself to confront Draco, especially since he had been wounded in his last confrontation with the comitatus. They needed to send the fear of the vision from one direction, make him appear to Harry in some form that could be held, and then use both combined as a distraction that would keep Nihil from seeing the real plan.
It sounded unnecessarily complicated to Harry, but he accepted, grudgingly, that they couldn't trust Nihil to simply walk into a trap and bring all of himself with him. Of course, that didn't explain why Portillo Lopez thought only two traps would be enough. Why not three?
Or maybe it did count as three, since the Order would be attacking from a different direction. Harry shook his head in impatience. When this war was done, he vowed, he was going to study magical theory until it made sense to him, even if it took the rest of his bloody life.
Abruptly, something changed in the atmosphere of the night around him. It was as though a skunk had suddenly died and added a putrid odor to what had been a sweet breeze. Harry turned in the direction that he knew marked the Auror camp, eyes narrowed. Portillo Lopez had said he would know when Nihil began to respond to the vision Draco was projecting, but not how.
This felt like it, though. Harry swallowed and conjured up his own portion of the vision.
Draco was imagining what could happen to Nihil, thanks to the Order's having supposedly discovered this secret weapon. Harry was supposed to imagine that it was happening right now, to a part of Nihil.
I knew Nemo would come in useful for something, Harry thought, and started to imagine as hard as he could. The hooks that the Order had conjured--or would have conjured if this vision had been at all real--were ripping into Nemo's flesh, tearing it apart in ways that nothing else could have. Instead of becoming useless blood and skin, or clots of oblivion, Nemo was yielding his secrets to the Order.
What secrets? Harry didn't know. That was part of the reason that Portillo Lopez had chosen him to project this part of the vision, since she knew that Nihil knew that Harry wouldn't understand all the magical theory, and that would make the threat both plausibly vague and more real.
We are trying to panic him, she had said, when Harry complained about, essentially, being used for his stupidity.
Harry shut his eyes and concentrated until he could see the light gleaming on the hooks. And Nemo was screaming. He had no trouble imagining that, after the screams that he heard during the war.
The night shifted again. This time, Harry could feel it as a shimmering and shivering in his bones, like someone had struck them with a tuning fork. It was similar to, though not exactly the same as, the way he had felt when Nihil launched his attack on the Auror camp all those nights ago.
He's coming, Harry thought, and continued to concentrate on the idea of Nemo being torn apart as if he hadn't noticed.
But when the air ripped and the immense glamoured being that was Nihil landed in the middle of the clearing, filling Harry's eyes and ears and nose and all his senses with that sensation of drowning in acidic mud, Harry was ready for him, snakes coiling and hissing in each hand.
*
The Dark Argus had thousands of eyes, and thousands of claws. All of them seemed to be staring and scraping, respectively, at Draco in those first few seconds of the fight.
But Draco had an advantage he hadn't even realized was an advantage. His magical eye painted the darkness around the beast with lines and shimmers of vast color, lines that seemed to link to nothing at first and which Draco was tempted to ignore--until one line suddenly slanted a moment before the great clawed hand on the left came down and struck towards Draco.
His magical eye could see the motions the beast would make, and allow Draco, in turn, to counter those motions the instant before they happened.
Draco laughed aloud, and had the impression, from the way the lines of color twisted and coiled, that the beast hesitated. But he didn't allow himself to dwell on that for long. It was an advantage, yes, and one that he had to utilize fast, before the beast realized what was happening and covered the hole in its defenses, or, more likely, received something from Nihil that would allow it to do so.
He saw the red line that led to the right hand flare with blue, which the line leading to the left had done before it moved, and so aimed his wand at empty air and shouted, "Ardeo!"
The air burst into flame, an expanding wheel of fire that was actually best-suited for taking out enemies at the margins of an area--
Like the Dark Argus's right hand, as it moved down and into the edges of the conflagration a moment later.
It made no attempt to escape until a few seconds after, Draco noted, when even more red lines turned blue. That told him even more. It, or the magic that controlled it, was slow and deliberate. It couldn't react fast to new situations that suddenly developed; it was as though it had to think about things.
He smiled, and watched for a moment as the fire shimmered across the bony hand, wondering what effect it would have. He hardly wanted to cast a spell that wouldn't work, no matter how tempting some of the fire spells would be to use on a creature that had trouble reacting to change.
The flames faded, and left behind a dangling, blackened finger. Draco grinned, decided that was good enough for now, and whirled into the battle.
*
The snakes grew from Harry's arms, from his head, from his chest and neck and eyes. He had envisioned only a crown of snakes at first, but that became a cloak, and that became armor. He only had time to see a few of them--who looked like golden cobras, the infinity pattern drawn in dark ash on their hoods--before they all struck at once, lunging forwards and holding onto Nihil.
Nihil said something, or perhaps hissed something, in a language so foul that Harry felt as though parts of his earlobes were simply melting away. He gritted his teeth against the pain and conjured fangs on the snakes that were already hanging on, making them sink deep, like the hooks that Portillo Lopez had told him to imagine.
Nihil roared and thrashed like a lion. Then he lifted his head, or rather a head-shaped part of the blob turned Harry's way, and Harry was caught by a pair of eyes that, so far as he knew, Nihil hadn't used before. One of them was a golden eye that imitated the shine coming from his snakes.
The other was Draco's grey eye.
Harry hesitated for just a moment, which weakened his snakes, and Nihil sent a tendril sliding and slicing through their protection, landing on Harry's shoulder and inflicting a sucker-shaped wound.
Harry shivered. It didn't exactly hurt. It was just very cold, and flashed blue-black at the edges.
It was the color that told him what Nihil must be doing. He was feeding the void into Harry, filling his veins with death the way that Nemo had done with the creatures that he brought back to life from ancient bones. Harry had no idea what would happen to him once the process was complete, but he doubted it would be anything good.
Irritated, he focused his mind on the glowing golden warmth of the reality that Ventus had stolen from that other, more vital world, and imagining it pumping down the fangs of his snakes into Nihil, taking the place of the venom that might be there if they were poisonous.
Nihil screamed aloud.
The sound set up vibrations in Harry's bones and made his head sag on his neck. The wound on his shoulder seemed to widen and to grow colder, although honestly, Harry didn't know how it was doing that. He trembled and felt an intense weariness coming over him. What did it all matter, after all? They were never going to defeat Nihil; he was simply too powerful. And hadn't he fought in enough battles, seen enough wars? He should feel free to rest, because no one else had ever be expected to do so much.
No.
Against the despair that seemed to have taken the place of fear among Nihil's weapons, Harry raised a barrier of ferocity and free will, courage and compassion. Dumbledore might have manipulated him and kept the prophecy from him, but Harry had still chosen to fight in the war. Nothing could have happened unless he had willingly sacrificed his time and his efforts and even his life against Voldemort. Nothing would happen here, could have happened, if he had not chosen to fight the war against Nihil. He could have dropped out of Auror training, as many had after the war became obviously dangerous. He could have refused to study the compatible magic with Draco. He could have refused to partner with him. He could have gone on studying necromancy and not listened to Draco when he begged him to stop.
So many choices, and everything would have gone differently.
So Nihil had chosen a poor weapon when he tried to tell Harry that nothing he did made a difference.
The cold flowing into his wound seemed to falter. Harry lifted his head and thought again of reality pouring through the snakes' fangs, hitting Nihil in the face or whatever other body parts he might have available for hitting, weakening him, driving in warmth and life as he was trying to pour the void into Harry. How long since Nihil had seen the sun, held an animal in his arms, tasted fruit? All those were experiences of the outside world, of the world that Nihil had decided he would do his best to destroy.
The sucker withered and fell away from Harry's shoulder. The snakes' bodies thickened, grew stronger and brighter.
That's it, Harry thought in wonder. This is a battle fought on the mental plane as much as anywhere else. Maybe it's because we're using fear against Nihil or because he's more powerful this way than any other, but what we think can hurt him.
Harry changed tactics, and thought this time of his love for Draco, of the way that their compatible magic flowed through them when they were using it, of how perfectly they dueled together, or how Draco arched above him, head tossed back, eyes fluttering, when he was coming--
Nihil screamed in pain, a sound like the harmonics of crystal bells shattering to Harry's ears.
Oh, that really hurts him. Harry laughed dizzily. I wonder if it comes partially from the fact that I'm thinking of togetherness, and Nihil doesn't know what that means? He's just this whole melded thing, and all the people he works with are parts of himself. He's always alone. It's not real cooperation.
Nihil turned his formless head again as if he had heard that, and a new sensation stabbed into Harry's brain. This wasn't the cold of the void, but something worse, something draped and flowing with black rottenness. It only took a moment until Harry was gasping silently, bent at the waist as he struggled to control his reaction, coughing as he tried to remove the gag that it seemed intent on clapping into his mouth.
Thickness. That was the best way to describe it, he thought, from behind the building wall. Uniqueness. Nihil was trying to isolate Harry from his thoughts and his friends by tapping into the feelings that lay smoldering uneasily beneath the surface of his mind, bringing up all those moments when he'd felt himself alone or so different that no one else would ever understand him and cramming them together into one barrier like packed earth.
Memories of Dudley flashed through his head, and the way that Dudley had laughed and taunted him, telling him that no one would ever love or want to be with a freak. Draco drew away from him, turning his head aside as he declared that he could never be with someone who practiced necromancy. Ron left him in the Tri-Wizard Tournament and again during the Horcrux hunt, and Nihil was working hard to ensure that Harry didn't remember him coming back.
Harry answered with grim resolve: the memories of going away to Hogwarts, of reconciling with Draco, of Ron returning of his own free will when he realized that Harry was in danger. But those memories were thin and shivering, wailing things next to the solid muscle that Nihil rammed into him.
His snakes began to flicker and change. Nihil laughed in his ears, not taunting; the laughter was too dead. But it was horrible anyway.
Harry reached out instinctively, before he thought about it, seeking a source of strength that had once meant everything to him, that the Aurors had trained him to work with, that he had once sworn to lean on and consult before he did anything too dangerous.
Draco!
The word rang across the miles between them, Harry didn't even know how many miles, and he found himself holding his breath, hoping that Draco would hear him and send help before it was too late.
*
Really, it was almost too easy fighting the Dark Argus, at least once Draco had noticed the messages from his magical eye. The beast always struck where he wasn't, and soon it was roaring in frustration and waving its claws in random patterns.
Or they must have seemed random to it, at least. It still couldn't move without the magic to direct it, and that meant magic to signal it. Red turned to blue, and Draco was out of the way or ambushing it, or, several delicious times, casting a wind spell that meant its hand traveled further than it was meant to and scraped against itself, causing chunks to fall off.
Draco!
The cry turned his head, wrenching it physically to the side, and for a moment Draco lost track of the lines of magic and the Dark Argus as he viewed them only with his ordinary eye. The beast's claws swept over his head, parting his hair with the riffle of the wind, and he ducked beneath them only just in time, tucking his arms around him to roll. The beast roared or chuckled and shuffled forwards.
Harry! Draco reached out, uncertain, fumbling. They had never tried to stretch their compatible magic over a distance this great.
He received only silent distress. There were no more words, and Draco was uncertain what Harry wanted him to do. The silence was maddening. Harry might be dying right then, and although Draco was sure that he would feel that, he didn't know what he was supposed to do to stop it.
Then he firmed his mouth and nodded once. The cry had been a cry for help, and there was only one kind of help that Draco thought he could furnish from here, or that Harry would ask for.
He flung the compatible magic out in a reaching stream, a skein that sought and hopefully found the reaching hand that sought it. For a moment, he thought he felt Harry grasping it, and gratitude and wonder flowed through it. Lips brushed the skin beneath his ear; a hand touched his hair.
Then the skein lapsed, and left Draco shaking and facing a beast that he had weakened but still couldn't defeat. None of the spells he had cast had touched the glowing eyes.
Draco formed his mouth into a quiet snarl. Well, he would just have to do something about that, then.
And then it came to him that there was a certain kind of magic he had been avoiding, and he snorted in amusement and spread one hand. The wand followed it in a pointing line, and he reached back into his memory for the incantations he had found in books in his father's library.
He hadn't used Dark Arts so far. But Dark Arts were as likely to work on a beast made of bones and death as any other. Nihil's magic was neither Dark nor Light, but something beyond either.
But not undefeatable. Portillo Lopez had promised him that much, and that meant Draco had to believe her and stay alive while he could.
"Ad finem!" he called, and his voice was strong, even as magic began to bubble and boil in his gut that he had never called on before.
The beast snarled and came a step forwards, into the spell's range.
Draco arched his head back as a black beam burst from his wand. It encircled the beast and flung it--not physically, but magically--to the uttermost limits of its time on earth, sucking greedily at its existence, swallowing it the way a parasite would swallow blood.
The spell was the only one he could think of that might work on a creature like this, driven by death instead of life. A curse that swallowed life-force would be useless on it, but one that simply swallowed the force that bound its bones together ought to work. It wasn't a natural creature, after all. Draco thought he could count on that to end its existence as quickly as possible.
The Dark Argus roared in silence and struggled against the whirlwind that seemed to have surrounded it. Draco watched, panting, from his knees, and smiled when it seemed as though the Dark Argus was about to retreat into the void; the air around it turned blue-black and shimmered.
It wouldn't matter if it did retreat, or at least that was what Draco remembered from the description of the spell. The spell would follow it wherever it went, and continue drinking until the last of the binding force was gone.
Draco was somewhat surprised the creature was still standing, to be honest. Perhaps it mattered that its body was so much bigger than a human's, and so the curse had to work harder and take longer to eat what made it stand.
The Dark Argus shuddered, once, and its claws rose as if it would scrape out its own face. Then it simply collapsed, the dark whirlwind of the spell vanishing in the same instant. Draco ducked several times to escape the thud of bones around him and the smaller, softer patter that he thought was eyes.
When he looked, it was all over. The creature that had taken his eye and scarred his face lay dead around him, and Draco surged to his feet panting with triumph, and turned his head in the direction of Harry's earlier call.
He was going to find his partner now and battle beside him, the way it always should have been.
And fuck what Portillo Lopez would say if she knew.
*
The strength that passed into Harry nearly lifted him into the air; it felt as though someone had strung a wire beneath his feet.
He rode the lightning up and up to an invisible height, and then dropped, shaking, back into his body. His breath hissed through his teeth; his hands felt new and unfamiliar on the wand. For a moment, it seemed as though Draco was with him, physically present, standing behind Harry with his arms wrapped around Harry's waist. Harry felt a hand in his hair, soft lips brushing the softer skin beneath his ear.
Then the sensation faded, but it didn't matter, because new life was pumping into the snakes that held Nihil still, and Harry could see, by turning his head, that the cold-dripping wound in his shoulder had already faded.
He laughed aloud.
A roar came in response. Nihil was turning in for another attack, and Harry could see that golden eye, paired with the grey, staring at him, trying to push fear into him so that he would surrender and fall apart, and Nihil could get on with things.
Harry shook his head and pushed the fear away from him with one hand, and then attacked with a new snake that grew from behind his ear. It was as golden as the others had been, but with fangs that shone more, and a coiling tail, and eyes that were wide with intelligence. When it struck, it drove Harry's confidence into Nihil, and the compatible magic, and the feeling of togetherness and love that he had shared with Draco--
And his fearlessness.
Harry realized that he had found another weapon that would work against Nihil, and chuckled viciously as he employed it. Nihil had to live with the knowledge that he was always a coward, part of him so broken by the fear of torture that his immortal servants could be destroyed by it. Harry had gone through greater fears and had been willing to die to spite them. Nihil had fled death instead, and had sought ever since for what he had thrown away.
Nihil cried out in his mind. Harry knotted his hands together and grew a snake from between their entwined fingers, one that had two heads. One head contained green eyes, the other grey.
This one lashed out and tore the eye Nihil had stolen from his head.
The scream then was deafening, thunderous, filling all the world, and Harry went to one knee as he heard it. But the sound behind it was pain, not outrage, not fear, and that cheered Harry. He readied the two-headed snake to strike again, this time picking a target lower down Nihil's body. It was too much to hope that Harry would hit his groin--if he even had a groin in this particular incarnation--but he could still hope to inflict a mortal wound.
And then Nihil turned and cried out again, and Harry was sure that the emotion behind this sound was despair. Harry smiled. The Order must have found a way through to attack Nihil directly.
He vanished.
Harry called the snakes back into him at once, and stood there listening to the vibration in his bones. It was ridiculous to think he would be able to tell where Nihil had gone, but he listened anyway.
A distant groan rose and fell, and then there was silence. Harry smiled slowly. The vibration in his bones had gone.
Portillo Lopez had said that Harry would know when Nihil had retreated into the ball of nothingness and so could be cornered and enfolded in reality. Harry didn't know for certain if that had happened, but it seemed likely.
Which meant, of course, that Harry was going back to Draco. He didn't know where the main battle was right now, and it would be stupid to try and find it. He belonged with Draco.
He Apparated, the noise of battle still in his ears.
Chapter Thirty-Nine.
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