Voldemort stopped dead in his tracks, his eyes flitted around the room.
Fudge, on the other hand, paled visibly, his eyes trained on the Dark Lord in the doorway.
Ana cackled again.
"Not what you wanted, false Heir of Slytherin?" the vampire asked, his eyes gleaming and his fangs bared.
Voldemort's eyes snapped to the vampire.
"YOU!" he snarled.
Ana cackled again.
"You could have left me be," the vampire countered. "You didn't have to follow me here."
Sal snorted.
"I'm pretty sure you had a method to your madness, Ana," he said. "So, I'm pretty sure that there's a reason why he followed you."
The pointed look he threw his son, just ensured that his son's smile broadened.
"But Pater! Who do you think I am?" Ana said with amusement in his voice. "Of course, there's a reason why he followed me! I'm the son of a Slytherin! Did you really think I don't know how to manipulate somebody to do what I want if I want to?"
"You… You-Know-Who is alive!" Fudge interrupted at that moment.
Ana threw him an expressionless look.
"That's what you noticed just now?" he asked, sounding exasperated. "He's been standing in the door for at least a minute or two!"
At that, Voldemort snarled and stepped forward towards the vampire who looked at him unimpressed.
"If you want to intimidate me, you have to do more than show your crooked teeth to me," he said. "Honestly, I met scarier people throughout my life."
Voldemort raised his wand and several of the members of the Wizengamot scrambled backwards. Others - clearly his followers - pulled out their wands as well, and turned them on the last group who had pulled their wands on Voldemort.
Ana stared at the wand.
"You have to learn how to score a hit first before I even think about being a tiny bit afraid," he said in a voice one would use for a misbehaving toddler.
Of course, that only managed to enrage the Dark Lord in the entrance and green light left his wand, aimed at the vampire in front of him.
The light missed and splattered on a barrier that came up just in time to shield a few shivering members of the Wizengamot.
The barrier shattered.
" Anastasius! "
"Oops," the vampire said, sounding a bit sheepish. "I didn't think people were idiotic enough to freeze when being confronted with a killing curse."
The answer was a sigh from his father.
"Not everybody is a reckless Gryffindor who was just by luck trained to avoid most of the consequences of his recklessness," Sal said with a sigh, before painting another rune into the air, sending it out to re-erect the shield he had build just in time to save the two Wizengamot members.
"Aw! But Pater! I brought you a present! Are you telling me that you don't like it now?" Ana said pouting. "And there I went out of my way to come here all the way to the Ministry to bring you a liar and line-thief."
"Line-thief?" Augusta Longbottom asked. She was one of those who had drawn their wand on Voldemort and was currently in a stand-off with those who had sided with Voldemort. Next to her, her grandson had done the same.
Even some of those that had sided with Voldemort looked uncomfortable at Ana's words.
Sal eyed Voldemort.
He had stood up and had moved downstairs, closer to his son and Voldemort.
"He took blood without consent to use it in a ritual to resurrect himself," Sal answered, his eyes on Voldemort. "No matter how one looks at that, it's line-theft since our blood carries our heritage and magic."
"It's not as if he cares about lineage," Sirius Black spoke up from the back, where he had his wand drawn on Lord Avery, with his brother at his back. "I mean, he still has Bellatrix next to him - and she has been officially a No-Name for a few weeks now."
At that, whispers broke out around the room.
Sirius snorted.
"What?" he asked. "Did you really think I'd go and leave Bellatrix in my family after she worked actively with someone who endangered my heir's and my godson's life while killing some other, decent members of the Blacks?"
Bellatrix scoffed.
"And what decent members are you talking about?" she asked, clearly unimpressed.
Sirius showed his teeth.
"Dorea Potter, née Black, her brother, Marius Black, also known as Mad Marius," he countered. "Alphard Black…"
"Blood traitors!" Bellatrix immediately objected. "And squibs!"
"Neither Alphard nor Dorea were ever called a blood traitor," Sirius countered. "And you can't name them blood traitors just because you want to, now, long after their deaths."
Some of the Wizengamot members on Voldemort's side looked really uncomfortable now.
And of course, the vampire noticed.
"It's odd," he said, casually. "How many of those who called themselves 'pureblood' joined this man considering how little regard he has for those traditions and customs that they hold up high."
Voldemort snarled and stepped forward while more than one of his people wavered, their wands lowering in their hands.
Bellatrix on the other hand had her teeth bared and stepped up next to Voldemort.
"I will kill anybody who stands against My Lord," she declared.
"Oh, we know that, dear Bella," Lucius Malfoy said. He was one of those who had stepped back when Voldemort entered.
He had neither drawn his wand on his former comrades nor had he done so on the rest of the Wizengamot like his former comrades.
He held his wand - he wasn't stupid, after all - but it was clear that he was only planning to defend himself and not to aid one or the other party in the brewing fight.
Bellatrix cackled, "Oh, dear Lucius," she said. " You, I will kill personally. After all, you are a known traitor to our cause already."
There was a snort coming from Regulus at that.
"Don't worry, Lucy," he said, dark amusement in his face. "You're with the cool kids now, no need for following line-thieves or goody-two-shoes anymore."
At that, Bellatrix stepped forward another step.
"Oh, dear cousin," she said. " You, I won't mind killing as well-"
But before she could say more, the doors behind her fell shut with an echoing wham.
Sparks of magic creeped over the closed doors, jumping from the frames over the doors and back like lightning.
Bellatrix immediately turned and tried to curse the door open again.
Both, she and Voldemort were more than aware of what it meant if the door was closed behind them - without it, there was no easy way out of the chamber.
Apparition wasn't possible in the Wizengamot Chambers - and the other exit was on the other side of the hall, too far to easily reach.
The door didn't budge - not even when Voldemort himself tried to spell it.
Ana grinned, his fangs flashing making the grin more of a challenge than amusement.
He was turning an Amethyst in his hands.
"It's interesting," he said with amusement in his eyes. "What a simple, beautiful stone can do. Don't you think so?"
Voldemort's eyes turned to the stone in Ana's hands.
The vampire grinned.
"Protection and purification," he said. "I just enhanced it with a few nice runes."
Then he crooked his head.
"But… I guess you wouldn't know," he said thoughtfully. "Just like you wouldn't know my interest in stones…"
Behind him, Sal pinched the root of his nose.
"Do I want to know how long you've been planning this?" he asked, sounding exasperated and a bit amused.
Ana shrugged his shoulders.
"It grew on me within the last few months," he said, clearly unbothered. "Because, honestly, Pater - this is the easiest way to stop him right now. He wasn't yet ready to show himself, but he was alive again, and you were already working against him. I just thought that easing it along a bit might be a good idea."
"And you decided the Wizengamot was the right place to confront him," Sal asked thoughtfully, all the while watching Voldemort who was staring at him with narrowed thoughtful eyes.
"Nearly all of them are grown wizards and witches who should at least be able to defend themselves," Ana said before frowning at those Wizengamot members that Sal had rescued with his ward. "Or at least that's what I believed. It's the better option compared to Hogwarts."
Sal hummed in agreement.
It was then that Voldemort's gaze intensified.
Then, recognition spiked.
A boy with shoulder-long hair and an unearthly green shine around him. Eyes in the colour of an Avada Kedavra and the body see-through like a ghost's - and yet, dangerous to hurt one of Voldemort's most faithful without a second thought.
Azkaban.
And the same voice that had spoken to the vampire speaking to Voldemort.
" Afraid, Tom?"
Voldemort shuddered, his wand now moving to threaten the boy instead of the vampire.
" Afraid, Tom?"
He knew that boy.
He had met him before, a few months ago.
" If you cross my plans, I'll vanquish you," the boy's voice soft with syllabled hisses. " Don't worry, you'll cross me eventually ."
He knew that boy.
Voldemort's hand tightened around the wand in his hand.
"I know you," he said, directed at Sal, his face thoughtful. "You're the one I met in Azkaban."
"That, too," Sal answered, his own wand not yet drawn, but his attention now on Voldemort.
Green eyes met Voldemort's red ones and suddenly, something else came to mind.
An unprotected back and a spell thrown at it.
A white flash.
A curse rebounded from a barrier that hadn't been there just seconds before.
And then eyes meeting Voldemort's - mind-magic connecting them and trapping Voldemort in a mind similar to a void.
A monster in human disguise.
"I'm more than just a monster, Tom Riddle," the voice of the man in front of Voldemort said in his memories, before threatening him.
" Leave, Dark Lord of this time," the healer had said, his voice strong and old, so old. " I have no time to kill you right now. Leave - and I will let you stay alive for now ."
Oh, yes. Voldemort knew the man - had known him for longer than just Hallowe'en… even if he wasn't sure how the man in front of him could look so young when he should be older.
"Healer," Voldemort said and the healer's lips twitched.
"Tom Riddle," he answered in kind.
His eyes, so much like the killing curse, lit up.
"What are you doing here, Healer?" Voldemort asked, his wand now firmly aimed at the healer, the vampire next to them nearly forgotten.
"Something I should have done years ago," the healer answered, his gaze intensifying and cooling. "Disclaiming you ."
Albus Dumbledore was watching Voldemort with concern in his eyes.
He had to admit that this day got worse and worse with one after another unplanned thing piling up on the next.
Currently, he was standing next to his old friend Alastor Moody who had drawn his wand and was aiming at those from the dark fraction that clearly sided with Voldemort just now. On the other hand, Albus was watching Voldemort himself.
The man looked unhinged and Albus feared what he would do the moment he lost his patience.
Here, in the heart of the Wizengamot, he would be able to bring down the whole British magical world if he just went and killed everyone but his followers today. The only reason he had never done that before was because Albus was here.
Now, Albus wondered if that would stop Tom after being goaded by the vampire who had entered the Wizengamot without permission.
Albus gauged the vampire.
He looked out of place and yet seemed to feel perfectly content with the fact that he was in a place where the likes of him weren't welcomed.
But then, the vampire also didn't show an ounce of fear when Voldemort went and threw a killing curse at him.
No, instead of acting like any sane person and being afraid, the vampire went and taunted Tom. Albus wondered how someone could disregard his life like that… on the other hand, he was a vampire, Albus had read a lot about them in Eldred Worple's book and he was sure - even if it was never stated directly - that vampirism must have been some kind of curse once that now changed those inflicted into people that had nothing in common with the common witch or wizard. Maybe, the curse had also changed their ability to feel fear.
And of course, the Slytherin Lord knew the vampire…
Albus regarded the other man.
Slytherin.
He still couldn't believe that the man had been able to state a claim like that and got it validated.
It was a somewhat frightening thought - especially since the man must have had enough of a silver tongue to lure in families with different inclinations to follow him.
The Slytherin family had gone from a footnote to high importance within a day.
And Emrys-LeFay was their head.
Emrys-LeFay who went to school with Henry Potter - who fought against Grindelwald. He also had fought against Voldemort in the first war - even if Albus could barely believe it. Voldemort seemed to remember that tidbit as well.
"Healer," Voldemort said and there was something in his voice that Albus had never heard before.
It sounded like remembrance.
It sounded like nightly terrors.
It sounded like fear .
And it made Albus look at Emrys-LeFay with a frown.
Voldemort didn't fear people.
He terrorised them, made them fear him - he didn't fear them.
And yet, there was something in Voldemort's voice that spoke of fear and a remembrance that fuelled nightmares.
It was just punctuated by the fact that Emrys-LeFay returned Voldemort's chosen address with one of his own, calling Voldemort "Tom Riddle" instead of the name he had gone by for decades now.
And of course, then Emrys-LeFay had to top it by answering Voldemort's question of what he was doing at the Wizengamot with a few damning words.
Taunting words.
"Disclaiming you ," he said.
Albus watched when Voldemort started to laugh.
"Disclaiming me?" he asked, clearly not seeing a reason why Emrys-LeFay would do so. "What reason do you have to disclaim me?"
The answer was a cackle from the vampire next to them.
"Oh, but don't you know who he is?" the vampire asked. "This is the Lord I owe allegiance to. This is the one I'm faithful to."
And when Voldemort frowned, the vampire bared his teeth in a mockery of a smile.
"He is the true Lord of Slytherin," he introduced Emrys-LeFay to Voldemort and something like triumph was gleaming in his eyes.
This wouldn't go over well.
Albus hastily tried to reach the bottom of the Chamber, but he knew that he was still too far away to react in time.
This wouldn't go over well.
Voldemort stared at the other man, his face twisting.
No, Albus knew that this wouldn't go over well at all.
"The Lord of Slytherin," Voldemort said, staring at the stranger in front of him.
Said Lord just inclined his head.
"Like I have always been," he replied, his voice dry. "I'm surprised you didn't guess that considering the last time I spoke to you I didn't exactly keep to English."
" If you cross my plans, I'll vanquish you," the Lord in front of him had hissed at him on Hallowe'en. " Don't worry, you'll cross me eventually ."
But, the Potter boy could also speak Parseltongue, so Voldemort hadn't seen it as too strange. He had thought the man in front of him was Potter, after all… at least, until now.
Now he knew the stranger had said the truth back then.
The man in front of him - no matter how young he looked - was too old to be Potter.
But that didn't mean that being the Lord of Slytherin was the logical conclusion…
"You're Slytherin," he said, staring at the man.
"Among other things," the Lord replied before exchanging a look with the vampire next to him who looked totally unrepentant.
The vampire had packed away the stone and was now juggling the prophecy again - from one hand clothed in black cloth to the other.
"I wonder why he wanted this thing at all," he said, humming thoughtfully.
Voldemort's eyes returned to the prophecy.
His face twisted in anger.
"Give it to me!" he demanded again.
The vampire hummed.
"Why?" he asked. "I mean… that thing isn't all that important, isn't it?"
In that moment, Bellatrix jumped Ana.
He dodged, the sphere flew through the air and it was the Slytherin Lord who caught it with his bare hands.
He looked at the sphere and then at Voldemort.
Voldemort reached for it.
"Give it to me and I will let those others around us live," he offered.
The Slytherin-Lord looked at him, then at the people behind and on his sides - some of them looking nervous, others with their wands out, ready to fight.
"If you don't give me the prophecy, my men will fight," Voldemort warned the Slytherin-Lord.
Green eyes met red.
"You're a healer," Voldemort reminded the man. "Can you take responsibility for their inevitable deaths in case you force them to fight?"
Voldemort smirked at those words.
He knew the responsibilities of a healer - and causing unnecessary death was something they had to avoid thanks to their oaths.
The man in front of him returned his smirk with a cool stare.
"It's odd what people like you tend to do to get their will… or some unnecessary trinkets," he said, cool eyes assessing Voldemort as if he was a potion. "Sadly, you hear 'healer' and you forget, that even if I am a healer, I am still a guardian - and as a guardian, I have a responsibility to stop those who go too far. ' To protect those who cannot protect themselves from those who will maim them ' is part of my oath - and no matter what you promise today, you will maim or harm those people tomorrow if I give in to your demands today. And if you won't harm them, then you will harm others."
Voldemort stared at the man in front of him.
The other man stared back.
Next to them, Bellatrix went flying through the room. The next moment she stood up again to charge at the vampire a second time.
Albus Dumbledore was hurrying through the crowd.
Voldemort's Death Eaters had raised their wands again - a few of them more hesitant than before, but they did it anyway - and were waiting for his signal.
Voldemort snarled.
"Then it's on your head, Healer!" he said coldly. "Attack!"
And his Death Eaters attacked.
Voldemort held out his hand.
"The prophecy," he offered one last time. "Give it to me, and I will call them off."
The answer was a laugh.
"I fought Grindelwald," the Healer said. "I fought Morgan, and a lot of those who came before him. A thousand years ago, I was the one fighting the government for my school. And you think that I will back down from you ?! From the one who wronged me more than anybody else?!"
The Healer shook his head.
"No," he said, staring at Voldemort with cold, cold eyes. "No, no matter how much you try to frighten me. I know war, I know what it entails, and I am willing to pay the price of today's battle if that means that we won't have war again ."
Voldemort snarled.
But - no matter what the Healer thought - Voldemort would get what he wanted.
Fast as lightning, he drew his wand and called "Accio!"
The glass-ball in the hand of the Slytherin-Lord twitched and then stayed where it was.
Death-green eyes laughed him in the face.
"Did you try something, Tom?" the younger-looking one asked mockingly. "It seems, your spells don't have it in them to circumvent mine."
Of course, the Slytherin-Lord would know a way to stop an Accio even without an obvious Protego.
But there were other options - and one of them, Voldemort was very willing to try.
After all, he had promised the healer he would kill him one day - so why not today?
" Avada Kedavra!"
A sickly green light shot at the Slytherin-Lord and suddenly the smirk on the Lord's face vanished.
Instead, a deadly light began to shine in his eyes, then golden runes spread through the air in front of him and built a shield similar to the one that Voldemort still remembered from his nightmares.
The Avada Kedavra hit the shield and splashed from it as if it was water before the shield broke.
The white flash made Voldemort's heart beat faster.
Green eyes met red, and Voldemort reeled back, afraid of the black nothingness that would follow that gaze.
The Lord's lips twitched and Voldemort snarled.
"This time around, you won't win," he said, battling away that short moment of fear to look at the man in front of him.
He didn't look very impressive and Voldemort refused to be afraid.
He already knew that only Potter could defeat him, after all - and no matter what else that prophecy in the hands of the healer said - this was something Voldemort could rely on.
Which also meant he could rely on the fact that the Healer wouldn't be able to beat him - no matter how their last interaction had gone.
With that, Voldemort changed his stance, ready to take down the other man and get the prophecy once and for all.
"You will regret your arrogance," he told the Lord in front of him when he relaxed his stance and got ready.
Slytherin just hummed and his stance relaxed as well.
The way he held himself told Voldemort that no matter how serious the man had been when he had told him he had fought dark lords before - the Slytherin Lord's skills were anything but exaggerated.
And then, Voldemort attacked.
He did it with everything he had, spells - as obscure as he could make them - flew at the healer.
He wanted to take him down.
He needed to take him down.
The man hummed and dodged.
The next moment, a wand suddenly appeared in the Lord's hand, and a hastily erected Protego-like spell stopped it.
Voldemort used that distraction to fling more of his curses at the man.
One of them just missed the dodging man by a hair's breadth.
"Bone-breaking Spell - and not a very nice one, that," the Lord said, looking at the spell, oddly unbothered by the near-miss. "You really do know a lot of dark spells. I'm slightly impressed."
He dodged the next three curses - one of them darker than the other.
"Flesh-Rotting Spell, Internal Injury Curse, again a Bone-breaker," the Lord counted out every spell Voldemort used. It was unnerving.
No-one should have enough time in battle to be able to tell which spell was hurled at them.
Again, Voldemort hurled spells at the other man.
Said man dodged, countered a few, shielded himself from another three, then he frowned.
"You should stop using the Internal-Injury one. It's faulty at best," he told Voldemort with judgement in his voice.
For a moment, that stopped Voldemort dead in his tracks.
Then the other man frowned.
"I didn't actually say that aloud, did I?" he asked, sounding a bit horrified by himself at that realisation, and then he had the audacity to use the hand that held his wand to pinch his nose - which basically stopped him from using his wand immediately and therefore dismissed Voldemort as a threat in the most maddening way. "I'm turning into Ana! I can't believe that after more than a thousand years clinging to my sanity around him - he actually managed to rub off on me in the worst time possible."
Voldemort growled at that and threw another bunch of curses at the Lord.
Said Lord dodged them without even looking, his expression still pinched.
"But honestly," he said, staring at Voldemort. "Grindelwald was harder to fight than you."
At that, Voldemort hurled even more spells at the other man, forcing him to dodge and counter quite a few of them.
It didn't really seem to impress the Lord, though.
"I'm actually surprised," the Lord mused, sounding a bit absentminded. "From what I gathered from you before, you seemed to tend to use 'Avada Kedavra' a lot, and don't differ a lot from it."
"Crucio!" Voldemort replied, and this time, he managed to hit the man.
He expected the man to falter.
And he did.
He expected the man to cry out.
And he did.
He expected to have an easy time killing him afterwards.
Instead, he found himself in agony as well.
The pain started in his head and spread through his body.
The pain was all-encompassing.
The pain was unstoppable, running throughout his body as if the Lord in front of him was Crucio-ing Voldemort instead the other way around.
Cool green eyes - eyes in so much less agony than they should be - met Voldemort's red ones.
Then, Voldemort's eyes began to water and he ended his Crucio just because he suddenly could not concentrate on it anymore.
The pain stopped instantly.
His eyes snapped to the green ones in front of him.
A coolly amused look met his own horrified gaze.
"Did you really think you got away?" the Healer asked and then darkness enveloped Voldemort.
"How did it feel, crucioing yourself?" the voice of the healer asked from the darkness of the mind surrounding Voldemort. "How did you like your own power aimed at you?"
At that, something broke within Voldemort's mind.
He could feel it shatter.
It was something foreign, something that didn't belong there but that he had never noticed before.
The next moment, the light returned and Voldemort was staring at the Lord in front of him.
Something had broken.
Something that connected them had shattered .
"What…?" he asked.
The answer was a hum.
"A rune," the other Lord said.
Voldemort shuddered.
A runic connection - most likely done when they had met the first time.
A runic connection that had made it possible for the Lord to aim Voldemort's curse at Voldemort.
Slytherin.
The Healer had connected them, had monitored them and even if the connection was now broken - most likely being overloaded by Voldemort's Cruciatus.
And while Voldemort was glad that the connection was broken, he was unsettled by its existence as well.
He needed to end this.
Voldemort wasn't stupid enough to believe that he would be able to get away unharmed even if he won.
The Healer was dangerous - had always been dangerous.
And Voldemort, no matter what else he was, was a survivor.
Still, he needed the prophecy.
With that thought, he flung his wand out and ripped one of those fighting on the Slytherin Lord's side from their place.
The person flew through the air towards the Lord.
"Oh no, you don't," the Lord said.
Runes wrote themselves in the air with the wand in the Slytherin-Lord's hand.
Then, there was a mumble - maybe a spell, yet it was foreign to Voldemort's ears.
The person stopped mid-air before they returned slowly to the ground.
And around Voldemort and the young-looking Lord, the stone lit up.
The floor began to glow white, runes etched themselves in the stone, followed by hieroglyphs, circles, and pentagrams.
A ward.
Voldemort flung his magic at it.
Shattering it before it could actually form.
At the edge of his vision, he could see a chair glowing gold.
He dismissed it.
Instead, he stepped forward again before flinging a barricade of spells at the other man, making him dodge, twist, counter, and protect himself.
It was at the last spell when the Lord's back hit the wall.
They had moved throughout their fight and now they had reached one of the walls of the Chamber.
Voldemort bared his teeth.
"The prophecy," he demanded. "Give it to me and you may live, refuse and you will die like the cornered animal that you resemble."
The other Lord scoffed.
"A cornered animal bites, Tom," he reminded Voldemort, defiance in his eyes, his left hand tightening on the sphere he had been holding all that time.
"Your last chance, Healer," Voldemort reminded the other man.
The answer was just a look .
"That thing in my hand doesn't help you anyway," he said, clearly not willing to part with it.
It seemed that there was no other way then.
Voldemort flung a curse at him, but the healer dodged again.
Then, a smirk marred the Slytherin's face and instead of doing the sensible thing by handing over the prophecy, he threw the sphere to the floor.
It shattered to a thousand pieces.
But instead of a woman rising from it, speaking the words she had once prophesized, there was a haunting silence.
"I fear," the Slytherin-Lord said, his smile icy. "I was here before you - and I took it and exchanged it just in case."
Voldemort stared at the sphere, then he looked up and his eyes were burning with hatred.
Once, Voldemort had sworn he would kill the healer in front of him.
He guessed that day was today.
He raised his wand.
"I guess, playtime is up," the Slytherin-Lord said and suddenly his eyes brightened into a poisonous green.
Voldemort's body stiffened.
He knew that effect.
He ripped his eyes from the healer's, unwilling to trap himself a second time.
But it wasn't enough.
The spell that hit him came too fast to dodge.
He was flung to the floor.
The Lord raised his wand, clearly willing to end it.
And then, the wand was ripped out of the Lord's grasp and flew through the air towards Albus Dumbledore.
Albus Dumbledore watched in horror when Emrys-LeFay started taunting the Dark Lord.
He knew that Emrys-LeFay was most likely underestimating Voldemort but taunting him was the worst thing he could do in Albus's mind.
Albus slipped through the crowd of fighting people.
To his left, he watched Sirius and Regulus, back-to-back, working together while Sirius sniped at Severus Snape.
"Getting compliant in your old age, Princeling?" Albus could hear Sirius say while the Black-Lord went and flung a supporter of the Dark Lord away from the Prince-Lord.
"Oh, shut up, Black!" the Prince-Lord countered and threw a spell at an attacker to the left of the Black-siblings. "It's not as if you're actually better!"
Albus stopped for a moment and turned to look at them.
Sirius and Severus.
And they actually defended each other.
He had tried to get those two to work together.
He had tried - even forced them to shake hands… and yet, they had never shown any inclination to even be half-way civil to each other.
Well, they weren't really civil right now, but…
"Duck, you dunderhead! Have you ever heard about dodging or is that too hard to comprehend for your single brain cell?!"
"Ah, c'mon, potion-sniffler, stop complaining about me dodging and learn to shield! Honestly, do you even know the Protego or did you actually forget that lesson thanks to all those potion fumes you've been smelling throughout the years?!"
They worked together.
It wasn't perfect - wasn't perfect at all - but they were actually supporting each other instead of trying to kill the other while making it look like their opponents did it.
Regulus Black still situated at Sirius's back, meanwhile, could be seen rolling his eyes.
"You two are the worst!" he finally exclaimed when another round of sniping started. "Can't you just shut up and simply defend for a minute or two?!"
Which just ended in the other two shutting up for a second or two, before they turned on each other again.
Albus frowned, but then he saw Emrys-LeFay and Voldemort in the corner of his eyes and his attention returned to the danger Emrys-LeFay was in since the other Lord seemed to be inclined to taunt Voldemort.
He dismissed Sirius and Severus from his mind and stepped up towards Voldemort and Emrys-LeFay.
He watched them, watched Emrys-LeFay dodge, counter, and protect himself with an efficiency that Albus hadn't expected the young Lord to show at all.
At that moment, Emrys-LeFay shattered the sphere he was holding before.
Albus sucked in a breath.
He and his people had done everything to keep that information from Voldemort - and now, the young Lord had gone and revealed it by simply shattering it.
Albus expected to hear Trelawney speak up from the sphere, he expected Voldemort to laugh in triumph - and yet, nothing.
"I fear," Emrys-LeFay said. "I was here before you - and I took it and exchanged it just in case."
Albus stared at the younger man.
He knew that couldn't be it.
Nobody could take the prophecy but Harry and Voldemort.
He had it guarded, too.
And then, Emrys-LeFay smiled icily.
"I guess, playtime is up," he said.
And Albus hurried forward.
This was going too far.
He needed to stop this.
He knew that Voldemort couldn't die before Harry died and he knew that it would be worse if Voldemort died and turned into a spirit again.
If that happened, they would return to the stand-still they had been in for the last decade…
Voldemort landed on the floor.
And then Albus knew that he had to react.
He couldn't stand it anymore.
He needed to stop this.
He stepped in, turning his wand against the younger man and not the Dark Lord.
"Stop it!" He cried, while disarming the boy. "Stop it! This is insanity! You can't win against him! There's a prophecy! We have to abide by the proph-"
He was interrupted by Emrys-LeFay.
"We don't have to do anything," the young Lord snarled and then threw out his hand towards Albus.
Albus didn't expect the gesture to do anything.
He knew he had the boy's wand in his hand, so the boy was basically nothing more than an angry muggle right now.
So, naturally, Albus was stunned when instead of happening absolutely nothing, a force hit him and threw him backwards.
He raised his wand, ready to stun the young lord and stop him like that, but he was still in the upwards motion when the wand in his hand was ripped from his grip - and not just the Emrys-LeFay's wand, but his own as well.
The young Lord caught both.
His eyes sliding over Albus's wand for just a moment.
They darkened imperceptibly.
"You're not worthy of this," he seemed to say, his poisonous eyes meeting Albus's.
For a moment, some kind of magic seemed to linger in the air… as if something slowly but surely was turning Albus into stone.
The man pocketed Albus's wand.
"You're not worthy of it," he repeated aloud. "But it doesn't matter right now. I will deal with you later."
Albus wanted to step forward and stop the boy when he turned, but no matter how much he tried, he couldn't.
Voldemort.
The interaction between him and the boy had barely taken a few seconds, but he knew Voldemort was crafty.
He wanted to turn his head to look out for the dark lord.
He wanted to step forward and intercept in the upcoming battle between the boy and Voldemort again just to be sure that they wouldn't end up with Voldemort being less than a ghost again.
His body didn't follow his commands any longer, his skin suddenly more grey than pink… more stone than flesh.
The feeling of being turned into stone intensified.
Then, Voldemort used Emrys-LeFay's distraction and threw a curse at the boy, hitting him and throwing him backwards and the spell or whatever had happened, broke.
"PATER!"
Albus gasped.
His eyes followed Emrys-LeFay.
The man had landed on a chair and was now clinging to it.
His eyes were wide, but when someone in the shadows made a step towards him, he shook his head.
"Too late," Albus believed, was what Emrys-LeFay said.
There was an audible snarl in the air, but Albus was distracted.
Voldemort stood up, triumph in his eyes and his wand in his hand.
Albus tried to step forward.
He might have been forced to stop Emrys-LeFay, but he wasn't about to let Voldemort kill the other Lord.
So, Albus was prepared to step in and confront Voldemort until the Dark Lord was forced to flee, but before he could, someone grasped him in the neck.
"You know," a voice whispered in his ear, sounding angry and half-way towards grieving. "He might have been lenient with you. He might have been lenient to his own detriment. But I fear, I won't make the same mistake. Unlike Pater, I won't be."
At that, a dark-haired vampire stepped into Albus's vision.
His fangs gleamed.
"Let's see how you like it when you're the helpless one of a chance," the vampire said. "Let's see what people will say when you end up forgotten."
Albus opened his mouth.
The vampire's tear-shot eyes met his.
And then, a mind crashed into Albus's.
Albus was an Occlumens - one of the best in the whole world, but he had no chance.
The vampire's mind was like a crushing force, entering his own and overwhelming his shields.
Albus screamed.
And his shields shattered.
"Scream as much as you want," the vampire said, his voice full of fury. "Nobody will hear you - at least not for a very long time."
One moment, Sal was about to destroy Tom Riddle for the last time, the next Albus Dumbledore decided to step in and disarm him.
For a moment, Dumbledore drew his attention when he was forced to make sure that the man wouldn't stop him again.
His gaze, his attention, was on Dumbledore for just a second and the spell came at him too fast to dodge or react.
Because of course, Voldemort used that minuscule distraction to his advantage.
Sal was thrown through the air by a curse he hadn't been able to see or to block in time.
He was thrown against something hard.
His hands reached out to stabilize himself.
The next moment he knew that the worst thing that could have happened, had happened.
Wards that Sal wasn't prepared for reached for him and tore into him when they tried to connect with him without a proper ritual.
His magic objected, but the broken Hallowe'en ritual also started to play into the whole chaos of light and magic suddenly surrounding him.
Sal gasped, tried to let go of the stone beneath his hands, but found that he couldn't.
Magic swirled around him, turning his vision white thanks to the light coming with it.
"No," Sal gasped. "I'm not… I can't… no !"
This was the place he had tried to avoid for more than a thousand years. This was the place he had never wanted to take again - that he had rejected more than once.
But the magic around him was unforgiving.
"Heir," the magic whispered around him. "Lord… Prince… Pendragon… Heir…"
The throne .
He had fallen on the throne .
He had fallen on the throne which was warded against those that didn't belong to the royals of the land.
Fallen on a throne with wards that tied the throne to the land and to its people.
It was one of the most important artifacts of the magical world.
Once, it had been standing in the Great Hall of Camelot.
But now, with the government meeting in this Chamber, the throne, just like the obelisk, had taken their place here, where they belonged.
The throne was the conduct for the king to rule.
It was tied to the land.
Tied to the royal family.
And magic had called it to the Chamber the moment the government had first used this hall as the meeting place of their ruling body.
And Sal had landed on it.
Sal shuddered.
"No," he gasped, but the magic surrounding him was already tearing through him. "No, please, no!"
But the magic was unforgiving, unrelenting, unstoppable.
Sal could feel how the wards that were surrounding him reacted with the broken ritual magic within him.
The wards tying the throne to the land broke when they tried to adjust to a claiming without the proper ritual they normally needed.
A ritual, Sal had never had the intention of doing after the temporary one he had to do to rule in Arthur's stead which had been renounced long ago.
Nevertheless, the wards knew him and tried to adjust.
Instead, they broke when they started to interact with the broken ritual that was tied into Sal.
It made him gasp.
It hurt him, destroyed him from within.
Broken wards were deadly.
Everybody knew that.
There was barely an exception, but maybe it would have been for him.
Maybe, the wards, broken by his fall on the throne, might not have been deadly for him. He was heir, after all - the rightful successor of the last king. He was the one who should have taken the throne when Arthur died.
He was the one the wards, surrounding the throne that stopped people from taking it, were attuned to.
He might have rejected the throne, he might have ignored it, but it was still his.
But it wasn't just the wards on the throne that had broken.
Instead, the broken wards had connected to the broken Samhain ritual.
Magic reacted to magic.
Broken wards and broken ritual interacted, connected, turned something that might have killed him in a few months or might not have killed him at all into something that was deadly instantly.
Broken wards were deadly in their backlash, broken rituals were also deadly.
But while the first might have been survivable in this case for Sal, the combination clearly wasn't.
"I'm going to die," Sal realised in that moment. "I'm going to die today."
It was a startling and bitter realisation.
"It's Dumbledore's fault."
Sal knew that the old man hadn't wanted to do it.
He had intercepted, stopped Sal - and therefore stopped Sal from destroying Tom Riddle before his time was up.
And Sal's time was up now.
He could feel it.
The magic was tearing him apart.
His fall onto the throne had broken the wards surrounding it and the wards were reacting.
But Sal was the heir of the throne.
So, instead of activating the defensive wards, the wards had tried to draw him in without the usual ritual - which had broken them.
"PATER!"
The scream of his son ripped him out of his own agony for a moment.
His eyes met those of his son who was hurrying towards him, keeping himself close to the walls in the shadows to not be stopped.
His son.
Sal knew he should fight.
He didn't want to force his son to watch him die.
But there was nothing he could do.
"Too late," he whispered, his eyes trained on his son.
And Ana got it.
There was grief in his eyes when he realized what Sal was telling him.
Broken wards were deadly.
An interrupted ritual was deadlier.
And together, they were about to kill Sal now.
Sal hated it.
Sal hated the former Headmaster for it right now.
But he couldn't do anything about it anymore.
His strength was leaving him, his limbs trembled.
Then he gasped for air before he was forced to throw up.
Blood dripped down his chin, colouring his shirt red.
He could feel his strength and his power leaving him. His magic was fighting against the wards while at the same time trying to draw it in.
This was it.
This was his end.
And while Sal hated the fact that he hadn't been able to stop Tom Riddle and Dumbledore, he wasn't too put out that his life was ending right now.
For all that he wanted to fight, for all that he had reasons to live… there were reasons to die as well.
His atr was there.
His father was.
His mother was.
Père.
Mère.
His friends…
Godric.
Helga.
Rowena.
Peverell.
Móna.
Ralston.
Henry…
Hundreds and thousands of others.
They were all there, waiting for him, calling to him.
Blood dribbled down his chin.
It was over now.
Finally…
Maybe too early, but still finally …
He closed his eyes.
White light… no, white flames lit up the throne and the wards around him.
"So that's it, then?" a cold voice whispered in his mind. "That's it? Your whole work to end Tom Marvolo Riddle over the last decades are meaningless - your promises broken…"
Sal stiffened at that last exclamation.
Promises.
He had promised something.
He had promised a teen to keep him safe.
But with Tom Riddle still alive, that promise would be more than broken.
"I'm dying," he countered the words in his head. "There's nothing I can do anymore."
Not even get up and get away from the wards.
The wards had shackled him.
Bound him to the throne while killing him.
He couldn't feel his body anymore.
He could feel his magic leaving.
He could feel himself dying… for real, this time, there was no other way anymore.
"So be it," the voice countered.
It sounded ethereal.
It sounded like the wind.
Then darkness crashed down at Sal, trying to swallow him whole, triggering memories long since forgotten.
Dead people surrounded him.
Romans, Egyptians, Spartans, Greek, Celts, Germanic people as well as soldiers of different wars: Thirty Years' War, Hundred Years' War, Falklands War, Trojan War, First World War, Second World War… and many, many more…
His decision.
A stranger talking to him, giving him the chance to save his Oncle.
His decision.
London swamped with the plague and him being the only healer helping.
His decision.
A wound in his chest and him dying and dying and dying.
HIS decision.
An old man with white bushy hair and eyes of bright silver.
" I greet you, young one. You don't seem to be from here."
Flames and fury and no-no-no- NO !
Not like that! Not like that! Never like that!
The darkness tried to enter him, tried to consume him and destroy him.
Fury, hot and raging spread throughout his body.
Runes, written painstakingly ritual after ritual onto his body lit up in golden light.
White flames reached outwards to defend.
"No," Sal whispered, and his eyes opened, gleaming with a poisonous green. "I'm not your puppet!"
He wouldn't be taken and eradicated, forever lost to nothingness. Dying was one thing, returning to his dead loved ones was one thing - but he wouldn't cease to exist.
He couldn't do that to his loved ones.
Neither the living nor the dead.
Regulus still needed him.
Ana still wanted him.
And he wanted to see the dead again.
"I'm not your puppet!" He repeated, snarling the words into the darkness surrounding him.
The echo of laughter came back to him.
"Fight," the voice told him, more echo than real. "Just try and fight me. No matter what, you will succumb."
"Never!" Sal countered, the fire in his veins burning hotter and hotter. "Never!"
"You will," the other voice countered, the echo contorting the voice more and more with each word.
Then another voice merged with the echo - a voice Sal immediately recognized, even if he had heard it last more than a century ago.
" One day, the phoenix will be lost to the flames," the voices said - one of them the strange echoing one, the other one of Sal's grandmother . "One day the elf will be lost to his dreams - and the elder dragon, the dementor, and the basilisk will succumb to the beast inside them. This is how it should be."
"You will succumb," the stranger's voice added. "It doesn't matter when; it doesn't matter where. Someday, you will."
Sal shivered and for a moment, the darkness gained strength, reaching for him, entering him.
"One day the phoenix is lost to the flames," his mind echoed the words of the stranger… of his grandmother. "And the basilisk will lose to the beast."
" One day," his grandmother's voice in his memory added. " You will have to fight the beast inside you as well. "
The darkness entered him, reaching deep inside him, for his heart… for his soul .
"You're my beast," Sal whispered, finally understanding after all those years of fighting. "You've always been my beast."
Laughter echoed all around him.
"You don't have a beast," the voice corrected him. "But I'm the next best thing. Like the beast is the counter to the basilisk, like the flame is the heart of the phoenix - I am your counter… I am your heart !"
That confession alone was enough for Sal to cease his struggling for a second - one second too long.
The darkness struck.
One moment, Sal was still fighting against the darkness that was ever-growing inside him, the next, he was lost to it.
His heart, his magic, his soul, succumbing to the one thing he had tried to fight.
The darkness reached his heart and entered it.
Pain like he had never felt before swamped him.
His fire turned into ash.
His vivid green eyes broke.
His body crumbled.
And his soul…
Sal could feel his soul fraying.
It wasn't just dying but creasing to exist.
"I'm still needed," the thought shot through his dizzy mind. "I can't leave yet. Reg… Reg needs me. Ana… Ana wants me…"
He was their tether.
Reg might be about to find other tethers out there, but he wasn't ready to let go, yet…
Ana might have others out there, but he wanted Sal all the same…
Still needed…
Still wanted…
And not yet ready to be lost to the beast inside him.
With that thought, the fire ignited again.
Ashes turned into burning flames.
Flames turned into an inferno.
He reopened his eyes.
In front of the throne stood Voldemort.
He had his wand raised, clearly about to kill Sal - to finish him off just like he promised.
Just behind him, Ana was standing, about to intercept and kill him before he could kill Sal.
And Sal could let him.
But Voldemort was aiming at him and no matter how much he knew Ana wouldn't grief after killing Voldemort, Sal still didn't want Ana to have Voldemort's blood on his hands.
Voldemort opened his mouth.
"Oh, no, you won't," Sal said.
Blood dribbled down his chin, blood-shot green eyes met red ones.
The flames inside Sal burned hotter and hotter.
The throne surrounding him, the wards of the throne, everything around him, caught fire.
Voldemort's eyes widened.
Sal leaned forward.
He could feel the power of the land coursing through his veins.
He stood, white flames burning his flesh and keeping him connected to the burning throne.
The wards - twisted and deadly - curling around him, burning him.
He was the son of a phoenix.
He was the son of a basilisk.
He was the son of Pendragon.
The eternal Prince.
The Immortal Prince.
A crownless king on a burning throne.
"Tom Marvolo Riddle," his voice was many and sizzling with flames.
"You have committed crimes against this land."
Thousands of deaths.
War.
Destruction.
Torture and racism.
A flaming ribbon of white shot from the throne, stopping the curse that Voldemort fired and broke the Dark Lord's wand in the next instance.
"You have committed crimes against magic."
Line-theft.
Theft of magic and title.
Discrimination.
Obliteration of bloodlines.
Inferi.
Another ribbon of green fire shot towards him, binding the dark lord before he could move and avoid it.
"You committed crimes against life."
Murders.
Rituals.
Horcruxes.
Resurrection.
A third flaming ribbon of silver reached for the dark lord.
Together with the first which had lain in waiting, it wrapped itself up around him.
Sal could feel the flames burning in his bones.
He could feel the ribbons binding the man in front of him.
He could feel said man's panic through the bindings.
And he could feel his strength leaving.
But it didn't matter.
He knew what to do.
"Tom Marvolo Riddle," he said and his voice echoed through the Chamber.
The fighting stopped, forcefully coming to an end.
He was king.
A crownless king.
A king for a moment, and yet, still a king.
"You are judged guilty for your crimes."
The bindings of white, green, and silver flames lit up.
"You are cast out of the land, for you have wronged it."
Voldemort shuddered.
"You have been cast out of magic's grace, for you have wronged it."
Sal's eyes lit up with white flames.
They looked like stars.
Like stars in the last moment before they died.
Undefinable, beautiful, and deadly.
"You are guilty of crimes against life."
The bindings of Voldemort lit up and Sal could feel him desperately grasp for his Horcruxes just to find them gone.
The Dark Lord's eyes widened in fear.
"For that, your life will be the price."
And with that, the white flames burned them both.
Sal could feel the binding snapping.
He could feel Voldemort's body turning to ash.
He could feel Voldemort's soul departing.
And for a moment, he thought about his son.
He thought about Reg.
About Sirius.
About his Oncle Nick.
About Luna, Neville and Ron.
About the Weasleys, Severus and Hermione.
He didn't want to die.
There were still people alive - people who he would miss.
People who would be forced to fight even when he was gone.
He didn't want to die!
He was still needed…
Still wanted…
And not yet ready to be lost to the beast inside him.
Not ready to be lost to the flames.
With that thought, the fire burned even hotter.
White flames turned into an inferno.
And then, reality around him shattered - before spitting him out at another place, a place that Sal knew, yet had never entered like that before.
Sal looked around.
He was back at Hogwarts - a Hogwarts with unusual light and empty walls, but still Hogwarts, nevertheless.
"So… I'm finally dead?" He asked himself, looking around in interest.
"Is that what you wish, my balance?" Another wind-like voice answered him and Sal turned around to see a man walking towards him. The man was looking a lot like Peverell, a lot like Sal himself.
Black wild hair and pale but bright, silvery eyes.
It was the man whose voice Sal had been fighting against.
It was the man Sal had fought against more than once.
And just like before, Sal recognized him… or at least what he represented.
"Death," he said, and the other man crooked his head.
"That's what I've been called, my balance," the wind whispered, caressing Sal's hair. Now, that Sal could see the man, he could see that the wind had its origin in the man himself.
Sal closed his eyes tiredly.
He had been struggling against Death.
His beast, hidden inside him, had been Death .
Maybe, there was a reason why Sal hadn't been able to win, in the end.
Maybe, there was a reason for giving up instead of continuing his fruitless struggles.
Suddenly, the rest of Sal's defiance left him, leaving him tired and worn out and plainly exhausted.
"So, it truly was Death who stood by my side for centuries," Sal finally said, tiredness in his voice, and Sal was not able to hide it anymore.
The Plague.
Oncle Nick's accident.
Regulus's rescue.
And so many more instances.
"You are my balance, child," Death answered softly. "Of course, I stood by you. I stood by you since the moment you were born, since the moment you decided to accept the son of a basilisk as your father, since the moment you mastered my hallows without ever touching them."
Sal opened his eyes at that to stare at the pitch-black eyes of Death in front of him.
"Why?" He asked tiredly. "Why me? Why not somebody else? Anybody else?"
Death reached out to him and touched his face softly, regret in his eyes.
"It was never my decision, my balance," Death said. "It could have been anybody, everybody - it was your own decision that made sure you are the one."
Sal frowned.
"I don't understand," he whispered. "I never decided anything in that regard…"
Death just raised an eyebrow.
"Didn't you?" He asked. "Weren't you the one who refused me when I reached out for you for the first time?"
"It was my mother who refused you, who shielded me from you," Sal pointed out.
"And yet, all she managed to do was give you a choice - you were the one who chose. You were the one who refused to die," Death said amused.
Sal just shook his head.
"I can't remember," he said bitterly. "I can't even remember deciding to go back to the living back then."
"It doesn't matter," Death replied. "You decided it, and that's all that matters."
"Even if I decided," Sal countered tiredly. "It shouldn't have been enough to give me the place you see me in."
"It wasn't," Death assured him. "Not one of your adventures were. It doesn't matter how often you refused me; it doesn't matter how often you encountered me - you weren't what you are until you decided to send yourself to your destiny."
Sal closed his eyes again.
"So, the time-travel…"
"The one decision that led you to the path you're on right now," Death replied. "But not the reason for your place as my balance - not entirely, at last."
Sal opened his eyes again to glare at the being in front of him.
"What else was it that led me here?" He asked unhappily. "What else was it that bound me to you as the one to balance you?"
Death shrugged.
"It would be easier to ask what didn't," Death said. "You are the true owner of the Hallows - the one who ripped them out of the hands of your brother without ever touching them. You refused them, but part of them was always bound to you."
Sal's eyes widened at that.
"You are the impossible," Death continued. "You have no beginning and no true end. You were never born in the past, and yet one of its most important actors all along. It was certainly what you will do long before you were even born, yet it was your own free will that decided your path in life. As I said: You are the impossible. Always there, always existing without a true beginning, without a true end."
"I'm not the only one who ever looped in time!" Sal objected heatedly.
"But you are the only one who's been reborn millennia before your birth as the grandson of the one being who nearly succeeded in killing you."
Sal looked at Death in confusion.
"I… I don't understand-"
"The basilisk," Death replied. "She went after you in your second year because you were her grandson - but at the same time, back then you weren't her grandson as well. She bit you, tried to kill you and with her venom in your veins you went back in time and were reborn as the grandson the basilisk already knew you were."
Sal stared at the being in front of him.
"What happens if the descendant of the basilisk survives its bite?" He asked with dread in his voice. "What happened to me when grandfather healed me and atr birthed me as his child?"
Death touched Sal's face with his other hand to pull the younger man towards him and kiss his forehead.
Sal knew he should resist, but something inside him refused to do so and went willingly with Death's caress.
"It goes against the order of the world," Death whispered. "But then, you are of my blood - you were born as the one thing that goes against nature. The child of Death, and yet alive."
"But I'm not your child," Sal objected. "I'm one of your descendants. I'm far enough removed that it shouldn't count anymore…"
"Yet, you are the impossible - a being going against its very own nature in order to exist," Death said while caressing Sal's hair. "You are the one who shouldn't have survived, and yet you did because you had to. You are the one who shouldn't have lived, and yet, you were born because you had to for the world you know to exist. You, my balance, my unusual child, are the son of the basilisk - born to her venom and the blood of her son - yet it was your decision to take up your destiny."
Sal wanted to object to Death, he desperately wanted to deny every word he heard out of the other being's mouth, but he couldn't.
A mindless basilisk was bound to go after its children and grandchildren and kill them; not even one of them ever survived - and yet, Sal had.
The heir to the throne of Britain - and the heir that shouldn't exist.
Arthur's first near-death and survival.
Exccaliebor, Excalibur, later known as Godric's sword.
Not one of those things could or would have happened without Salvazsahar - and yet, Sal shouldn't have existed because the child or grandchild of a basilisk died when bitten by the mindless beast…
A child needed two parents to come into being - and yet, all that Sal had was a father when he was reborn millennia ago.
The Founding of Hogwarts - without him impossible.
The Chamber of Secrets and the Room of Requirements.
The birth of Rowena's son and her daughter Helena - Sal's Helily.
Not one of those things could or would have existed without Salvazsahar, and yet, it should have been impossible for him to exist considering that his parents, everything that ensured his existence was in the future - and while he wasn't the only one, he was the only one who decided to live the whole circle, the only one who decided to live and not to die while trying to return to the future… The only one who found the home he didn't have here far back in the past - a past that led to his existence.
People died when hit with the killing curse - and yet, Sal survived to tell the tale.
The Deathly Hallows were his, yet not in his possession.
The lost history of Hogwarts.
Ekrizidis and Paracelsus.
Every important event was riddled with Sal's interference, was riddled with Sal's magic and beliefs. It should have been impossible - and yet, here he was and existed in spite of it being impossible anyway…
He was the Master of the Deathly Hallows long before even touching one of them by killing his own brother…
The grandchild of a basilisk - yet born without a beast sleeping in his soul.
St. Mungo's existence.
His fight against Grindelwald and Voldemort.
Anastasius.
He was the impossible - the being whose existence went against nature itself while being part of its creation.
Sal stared at Death, his eyes bitter and at the same time begging.
"Why me?" He asked desperately. "Why me and nobody else?"
Death caressed Sal's face lovingly.
"Because you promised yourself to me long before you were even born," he said smiling. "Because you cannot stand by and watch them suffer, because you are of my blood and yet were fighting me on every turn. Because the monster hidden in your soul, woken and killed by the basilisk isn't just one of the immortal Firbolg - it is the descendant of the first grim, the one who is only bound by my laws and nobody else's."
A single tear ran down Sal's cheek when he heard Death's answer.
"So, this is it?" He asked bitterly. "This is my life? This is my death? Forever bound to you if I wish it or not? Forever alive, yet wishing to die and see those I love again?"
Death's nearly skeletal looking thumb removed Sal's tears lovingly.
"No, my balance," Death said. "This was your life until the moment you reached your entrance point in time. If you wish so, I will remove every memory of your life in the past. You have done your part, so if you want to, I can give you the freedom of living your life like you would have without the time-loop. If you wish it, I will reorder time, back to the second you encountered the Dementors, locking away everything you were, everything you could be until the end of time."
Sal looked into Death's pale, silvery eyes, silently weeping.
"So, this is what I can choose?" He asked Death. "A life without my memories from the past, a life where I will forever be Harry James Potter, unloved and ordinary - or a life as your counterpart, your balance, forever trapped beyond the veil, never seeing those I loved again after they died? This is my choice?"
He freed himself from Death's grip and stepped back, fire in his eyes.
"Am I not allowed to finally move on?" He asked desperately. "Haven't I earned the right to pass on and see those I love again? Haven't I finally suffered enough?"
Death just looked at him impassively.
"Won't you hate yourself when you have to sit by and see the world lose itself to the abyss just because you chose the easy way out?" Death countered coolly. "Won't you hate yourself when you have to sit by and watch the others fight and failing to win, watching those who die whose lives are currently in limbo?"
Sal stared at Death, shaken to the core.
He knew what Death wasn't saying.
Just because he had killed a dark lord, it didn't mean that the fight was over.
He knew that more than one of Voldemort's followers was still fighting and would continue to do so.
He knew where the magical world was heeded if nothing changed.
He knew that chances were high that people like Fudge would keep their power if nobody opposed them.
And he knew that no matter what else, Ana, Sirius, Oncle Nick, and Reg still wanted him…
"If you can endure it, if you won't feel regret, then yes, I will allow you to give up your burden by simply moving on," Death continued. "Like I said before: You have done your duty, you have balanced me for millennia - if you want to stop now, I won't object.
"I will even aid you if that's what you want. So, if you don't want to live out your life as Harry James Potter and don't want to continue as my balance, then I will allow you to die just this once!
"But know this: I know you, and I know that you will regret that you simply chose to die the moment you understand who else will have to die just because of your decision!"
Reg.
Ana.
Sirius.
Ron and Hermione.
Luna.
Neville.
Severus…
This time, Sal couldn't even think about objecting to Death. He hated it, but he knew that Death was right. He would hate to watch others suffer while knowing that he could have helped them if he just had chosen to return…
"So, it's either to forget everything I am, everything I was, and return to being the innocent fifteen-year-old I have been all those centuries ago - or being forced to live for forever, always alone, always by myself?" Sal asked bitterly.
"Not quite," Death replied. "But essentially not wrong as well."
Sal closed his eyes while another tear slit down his cheek.
"Where am I wrong?" He asked and didn't stop Death when the being reached out for him again to rub away his tears.
The answer was a soft smile from the being in front of him.
"I am Death," Death said. "I can't return the dead to the living. Those who enter my realm will always be bound to it."
"And yet you tell me you can give me the choice of returning to the innocent fifth-year-student I was before all this started," Sal replied bitterly. "If you can't meddle with the living, how can you return me to a time like that?"
Death just caressed Sal's face again.
"You won't have any reason to die if you don't wander into the past," Death pointed out. "By removing your memory of that time from you and everybody else, you won't have lived your life like you did throughout the last year - and therefore you won't have any reason to die. Don't take me wrong, we will meet again far sooner than anyone else would think of - but I am willing not to take you to me for another seven decades as a payment for your services."
"So, I would live not even half the life I should live if one looked at my ancestry," Sal said tiredly. "And my life would be riddled with the innocent I have long since lost in the past."
He sneered at that thought, but Death shook his head.
"You've long since lost your innocence," Death said. "I can't return you as an innocent fifteen-year-old. If I truly return you, you will have to suffer at least one tragic loss, you will have to suffer pain hardship, and betrayal. You aren't innocent anymore, and your soul wouldn't accept a return to the innocence you once held."
Sal's breathing hitched.
"So, death is in my future - whatever I choose?"
"I am Death, my balance," Death said. "Whatever you choose - it won't change the fact that you are born to my line. You will forever be bound to me in one way or another."
Sal closed his eyes and nodded his acceptance.
"So, this is my choice," he said bitterly. "A half-life one way or another - or a death with regrets for eternity?"
Death inclined his head slowly.
"More or less," he said. "Yes, this is your decision. The only one I can give you. I am sorry, my balance."
Your decision.
Those words stopped Sal dead in his tracks.
Your decision.
In Sal's mind, dead bodies were suddenly surrounding him and the wind… no, Death… was forcing him to decide for or against a life.
YOUR decision.
It was Sal's decision.
It had always been Sal's decision.
Sal felt dizzy when his mind finally connected the dots he hadn't seen before.
His eyes snapped up to look Death into his face, searching his face for the answer Sal had just found in his words.
Death returned his gaze.
No.
Death was watching him.
His eyes looked hooded and Sal closed his eyes at the gaze of the other.
"My decision," Sal said, partly in understanding, partly in repeating what Death had told him before.
"Yes," Death agreed calmly. "It's yours. I can't influence you when it comes to it."
Those words… a shudder ran down Sal's back.
It was Sal's decision.
His choice.
Live or die.
End or beginning.
Continuation or a sudden stop.
Sal turned his eyes away, not mentally able to return eye-contact under the calm gaze of Death and the revelation he was ringing with.
For a moment, Sal looked over Death's shoulder towards the window and Hogwarts's grounds, his gaze more far away and unseeing than actually taking in what he was looking at.
"Why all this?" He finally asked. "Why drag me in the past? Why keep me alive? Why…?"
He stopped, shook his head, and looked at the other man.
"Why not simply come to me in person? Why not simply talk to me?" He watched Death. "You had a body once. I remember the memories I dreamed of fourteen years ago. I remember the deal you made with… well, your father, I guess. A body for you. A lifetime of not remembering who you are so that your parents had their child, and a grandchild - and after that, a body for you and two children as your own descendants. You had a body once. Why not come to me?"
Death watched him calmly while Sal started to question his decision to ask for clarification.
But it was needed.
He might have been talking with Death, but that didn't explain why Death had never gone and approached him directly in the past.
Why hadn't Death told him what he needed from Sal?
Why hadn't Death come and influenced Sal?
Why hadn't Death simply claimed Sal as his own child and raised him for the role Death wanted him to play?
Why the distance?
The deception?
Why the resemblance of freedom that Death wanted Sal to give up now?
The answer was unexpected, and not something Sal would have thought of.
"I had a body once," Death finally agreed when Sal stopped talking. "But I'm Death… and you needed time, time to grow and leave the equivalent of your toddler's stage."
A childhood.
Freedom.
The right to grow into his own person.
All that and more Sal could hear in those simple sentences of Death, directed at him.
"Why?" Sal couldn't help repeating.
Why care about Sal when they never met and weren't bound in an emotional way beyond Sal's oaths and the fact that Death seemed to need him?
"Why?" the question was more whispered than spoken, more thought than word.
Silver eyes met green.
The silver eyes were pale, yet bright; there was black, wild hair surrounding a face with features similar enough to Sal's to show their relation - and then Death's face started to age, his hair started to grey until it was wild and white.
His face turned wrinkled.
Sal started.
"I gave you time. I took on a name and turned myself into a legend so that you had time to grow and find your footing. I turned myself into the First Grim to give you time. I took on your duties on top of my own," pale eyes watched the green ones widen. "I ensured myself that you were cared for and only left to let you live your life when I was sure. I gave my children life and gave them centuries to live as well."
Sal drunk in the face in front of him.
A face that shared part of his features and yet, those features were hidden by age.
"I stopped living when my children were still children in my eyes and yet they were finally at a time they were willing to grow to adults," Death said. "I left them when they met their other halves and were willing to give up their childhood to be able to age with them…"
Rowena had met Godric.
Peverell Helga.
"And I gave my son responsibility when he was old enough to be burdened by it," serious eyes returned Sal's gaze while comprehension bloomed in Sal's eyes. "I did everything I could to give you time, to let you grow like I let my children grow, time and time, again."
Green eyes searched silver ones.
There was understanding and grief deeply hidden inside those.
Even Death had loved his children.
Children he had bargained for.
Children he had raised and then let go so that they could find their own way in life.
So that they could die.
"Even when you finally took over your duties in full, I still ensured that you didn't feel forced," Death added. "The past was for you. You lived for yourself, just like I wanted. I can't give you the same consideration this time around. This time, you actually have to decide, once and for all. There's no way around it. I can't deceive you any longer, I can't put off my claim to you any longer."
Silver eyes bore into green ones.
"My son always knew the burden I was carrying. He agreed to help me when he and his sister settled down for their fifth and final time - and he knew who you were when he met you just thirty years later."
Sal frowned.
"He… Peverell… Rowena… weren't that old," he said nearly quietly.
"Older than you knew," Death corrected gently. "Centuries older. Far older than Godric and Helga LeFay knew."
Which told Sal of secrets both Rowena and Peverell had kept tightly to their chests… like Sal had always done with his own.
It was a startling thought to find kindred souls in that regard centuries after he had lost them.
The children of a thunderbird and the First Grim.
No, the children of a thunderbird and Death in mortal form.
Death smiled sadly at Sal.
"This time, it's your decision, godson of mine," he said. "What will you decide?"
Sal closed his eyes, the tiredness back and a crushing weight on his shoulders.
He was exhausted.
He was done.
But… someone needed him. Someone wanted him…
He shook his head and forced those thoughts away.
"Ollivanneder," he said, his tongue twisting around words he had believed forgotten a long time ago for the first time in millennia.
The name of his first godfather.
The name that had been Death's once.
A name, Death had been given through the deal with the current Ollivander family when he saved them from extinction before they could even become known by their name.
"I'm not sure I can decide."
Death looked at him calmly and surely.
"You can," he answered. "You've shown me that you are strong enough to do what is needed. Now, you simply have to do what you want. Decide. There is no right or wrong, just you and your decision."
Your decision.
Sal's decision.
It had always been Sal's decision… and oddly enough, there wasn't anything to think about it when it came to it.
It was Sal's decision - a decision he had already decided on a long time ago.
There was no choice anymore, just the act of accepting the chosen path.
Sal closed his eyes.
A single tear slid down his cheek.
"May the world forgive me," he whispered. "But there's just one way I can choose to travel…"
And Hogwarts around him lit up like the night sky with thousands and thousands of stars before it dissolved.
I hope you liked it.
By the way, this is NOT the end of the story, there are still some chapters left, so don't worry about me leaving you hanging with an ending like that… ^^'
' Till next time.
Halyx
…
Omake:
…
What Ana Would Have Loved To Do
…
Albus tried to step forward.
He might have been forced to stop Emrys-LeFay, but he wasn't about to let Voldemort kill the other Lord.
So, Albus was prepared to step in and confront Voldemort until the Dark Lord was forced to flee, but before he could, someone grasped him in the neck.
The grip was unrelenting and harder than necessary.
"You know," a voice whispered in his ear, sounding angry and half-way towards grieving. "He might have been lenient with you. He might have been lenient to his own detriment. But I fear, I won't make the same mistake. Unlike Pater, I won't be."
At that, a dark-haired vampire stepped into Albus's vision.
The fangs gleamed.
It would be the last thing, Albus would ever see in his life.
Later, he would be found dead in one of the corners of the battlefield. The examination would show that he died of a heart attack in the middle of the battle. No one could have stopped his death - even if he hadn't suffered it while the battle was raging all around him.
…
Sadly, he was too much like his Pater to actually do it. ;-)