I pressed again.
The black fire twitched.
No more than before.
A few centimeters.
Maybe six.
The structure tightened and began returning to its original position.
I let go.
The flames closed the gap.
I stood in front of them for a moment.
I was not looking at the fire.
I was looking at the spell.
That was my problem.
I had been trying to move too much.
The wall of fire was several meters tall.
I did not need several meters.
I needed a passage.
I looked from the floor to the height of my own shoulders.
That much.
No more.
"Alright."
Death's Sight sharpened the structure.
I did not try to understand everything.
Conditions.
The potion.
Anchors.
I did not care about them.
Yet.
I found the section responsible for the space occupied by the flame.
Then I narrowed the pressure.
Not:
Move.
Too much.
More like:
You.
A small section of black fire trembled.
I pressed.
Sideways.
The flame yielded.
Five centimeters.
Ten.
Stopped.
I frowned.
Pressed harder.
Fifteen.
The structure began to tense.
But differently than before.
Less.
Much less.
"Ah."
Of course.
For the past several minutes, I had been trying to move a magical wall from floor to ceiling when I was barely a meter and a half tall.
Brilliant.
I let go.
The fire returned.
I tried again.
This time the section was even smaller.
Maybe thirty centimeters wide.
From the floor to the height of my head.
I pressed.
The fire moved aside faster.
Ten.
Fifteen.
Twenty.
My left eye stung faintly.
I ignored it.
Twenty-five.
The gap was real now.
Not enough.
But real.
I let go.
The fire snapped shut again.
I was breathing a little faster.
Not much.
I wiped my hand against my robes.
My fingers were damp.
Sweat.
Good.
Only sweat.
I looked at the black wall.
This was easier.
Not easy.
Easier.
The difference mattered.
I did not have to overpower the entire spell.
I did not have to be stronger than Snape.
I only had to force a small part of his spell to exist somewhere else for a few seconds.
That was...
Considerably more reasonable.
Which naturally meant I should have thought of it earlier.
I pressed again.
I did not know how much time passed.
Two minutes.
Five.
Maybe less.
Time had an irritating habit of refusing to behave normally in situations like this.
The gap appeared.
Widened.
Returned.
Each time a little faster.
Each time a little wider.
Thirty centimeters.
Thirty-two.
Thirty-five.
Then resistance.
Always around the same point.
It was not ordinary strength.
The spell seemed to recognize that it had been moved too far from its own state and tried to restore itself.
The greater the change, the harder it pulled back.
With a small movement, it almost cooperated.
With a larger one, the fight began.
Interesting.
I tried moving only the upper section.
The fire yielded.
Easily.
The lower section.
Even easier.
Both at once.
More expensive.
Not linearly.
I frowned.
"That's unfair."
The fire did not answer.
Typical.
I tried again.
This time, I did not create a perfect rectangle.
There was no need.
Shoulders.
Torso.
Hips.
Narrower around the legs.
The passage looked more like a badly cut-out silhouette than a doorway.
The cost dropped again.
I almost smiled.
It was absurd.
And it worked.
The gap reached maybe forty centimeters.
I could squeeze through.
Probably.
If I held it long enough.
And if the fire did not close on me halfway through.
That part mattered.
I let go.
The fire returned.
My left eye throbbed.
Harder.
I closed it for a second.
Opened it.
My vision was normal.
Good.
Again.
I pressed.
The flame moved.
Ten centimeters.
Twenty.
Thirty.
And then something changed.
Not in the spell.
In me.
The pressure was still there.
But before, it had felt as though I were pushing something with my hand.
Now it felt like doing exactly the same thing after dozens of repetitions.
The mechanism still worked.
My body was simply beginning to protest.
I felt a pulse behind the eye.
Then a dull ache at my temple.
The gap stopped.
Thirty-seven centimeters.
I pressed harder.
The pain sharpened.
The fire moved one centimeter.
Then another.
Something warm gathered at the corner of my eye.
I let go immediately.
Not out of good judgment.
I checked with a finger.
Red.
Of course.
I looked at the blood.
Then at the flames.
Maybe Pomfrey had not been exaggerating quite that much.
Annoying.
I wiped my finger on my sleeve.
I should wait.
Hermione was already coming back with help.
Dumbledore might be in the castle.
McGonagall was in the castle.
Snape was in the castle.
Harry...
Something struck stone on the other side.
I froze.
Not loudly.
A dull sound.
Then something that might have been a scream.
"Harry?"
Nothing.
I moved closer.
"Harry!"
Silence.
Wonderful.
Absolutely wonderful.
I looked at the fire.
My left eye burned.
Of course it did.
The right side of my face was completely fine.
At least one of them was behaving sensibly.
Then my right eye saw something through the flames.
Not normally.
A trace.
I stopped breathing.
Fresh.
So fresh that for a moment I did not understand what I was looking at.
Then I remembered the unicorn.
A residue forming.
The moment an event stopped happening and became a trace left behind.
Except this time, there was no silver body in a forest clearing.
There was a wall of black fire.
And behind it, something was dying.
A human.
I could not see the body.
I did not need to.
The trace was beginning to settle.
Ragged.
Brutal.
Full of pain.
And something was wrong with it.
Not the death itself.
Something had been intertwined with that person before.
I could see the empty space left by a presence.
As if two things had occupied almost the same place for a long time...
...and now one had been violently torn away.
No.
Fled.
I froze.
Quirrell.
Voldemort.
Something on the other side had just ended.
And Harry was not answering.
The structure of Snape's spell suddenly seemed much less interesting.
"Alright."
I opened my left eye wider.
It hurt.
I did not care.
I found the section of the structure.
Not all of it.
Just the passage.
My passage.
I pressed.
Sideways.
The fire yielded.
Ten centimeters.
Twenty.
Thirty.
The pain appeared almost immediately.
I did not stop.
Thirty-five.
Blood ran down my cheek.
Forty.
The structure strained.
More.
The fire tried to return.
I pressed harder.
Do not break apart.
Do not go out.
Do not stop existing.
Just:
Move.
Forty-two.
Enough.
Probably.
I did not have time for measurements.
I turned sideways.
One hand against the wall.
One leg forward.
The flames rippled only a few centimeters from my face.
Heat struck my skin.
Not ordinary heat.
Magic.
I did not want to find out what it would do without the potion.
I moved.
First shoulder.
Head.
Torso.
The spell jerked.
The gap narrowed.
"No."
I pressed.
Pain tore through my left eye.
The fire moved back.
I squeezed my hips through.
My robes brushed the flames.
The fabric hissed.
I pulled harder.
One leg.
The other.
I let go.
The black fire slammed shut behind me.
I dropped to one knee.
For several seconds, I looked only at the floor.
Stone.
Good.
Stone was simple.
Stone did not require analysis.
I wiped my face.
Blood.
Not much.
More than before.
My left eye could see.
Slightly blurred.
Acceptable.
I stood.
Only then did I look ahead.
The Mirror stood at the end of the chamber.
The same one.
Erised.
For a moment, it was what drew my attention.
Then I saw Harry.
He was lying on the floor.
I moved.
I did not think.
I did not look at anything else.
I knelt beside him.
"Harry."
No response.
A hand to his neck.
Pulse.
Fast.
But there.
Breathing.
There.
Relief came before I could stop it.
"Good."
He did not answer.
Ungrateful.
I checked for blood.
Nothing obvious.
He was unconscious.
But alive.
Only then did I look at the other body.
Quirrell.
He lay several meters away.
Not moving.
I did not need to check his pulse.
Death's Sight was already telling me enough.
He was dead.
A trace was forming around him.
Human.
The first I had ever seen this fresh.
The unicorn had been simpler.
Not weaker.
Simpler.
Here, everything overlapped.
Fear.
Pain.
Magic.
Panic.
Violence.
And that strange emptiness.
The place where Voldemort had been.
I watched.
Only for a moment.
Then another moment.
Harry was breathing.
Quirrell was not.
That was enough of an excuse.
I stood.
Took one step closer.
The trace was thickening.
Not like a ghost.
Not a soul.
At least not a whole one.
Something left behind by the event.
By a person.
But around the head and upper body, the structure was completely disrupted.
Two magics.
No.
More.
Quirrell.
Voldemort.
Contact with Harry.
Something else.
Everything torn apart within seconds.
I leaned slightly closer.
With my right eye, I could see more.
Quirrell's trace remained.
The other presence did not.
But its departure had left a shape.
Absence could be information too.
Interesting.
Very.
I took another step.
"Mr. Peverell."
I stopped.
Damn.
I turned my head.
Dumbledore stood at the entrance.
I had not heard him pass through the fire.
I did not like that.
His gaze moved over me.
Blood beneath the eye.
Quirrell.
Harry.
Then returned to Harry.
"He's alive," I said.
Dumbledore was beside him almost immediately.
He did not run.
He simply covered the distance faster than a man his age should have.
He crouched.
His wand appeared in his hand.
Several diagnostic spells.
I did not recognize half of them.
Harry did not react.
Dumbledore touched his forehead.
Then his wrist.
Only after several seconds did some of the tension leave his shoulders.
"Yes," he said quietly. "He is."
He looked at me.
"And you?"
"Also alive."
His gaze settled on my left eye.
"Technically."
He did not comment.
That was worse than a comment.
Dumbledore looked toward Quirrell.
His expression changed only slightly.
Enough.
"Voldemort left him," I said.
Dumbledore looked at me.
"Yes."
"Before he died."
This time, he watched me longer.
I did not like that look.
Too calm.
Too focused.
"How do you know?"
I looked at Quirrell.
The trace was still settling into place.
"Because he isn't there anymore."
Silence.
Dumbledore did not look where I was looking.
He looked at me.
That was irritating too.
"Mr. Peverell."
"Hm?"
"This is not the place for that conversation."
"It's becoming a popular place to postpone conversations."
The corner of his mouth moved almost imperceptibly.
I was not sure whether that was amusement.
It probably should not have been.
Dumbledore lifted Harry.
Without effort.
Or with magic.
Difficult to tell.
Then his gaze shifted behind me.
To the black fire.
And stopped.
I looked too.
The wall was perfect.
Even.
Calm.
Exactly as before.
Dumbledore looked at my bloodied eye.
Then back at the flames.
"Miss Granger returned with the potion."
"Yes."
"She told me you remained behind."
"Also true."
A brief pause.
Dumbledore looked at me.
"Yet here you are."
Right.
"Apparently."
For a moment, neither of us said anything.
I had no intention of explaining.
Apparently, he had no intention of asking.
Yet.
That word was doing far too much work again.
Dumbledore headed toward the exit.
"Come."
I looked at Quirrell.
The trace was still fresh.
Still changing.
In another few minutes, it might look different.
Maybe I would see more.
Maybe—
"Mr. Peverell."
I sighed.
"Coming."
I walked over to Dumbledore.
Stopped before the black fire.
Looked at it.
Then at Dumbledore.
"How are you going to—"
He flicked his wand.
The black fire parted.
All of it.
From floor to ceiling.
Without effort.
Without blood.
Without trembling.
It simply moved aside.
I stared.
Dumbledore looked at me.
"Something wrong?"
"No."
I walked through the passage.
"Absolutely nothing."
We passed through.
The flames returned behind us.
I looked back at them once more.
Perfectly even.
As if they had never moved.
Annoying.
I knew they had.