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The Dust of Water	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 20632 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story.

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Chapter Forty-Three—A Maze of Mirrors

            Kelvin was in the lead. He saw Harry and lifted his hand with a faint smile. “I thought you might be one of the first who came to meet us, Mr. Potter.” He reached out and casually kicked one of the strings of copper bells out of the way.

            Harry kept his hands relaxed. He knew that his friends and Draco could only come to help him if they were at the right points in the ritual. Otherwise, they would be bound by the conditions of the choices they had made before.

            On the other side, there was the sharp humming of the Elder Wand in his hand, and there were two figures behind Kelvin. Fewer than he had feared, more than he’d hoped. He stood and waited.

            Kelvin took a vial from one pocket and casually began to juggle it. Green light shone through the glass, brightening rapidly, with a yellow edge to the glow that picked up and grew bright enough that Harry had to squint.

            “You asked me once about battle potions,” Kelvin said casually. “I could never make them fast enough for you. Or perhaps uncomplicated enough. You wanted potions anyone could use in battle, and that could be used at any time.” He smiled with what seemed to be genuine amusement. “Which meant you, of course. I know you were always…unsophisticated in Potions theory. That might be the polite way to put it.”

            The hooded figures began to spread out, one on either side of Kelvin. Harry kept his attention mostly on Kelvin, but spared a little for them.

            “Well.” Kelvin held up the glowing vial. “It might also be fair to say that I never had incentive enough to achieve such potions before now. Working for someone who blackmailed me into it isn’t enough incentive.”

            He glanced at his allies, smiled a little, then said softly, “Catch, Harry Potter,” and tossed the vial towards him.

            Harry had no idea what the potion would do, and no intention of letting it get close enough to find out. He held up the Elder Wand, and it barked a spell into his thoughts, another one of those he didn’t know, the way it had given him the countercurse to Draco’s attempt to turn him into a tree.

            “Convello anima!”

            The vial gleamed for a moment as though the potion had begun to pour out of it even before it shattered, and then it spun wildly apart. The yellow light zipped out of the green liquid. Harry dodged as the liquid fell around him, but he didn’t think he really needed to worry about it, and he was right; even though one drop splashed on him, it did nothing except make his skin burn a little. And the potion that fell on the bells and the meadow grass did nothing to them, either.

            The yellow light was something different, was the heart and soul of the potion, and as it sped towards him, Harry knew he would have to do something different, too, to handle it.

            The Elder Wand knew what to do, and it was almost singing in his head and hand as it whispered the next spell.

            “Spargo anima!”

            The spell that came forth from his wand this time was a long, lazy spiral that split into two spirals as Harry watched, each of which split into two spirals, and so on, until there was a maze of them between him and the yellow light. The light tried to dodge, but no matter where it went, it had to brush against some part of Harry’s spell, and it was eaten as soon as that happened.

            Harry turned back to Kelvin and the other two wizards, hoping they hadn’t attacked his friends while he’d been busy watching the yellow light dissolve. He should have learned better than to take his eyes off his enemies for so long through the war, even if he didn’t remember training as an Auror anymore.

            Kelvin stared at him with a dazed expression. Harry held back his smirk as best he could, and only nodded a little. “Not what you were expecting, Kelvin?” he taunted almost gently. “You might as well back out now, you know.”

            Kelvin took another vial from his pocket without answering and simply tossed it on the ground, where it broke.

            The Elder Wand was guiding Harry’s hand forwards before he thought about it, and the spell came out of it. “Elicio tholum!”

            The air congealed above the vial, and then formed into what Harry thought was probably a variation on the Shield Charm, except it was a dome instead of an actual shield. A dome that sat above the vial, caging in the nasty effects of the fumes with little effort.

            One of the wizards behind Kelvin whispered harshly, “I thought you said he forgot all about battle!”

            “It’s his wand, not him.” Kelvin’s face was transformed by its harsh snarl; he looked as if he would have twisted Harry’s head off with his bare hands, if he could have reached him. He moved a slow step forwards, never looking away from Harry. “I actually planned for this to be quick. Either of those potions would have killed you before you could do more than breathe them in.”

            “I don’t believe you,” said Harry. The Elder Wand wasn’t pulling or tugging on his arm or whispering spells into his head anymore, and it wasn’t telling him the truth about Kelvin, either. Harry simply looked him in the eye and spoke what he was sure was the truth, whether or not Kelvin wanted him to know it. “You always intended for me to die as messily as possible. Both because you hate me and because you wanted to warn others about what would happen if they betrayed you.”

            Kelvin stared at him in silence, and then relaxed and laughed. “Very good, Harry. Yes, I always intended that. I suppose there’s no need for deceptions between friends as old as we are, is there?” He began to work his way casually around to Harry’s right, taking over for the wizard who’d stood there.

            Harry swallowed. Even with the Elder Wand’s help, he wasn’t sure how he could face three trained Dark wizards alone.

            But he had to try. Even this was part of the ritual.

            One of the strings of bells trembled as one of Kelvin’s friends kicked it. But for some reason, the ring didn’t subside. It picked up and zoomed back and forth, and now Harry was hearing bells ring that he couldn’t see, bells that were concealed by the rise of the ground.

            “What is that?” Kelvin asked sharply, his head turned.

            Harry opened his mouth to answer, although he honestly didn’t know what he would have said. And then the bells trembled again, and Ron was there, leaping over them as if he knew instinctively where they were.

            Harry found himself falling back with his shoulders pressed against Ron’s as though this were something they had done hundreds of times. Well, more to the point, as if it was something he remembered doing hundreds of times. He wondered for a second if he might have muscle memory of fighting beside Ron when they were both Aurors.

            Ron was thinking along the same lines. Harry heard him laugh. “Like old times,” he whispered.

            Harry nodded, and then he was letting the Elder Wand pull him into battle with the first wizard in front of him, the one who had asked Kelvin how much Harry remembered. He seemed to favor fighting with enchanted weapons, since the first thing he did was toss a bunch of small, whizzing metal balls that glowed blue at Harry.

            The Elder Wand raised a shield that bounced two of them, but the third one came on, aiming straight for Harry’s jaw. Harry flinched back. He could imagine how it would feel if it hit, and—

            But the Elder Wand was already tracing a cross shape in front of him, and the metal ball suddenly paused and hovered like a Snitch for a second. Harry blinked dazedly at it, wondering if he would see little wings around it. He’d thought they just flew by enchantments, but, well, a Snitch didn’t.

            Then the ball turned and zoomed back at the man who had tossed them at Harry. The man dodged, but it didn’t matter. The ball slammed into his left hand and broke some fingers, from the sound of the scream he gave. Harry shook his head and turned to cover Ron, who was dueling with the second Dark wizard.

            It looked like Ron had it under control, though. He’d made the wizard’s wand jerk around in his hand, even though it appeared to have something on it that protected it against the Disarming Charm, and now the wizard was reeling back from his own spell. He dismissed it, but not in time to escape Ron’s Tripping Jinx. In seconds, he was on the ground.

            Kelvin was the only one who stood now, and he turned his head back and forth slowly. At first Harry thought he was looking out for other enemies who might spring over the bells. But then he realized Kelvin was simply shaking his head.

            “Well, really,” Kelvin muttered. “One would think they could handle battle with a single Auror and another Auror who forgot all his training.”

            “You could give up now,” Ron said, in the sort of tone that Harry had the impression he’d used a lot. He didn’t expect it to work, but the thought was so nice that he couldn’t help suggesting it to criminals. “Drop your wand and come quietly. I’d speak up for you and your common sense at the trial.”

            Kelvin smiled and drew his cloak in around him like wings. “You know,” he said, “one must decide on one’s priorities. If it was my life, I would do as you say. If it was freedom, then I would escape now.” He turned to face Harry, and his face was alight with savage red. Harry found himself falling back one step.

            “But my priority,” Kelvin whispered, “has always been revenge.”

            He drew his wand and touched it to what looked like a brass button on the front of his robes, muttering something. Then he raced towards Harry and jumped at him, screaming like an Augurey.

            Harry saw flames springing up around Kelvin, and tried to dodge. Not even the Elder Wand would help him if it got burned to ash.

            But the wand held him in place, and a sweet thrumming filled Harry’s whole being. This time, he didn’t even move the wand. He simply opened his mouth and spoke the incantation for the spell that the wand knew. “Opprimo.”

            The flames around Kelvin went out even as he grabbed Harry’s robes and hauled him towards him. In instants, his eyes opened wider than Harry had known they could. He tried to disentangle himself and roll backwards.

            It didn’t work. Instead, something bright and glowing filled his mouth, and then plunged down his throat and into his chest.

            Kelvin tried to scream, Harry thought then. But the glowing thing still filled his throat and chest, and shook him around. He kicked and flailed his legs, and his noises were even more muffled than before. There were bright yellow tendrils extended around his face now, masking his ears, and Harry trembled as he listened to Kelvin suffocate in front of him.

            Ron sprinted past him, his face set. He crouched down beside Kelvin and began trying to dispel the magic by pass after pass of his wand. Nothing was working, from what Harry could see, but still Ron tried.

            “What are you doing?” Harry asked, gasping, bewildered.

            “I can’t let him die,” Ron snapped, staring at him for one moment before he turned back to Kelvin. “Aurors bring in our prisoners alive unless we have no choice.”

            Harry just blinked at Ron’s back for a second, and then he shook his head and hurried over. He didn’t know for sure, but he highly suspected, that Ron wasn’t about to succeed unless the Elder Wand let him. It had been the one to cast this spell. It was the one who could maintain it until Kelvin was dead.

            Or let it go.

            You cast the spell using me as an instrument, Harry snapped in his mind as he knelt beside Kelvin, who was spasming now, and drew the damned wand. I want you to let it go using me as the instrument.

            If he felt silly talking to his wand, at least he knew it was going to respond. The Elder Wand abruptly heated up against his hand, and Harry would have dropped it if he wasn’t so determined.

            And if he hadn’t felt a lot worse pain than that. There was an advantage to having memories of the Cruciatus Curse that felt fresh, even if they were ten years old.

            He waited until the wand stopped burning, although it meant he had to wait while Ron cursed breathlessly and Kelvin’s face turned more and more of a shade of puce. I know you can hear me. You were the one who came back to me and prevented me from taking up my holly wand again. Work the way I bid you.

            There was a silent moment when Harry felt as if he was on the dipping side of a pair of scales. He ignored the unease coiling in his stomach. So what if he was? The Elder Wand was still his servant, not the other way around. He held Ron’s gaze, and then the wand seemed to sigh and a trickle of magic curled out of one end.

            The magic was forming into a silvery-white blade. Harry nearly cut Ron and then Kelvin with it before he figured out what it was for and got the wand pointed in the right direction. Then he could twist it, and it sliced through the tight mask of light the first spell had put over Kelvin’s mouth and nose.

            Kelvin arched up as he breathed. The magic of the first spell and the second spell both turned into cold white light at the same time and sped away, and Harry sat back and wiped his burned hand on his knee. “He should be all right now,” he offered, without looking at Ron.

            Ron cast a few charms that Harry didn’t know, maybe to check on Kelvin’s health or lungs, and then one he did: a Stunner. When he’d conjured ropes to bind Kelvin and the other two wizards, he turned and stood in front of Harry, face solemn.

            Then he held his hand out.

            Harry took Ron’s wrist with his own hand shaking slightly. Ron didn’t shake his, only stood there, then squeezed down firmly enough that Harry’s bones hurt and let him go. “We need to find out what’s going on with the rest of the ritual,” he said, turning in the direction of the bell-strands.

            Harry relaxed. Ron hadn’t become reconciled to him through the ritual, the way Hermione had and Fleur had planned on, but it seemed their individual choices had had an effect. They were together again.

            They moved slowly towards the center of the meadow. Harry listened as hard as he could, but he couldn’t make out any noises. No shouts, no laughter, no breaking of glass like he thought would come along with the breaking of mirrors, no ringing of bells.

            No, wait, there. It did sound as if one strand of bells was ringing, directly behind a green mist that was rising in front of them where nothing had been a few seconds before.

            “Do we go through that mist?” Ron muttered, hesitating and glancing sideways at Harry.

            “I don’t know that we’ve got a whole lot of choice,” Harry said, and smiled a little as he noted the way Ron was staring at him. “Yes, I know that doesn’t sound comforting.”

            “But we had to make our choices to be part of this ritual. So, theoretically, our choices should have a lot of power.”

            Harry nodded at the mist. “But we’ve got to get through that no matter what. So even if we make a choice not to enter it, that’s still influencing the outcome of the ritual.”

            “Can’t you use the Elder Wand and blast it away?”

            Harry touched the Elder Wand. Ever since he had reversed the deadly spell on Kelvin, the thing had felt a lot more like a piece of dead wood, the warm connection Harry had sensed with it when he cast the earlier spells in the duel muted. “That’s a choice I won’t make. Especially not when it could upset lots of delicate little pieces in the ritual.”

            “Oh, fine,” Ron sighed, and walked towards the mist with as much bravado as he could muster, which wasn’t much at that point. “But I’m making you buy me a drink if this mist burns my throat.”

            Harry followed him. “At least this way,” he added, when Ron stared at him as if he was crazy, “it’ll burn both our throats.”

            “True. But you’re still paying for the whole round.”

            Harry grinned and started to respond, and then realized the mist was moving around them. It honestly didn’t feel much except damp and cold, despite the color. He reached out a hand and scooped some up, and it didn’t sting him even when he held it closely. He shrugged and let it go.

            “Maybe that’s the result of a choice someone else made,” he told Ron as they emerged from it again. “A choice not to harm other people.”

            Ron opened his mouth, probably to say what he thought of that, and then he and Harry stumbled out of the green mist and towards a triangle of familiar mirrors. Harry blinked in surprise. He supposed there was no good reason why the ritual should be finished already and Lucius should already be pulled out of the house-elf, but it had felt like that was what they were heading towards.

            Draco stood with one hand resting on the nearest mirror, his head bowed. He turned towards Harry and simply whirled, burying his head in Harry’s chest. He would have fallen if Harry hadn’t caught him in sheer shock.

            “He’s still in there,” Draco whispered. “I can hear him asking for help, but Weasley says I can’t go in to him.” His fingers grasped Harry’s sleeves hard enough to hurt his wrists. “I don’t know what to do.”

            Harry cleared his throat a little and said, “We’ll find a way.”

            He guided Draco closer to the mirrors, his gaze on them all the time. And he meant what he’d said.

            If there’s anything I can do to set Lucius Malfoy free, I’ll do it. That’s another of my choices.

*

            Severus1snape: You’re welcome. ;)

            SP777: Thanks! And sorry, but I don’t think so.
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The Dust of Water