Chapter Nineteen

Again, this September Hogwarts would only be opened as a day school. There were even fewer students registered than the year before. So everyone had little to do other than concentrate on Voldemort.

August crawled slowly. Ginny was confined to bed for two days. James Church, the injured police officer had agreed to a blood oath, not to reveal the Wizarding World. His 'rescue' made the nightly news.

Remus and Harry came up with an idea to try to engage the Death Eaters in situations where either the Order or the Ministry was in control. The first phase, implemented before Ginny was out of bed, was to have the Order resume the watch on Malfoy Manor. Another step that was implemented almost as quickly was to start using the Sling hex, just like the Death Eaters who attacked Harry and Ginny did. There were more than a few people who had been upset with the fact Harry was using a bow and arrow in combat. No one could say anything about using a spell to do the same thing. The Ministry created several hundred of the special Portkeys, directly holding cells. Fred and George came through by adding two new spells to them. The first was a sort of detection spell. It would allow the Portkey to activate only if there was a certain amount of heat present, namely the average temperature of a human body. The second, from their years of creating jokes and pranks, was a spell that they had planned on using on the Slytherins the night of their Leaving Feast. It stripped the person it was used upon down to their undergarments and then turned the person one of several colors, all hideously bright.

From the interrogation of Blaise Zabini, it was discovered that there were more Death Eaters than anyone had thought. It seemed that, yes most of the British ones had been captured or killed, Rudolphus had made several secret trips to continental Europe to recruit some new blood. Most of the recruits, numbering about two dozen, were not really skilled wizards. They were more like street thugs and snapped at the chance to move up to murder and mayhem. Also, in addition to the two LeStranges and Draco Malfoy there were four other older Death Eaters. Zabini did not know their names. The dozen werewolves that Voldemort had had in July were whittled down to four. Zabini also knew that the number of Inferi had been reduced to less than two hundred and Voldemort was loathe to make any more, because the process, for some reason, had become too draining for him. Voldemort had a few Dementors still loyal to him, about two dozen. The rest had either been destroyed or deserted him.

The third week of August was the first where the Order met with some success in drawing out several Death Eaters. Six of those new recruits were captured, using the Sling hex.

Through the rest of August and the first two weeks of September, there were very few attacks. None on Wizarding targets and only a few scattered, not very effective ones on Muggle targets. These attacks were more like reminders that the threat was still around more than anything else. Ginny had recovered fully by the end of August and was eager to do something, and was very frustrated that there wasn't all that much to do. Moody insisted that Harry and the others keep a fairly rigorous practice schedule during those weeks.

Early in September, Harry received a letter from Horace Slughorn announcing a time to sit for the Journeyman's Potions Certificate. Harry had pulled an O on his N.E.W.T. potions examination (a low one, but still an O) after thoroughly studying both Snape's annotations to the standard text and his mother's and grandmother's notes and journals. He had also been tested and approved by Belby to brew the Wolvesbane Potion. Scrimgeour originally had the idea for Harry to sit the exam, but when Hermione heard about it she pestered him to write to Slughorn. Slughorn, who still thought of Harry as one of his 'Slug Club' members, didn't stop until he had a commitment from Harry. Harry returned from the examination tired and smiling, carrying a small cloth insignia and a single gold braid.

Ginny grabbed him in a bone crushing hug, Hermione engulfed both of them and Ron thumped Harry on the back. That night, even though Harry was dead on his feet, the teens threw and impromptu party.

The week following Harry being awarded his journeyman's certificate, he received several offers for more advanced study. Two were from within Britain, the other five from around the world.

He was also inducted into the Dark Arts Defense League, an honor that he almost turned down, until Cadoc and Bob convinced him that all the members were not like Lockhart. They also told him that there were two types of membership. The first was a dues paying general membership, that almost anyone who was willing to pay the fee could sign up for. The other, the inducted membership, was by far the more prestigious of the two. Lockhart had been a dues paying member, who by being the smarmy git he was, wormed his way onto many committees. Both Cadoc and Bob were members and told Harry that Lockhart was generally disliked at the international level, but neither one was sure how he was perceived in Britain or Europe. They also told Harry that he had no real obligation to attend any meetings or any other functions. In fact, he didn't even have to acknowledge the fact that he had been inducted.

Starting the third week of September, the elves began harvesting apples and making cider. The four teens were eager to learn the process. Ron wasn't really interested in the work involved, but went along with helping because he enjoyed the end results. It was also time to begin the grape harvest in France, so Harry, Ginny, Bill and Fleur made a trip to France that weekend. Fleur was right at home at the vineyard.

The trip to France was rather uneventful, but Harry did learn a bit more about wine making. He also discovered that the two properties produced a much wider range of beverages than he had thought they did. Of course, the main ones were wine and cider, but the elves at both locations also made mead, beer, ale and just about any other easily brewed beverage. In addition, both locations produced distilled spirits--brandy and cognac in France and firewhiskey and several other whiskey varieties at Applegate. Moppy even made some absinthe on occasion. He also realized that these activities were the main reason that both estates had remained self-sufficient for the many long years that no one was able to properly manage them.

Fleur spent a fair amount of time putting into practice some of what Harry had learned about wizarding culture. In many ways, wizarding culture, in Europe, had stagnated around the late 17th century, though in some areas it had advanced to late Victorian or very early 20th century. Harry and the others had been taught about the way Wizards viewed wine and other alcoholic beverages, but never much practiced the wine etiquette they had learned in theory.

The weekend was also a time for Ginny to finish her recovery. She had mostly recovered physically within a few days, but emotionally she seemed to be stalled. The first night at the estate, she finally broke down and spent nearly two hours crying, while Harry just held her. At the end, both Harry and Ginny strengthened their resolve to seek a quick end to Voldemort.

After their return to Britain, Harry decided that since Halloween had always been one of the times that Voldemort seemed to be most active, that he would be the one to initiate events, this year. His idea of an assault on Malfoy manner was readily accepted by the members of the Order. With little over a month to plan, they set to work. The idea was to try to draw the remaining Death Eaters into a position where they could be captured or otherwise neutralized. They were planning on having to deal with somewhere around fifty Wizards.

One morning, in the middle of October, Ron looked up from a series of maps he was studying and asked, "So how are we going to get them to show themselves? They will have plenty of cover if they stick to the main buildings or don't breach the wards."

"I was thinking that they would just do the same as last time. You know that the Ferret isn't going to change," said Harry, in an off handed way.

"Yeah, but even Zabini didn't say anything about him. I bet things didn't go to well for him after that last balls up he pulled."

Harry thought for a second and said, "You're right, Malfoy may not be in a position to do anything. He still has to be alive, though, otherwise the wards would have failed...wouldn't they?"

"Which wards?" asked Hermione, joining the conversation.

"The ones around Malfoy manner." answered Harry. "If Malfoy is dead, they would have failed, right?"

"I'm not sure, you should ask Bill," said Hermione. "He'd probably know."

Harry nodded and grabbed a sheet of parchment to write a note, but be for he started, Bill and Fleur walked into the room.

"How did you do that?" asked Ron, grinning.

Confused, Bill asked, "Do what?"

"I was going to invite you over for dinner, we have hit a small snag in the plan," said Harry.

"Oh?"

"Well, would the wards around Malfoy Manor still be up if Draco were dead?" asked Ron.

"They are very similar to the ones around here and he is the last, as far as we know, Malfoy..."

Harry and Ron shivered at the thought of Draco having an heir.

"So," continued Bill, "they probably would drop. Why?"

"We were trying to figure out whether the idiots would take the bait and return our attack," said Harry. "If Malfoy was still in charge of the house, then what we planned so far would work, but if he isn't, I'm not sure, now that Ron brought it up, that they would."

Bill sat down and examined the documents that Ron had been looking at a few minutes before.

"I think we need Moody to look at this," said Bill.

Later that evening, after dinner, Harry sent a message to Moody. He arrived a little before eight.

"I've got about an hour, so make it good," growled the former Auror.

"We've hit a bit of a snag," said Bill, handing several pieces of parchment to Moody.

He looked at what Bill had just handed him, stomped over to a chair in front of the fire and sat, reading through the stack, quickly.

"I'd say you do. It is an awfully big 'if' to be counting on that little shite to still be running the Manor. I know that there haven't been many attacks lately and that we think we have most of the Death Eaters captured, but you can never be too prepared."

"Constant Vigilance," muttered Harry.

Moody frowned at him and continued, "Right, lad. But this is a bit more than that. We are talking about nearly a total lack of any viable intelligence. We'd be hitting them blind. I'd say wait a while..."

"Look, I'm tired of waiting. Waiting nearly got Ginny killed. It did get Sirius killed. Hell, for that matter it got Dumbledore killed. If he had enough strength to petrify me, he could done Ferret-boy, too!" shouted Harry.

"I'm not saying you shouldn't do this," Moody growled back. "I'm just saying do it smart."

Ginny came up behind Harry, who had started pacing in front of the fire. She whispered something in his ear and he shot her a faint smile. Then he turned to Moody and said, "You're right. I just wanted to be the one to do something this time. HE always seems to have the initiative and we react. Halloween seems to be Tom's favorite night to do something and..."

"I understand," replied Moody. "After all this, I just don't want to see you hurt, lad. Smart always gets you more than plain brute force. If you really want to go ahead with it, then we've still a few days to come up with something workable."

With that, Moody stomped over to a table and swept everything on it into a pile and spread out the stack of parchments he had been reading. "Right, you lot, let's get cracking."

The morning of Halloween, Harry was in the library, pacing in front of the fire. Ginny walked in, carrying a tray which she set down on a table.

"Have you been here all night?"

"Yeah, I can't seem to relax. Tonight is it. Hopefully it will be all over..."

Ginny put her arms around him and pulled him into a tight hug. She whispered, "I know. I know. The plan will work."

"I sure hope so."

She led him to one of the couches and made him sit, before going to the tray and pouring a cup of tea. Harry took a couple of sips and yawned twice, before his eyes closed. Ginny barely caught the cup before he dropped it. She gently eased him down onto the couch, so he was lying there comfortably.

"He didn't even notice," she whispered to Hermione, who had just entered the room.

"I was watching, from the doorway."

Just before dusk, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny and several members of the Order were standing on the hill a short distance from Malfoy Manor.

"That was a dirty trick," said Harry, trying to glare at Ginny.

"But you needed it, didn't you?"

"Yeah, but it was still..."

A quick kiss stopped him from saying anything else.

After Ginny broke the kiss, Harry asked, "Any word from Moody or Bill?"

Ron replied, "No, but that doesn't mean anything. Bill didn't expect to have anything ready until full dark."

"Oh, well, I suppose we should get ready then."

The rest shrugged and moved into Harry's tent. The crew changed into something that resembled Muggle combat fatigues, except everything was a dull, flat black. Everyone had at least one knife and a ranged weapon. Harry had his bow, Ron a crossbow, Hermione a sling and Ginny also had a bow. They also grabbed several 'anti Dementor' devices.

Just as the sun set, Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny set off on Harry's carpet. Harry flew the carpet in a wide arc away from the Manor and circled around to the north side. The Order was going to conduct an all out frontal assault, while Harry hoped to sneak in from the other side. He was carrying one of the largest 'ward bombs' that the twins had been able to make. When the main assault began he was going to try to breech the wards and fly in. The one thing that Harry was worried about was what the Ministry would do. His status protected him from prosecution, but it didn't extend to everyone helping him.

'Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead,' he thought, wondering where that came from.

He didn't have much time for more thought, as the last of the twilight faded to black, a sound like a large gong crashing to the floor was heard and multi-colored light lit the area where Harry knew the rest of the Order to be.

"This is it," said Harry, dropping the device from the twins over the edge of the carpet. A few seconds later a flash of blue light and a loud crackling sound signaled that it had detonated. Harry steered the carpet through the glowing, ragged hole floating a few feet off the ground. When they were about two hundred yards from the large, imposing manor, he nodded to Ron and stood. Ron and Harry mounted their brooms and dove off the carpet, breaking to either side of the manor house.

"Harry," whispered Ginny, into the mouthpiece of the communications device she wore, "stick to the plan."

Harry nodded as he flew to a second floor window.

He pulled his broom hard to the left, then stopped, hovering at the window. An'Alohamora' later and Harry was climbing through the window. As he stuck his head into the room, he was hit by the overpowering stench of urine, feces and unwashed socks. Harry dropped to a crouch, pulled out his wand and started systematically searching the room with his eyes, for the troll he was sure to be in it. He spotted several overturned buckets, that were being used as chamber pots, piles of unidentifiable bones and what, at one time, had been a large, four post bed, its hangings shredded beyond tatters. The sound of hoarse laughter came from the remains of that bed.

"Potter," said the voice from the bed. "Welcome to my room, as much as it is. I have you to thank for its current decor." The owner of the voice stood and slowly approached Harry. The figure was gaunt and hadn't seen a bath in quite some time. Its hair was of some indeterminate color, far greasier and lank than Snape's had ever been. It was naked, except for some sort of collar around its neck. Harry noticed that the collar was attached to a stout chain, which, in turn was firmly attached to the floor.

As the figure approached Harry, it stepped through a patch of sunlight. Harry now had a good look at its face and the very distinctive scar pattern on it. "Malfoy," said Harry. "I was wondering if you were still alive."

Draco laughed, a hollow, mirthless laugh. "I guess I am. Come to gloat, Potter?"

"No," said Harry, calmly. Unseen by Draco, who had been watching Harry's wand hand, Harry thrust out his left hand, at waist level. A streak of red light shot from his fingers, catching Draco in the midsection. He dropped, wordlessly to the floor. Harry quickly made his way to the door and a few spells later was in the hall. Ron was crouched in a pool of shadow at the top of the stairs.

"What took you so long?" asked Ron, nervously glancing down the stairs.

"I was taking care of something...ugly," replied Harry.

Ron opened his mouth to say something, but Harry gestured and whispered, "Later."

Ginny and Hermione flew the carpet above the northernmost gable of the house and settled into a hover. Ginny laid out several arrows, all different colors, while Hermione pulled a varied selection of shot from a pouch at her waist. They had a clear field of view to where the twenty or so wizards and creatures were gathered, in front of the main entrance to the manor.

Bill and the twins continued to assault the main wards, the twins with their 'ward bombs' and Bill in the more traditional manner. The cracks of wizards Apparating suddenly filled the air.

Fred let out the breath he was holding as he noticed who the incoming wizards were. "Re-enforcements," he muttered.

Bill nodded, not taking his eyes off the intricately carved stone in front of him.

"Budge over, William," said a voice next to Bill. "I may not have followed you into Curse Breaking, but I did beat your marks in Runes."

"Whatever, Percy, can you take out the combination powering this beast?"

Percy looked at the glowing sigils and nodded.

Harry and Ron started creeping down the stairs. When they had nearly reached the ground floor, a thunderous crack shook the house. Several windows shattered and a loud scream rent the air.

"Looks like the stupid git actually tied the wards to himself," muttered Ron, shaking his head. "Think he snuffed it?"

"We couldn't be that lucky," said Harry, dryly.

The masked wizards and creatures congregated near the doors began to move toward the main gates, only to be halted by various gases, sparks, flames and other less identifiable things raining down on them from above.

The group at the main gate, now consisting of over fifty wizards, including a number in Auror's robes began to march down the path to the house. About a hundred yards down the path, the ground suddenly opened. A couple of hundred Inferi rose out of shallow 'graves'. Not missing a beat, the attackers, lead by Remus and Flitwick, immediately started with rolling waves of fire. Soon the feared Inferi were nothing more than smoldering piles of ash, spewing noxious fumes into the night air.

As the group advancing on the main doors neared the defenders, they began throwing curses at the attackers. Very few found a mark, however, as a large number of stone pillars suddenly sprang into existence between the two groups. The spell fire from the attackers seemed inordinately accurate and those hit instantly disappeared. Soon the group of defenders was whittled down to less than five. Spinning on his heels, Rudolphus LeStrange fled back through the now open doors. Once inside a loud crack signaled his departure.

"He won't get very far," whispered Harry, who was watching from the stairs, about to curse the man before he disappeared.

Ron nodded. "Time to move out."

Harry nodded and began making his way through the main hall.

Suddenly, the door at the end of the hall, the one leading to the ballroom exploded outward. Striding from the room, Voldemort entered the hall, flanked by Rudolphus, who was clutching a struggling Hermione. He held dagger to her throat. Another cloaked and masked figure held a similarly struggling Ginny.

"Ginny!" bellowed Harry.

Voldemort laughed. "So, Potter, you still have feelings for the little strumpet. Did she tell you how much she enjoyed my younger self?"

Harry snarled.

"Kill them, all three of them."

Harry locked eyes with Ginny and nodded slightly. "No. I surrender."

"Well, well," said Voldemort. "It seems that you have grown a brain, after all. Too bad. Kill them anyway, starting with the girl he has feelings for."

A woman screamed, somewhere behind Harry.

The masked figure made a barely perceptible nod and said, in a cold voice, "Avada Ke..." The girl disappeared. "davra." The green light left the wand, but since girl was no longer there, the spell hit the wizard square in the chest. A ginger haired cat scrambled out from under the falling wizard.

Rudolphus, not waiting for an order from his master, began to draw his dagger across Hermione's throat, only to have his arm nearly ripped from its socket as a large dog grabbed it in its mouth and pulled.

Voldemort leveled his wand at Harry and cried, "Sectumsempra."

The spell hit Harry in the chest. Loud gasps were heard throughout the hall. Harry, expecting his chest to now be laid open and blood gushing forth, was shocked to see that nothing happened. He then glanced at Voldemort, who was also astonished. Harry noticed that Voldemort's wand, while looking very familiar did not seem to be his yew wand that had reacted to Harry's the last time they traded spells. Voldemort looked at the wand in his hand and cast it to the floor in disgust. He drew another wand from his sleeve, in the same motion.

Harry took the slight pause to cast a few spells of his own. Flaming arrows leapt from his left hand while a vivid magenta beam arced from his wand. With a deft flick of his, Voldemort blocked the arrows and in the blink of an eye a shimmering silver shield, which rang like a gong when the magenta beam hit it, appeared in front of him.

When the sound died down, Voldemort said, "Impressive, for one of such little talent. Last time we met I was attempting to instill in you the finer etiquette of dueling. Obviously my attempts at increasing your feeble store of knowledge fell on infertile ground."

Harry snorted.

"Then, let's dance, boy."

Voldemort's hand became a blur of motion, with many spells streaking forth. Harry began blocking and dodging as many of them as he could, barely having a chance to send one back in return. Off to one side, he heard what sounded like a dog yelping in pain. The split second break in concentration was all it took for some sort of bludgeoning curse to connect with his left shoulder. The horrible popping sound and sudden loss of use of that arm told Harry that his shoulder was now dislocated. Voldemort paused for a second, a high, hollow laugh escaping his thin lips, before resuming his onslaught. With his left arm disabled, Harry was reduced to using only his wand. This left him unable to do anything other than block the incoming spells. Harry was pushed, relentlessly, back down the hall, toward where the group of others was gathered. He was also being pushed to the side of the wide hallway.

Harry's back slammed against the wall, after taking a particularly strong hit to his shield. The startling impact allowed a second bludgeoning curse through. It hit his right leg, above the knee. The snap of bones breaking was clearly heard, throughout the now silent manor. Harry bit back his cry of pain and slowly slid to the floor.

"As they say, all good things must come to an end. Avada Kedavra!"

As the streak of green light leaped from Voldemort's wand a large, ginger colored cat landed on his face, claws fully extended. With a vicious swipe of his free hand, Voldemort flung the cat away.

Instead of hitting Harry, the curse struck the wall above his head, showering him in chips of plaster and lath.

Harry raised his wand, pointed carefully to control the shaking in his arm and said, barely above a whisper, "Accio, Bone of the father."

At first nothing seemed to happen, but then Voldemort started to scream. It was an ear-splitting bellow of pain. Then his pale skin began to writhe. Finally a fine white powder exploded out from Voldemort, followed closely be a fine red mist. Harry slumped over.

"Odds bodkins!"

Harry was roused by the loud voice of Arthur Weasley, but he chose to remain still and keep his eyes closed.

"Now , Arthur," said Rufus Scrimgeour. "There is no need to be so upset, Pius only wants to bring him in for questioning."

"You were there, Rufus, you saw what happened. Tell me, did you see anything that warrants any further investigation? Also, remember the whole 'agent of prophecy' bit. That was your idea to pursue, if Percy is telling the truth. So just tell Thicknesse to take a long walk off of a short pier."

Sighing in exasperation, Rufus said, "You're right, Arthur...I'm getting too old for this shit. Thicknesse has about as much sense as a flobberworm. I'll keep him off Potter's arse. But, remember, I want to talk to him once he's off that Skele-gro."

Harry coughed.

"Oh, you're awake?" asked Arthur.

"Yeah, I guess so, it is a little hard to sleep with you two going at like two old fishwives," replied Harry, with a slight smirk. "I'm not in too much pain, so ask away, Minister."

"No need, right now, Potter," said Rufus.

"But I insist. This may be your last chance to talk to me. I'm going to make myself rather scarce over the next few months. Probably go spend some time on a nice sunny beach in some very out of the way part of the world."

"Very well, then, just be warned, most of what I'm going to ask you is probably going to end up in a press statement."

Harry shrugged. "If it has to, then, well...at least I don't have to talk to them, directly."

Scrimgeour laughed. "You've got me there. I'll try to keep it brief. I heard that it took you about five minutes to figure out my little bit of plotting."

"It was rather obvious, once I thought about it. But I have a question for you, why? To keep idiots like Thicknesse at bay?"

"Mostly, but I've learned something from the Muggles over the past two years...have you ever heard of 'plausible deniability'?"

Harry nodded. "We even guessed that.

"I really have only one question to ask. I was in the back, behind most everyone else and didn't hear what your final spell was."

"That's an easy one," replied Harry. "It was a simple summoning charm."

Scrimgeour raised his eyebrows, puzzled. "What did you summon?"

"You heard how he created a new body, right?"

Scrimgeour nodded.

"I simply summoned his father's bones."

Scrimgeour and Arthur both started chuckling, and quickly dissolved into deep laughter.

Gasping for breath, after a minute of so of laughing, Scrimgeour said, "I really am getting too old for all this. I'm never going to be able to go public with that, Potter."

"Well, simply say that I disenchanted his homunculus or constructed body or what ever you want to call it."

Several weeks later, after most of the ceremonies, celebrations and other nonsense had settled, Harry sat on the hill, by the entrance to the cave. Grawp and Kat were wandering off in the distance, the children were riding, what Harry wasn't quite sure, at least he thought they were horses, and Ginny was next to him, her head on his shoulder.

"It's really over," she whispered.

"Yeah, I guess it is."

"What next?"

"I want to go across the Pond, spend some time learning wand crafting and such."

"Sounds like fun. Doesn't Kingsley want you to start at the end of the month?"

"I'm not sure I want to do that any longer. Besides, we still have a wedding to plan."

"Umm...don't you mean, Mum has a wedding to plan?"

"Yeah, I guess."