The Other Black - Book 7

Chapter 31 - The Elder Wand

The world had ended, so why had the battle not ceased, the castle fallen silent in horror, and every combatant laid down their arms? Aurora mind was in free fall, spinning out of control, unable to grasp the impossibility, because Fred Weasley could not be dead, the evidence of all his senses must be lying--

And then a body fell past the hole blown into the side of the school and curses flew in at them from the darkness, hitting the wall behind their heads.

"Get down!" Harry shouted, as more curses flew through the night: He and Ron had both grabbed Hermione and pulled her to the floor, Aurora pushing herself as flat as she could, but Percy lay across Fred's body, shielding it from further harm, and when Harry shouted "Percy, come on, we've got to move!" he shook his head.

"Percy!" Aurora called. Her voice didn't sound like hers.

Harry saw tear tracks streaking the grime coating Ron's face as he seized his elder brother's shoulders and pulled, but Percy would not budge. "Percy, you can't do anything for him! We're going to--"

Hermione screamed, and Aurora, turning, did not need to ask why. A monstrous spider the size of a small car was trying to climb through the huge hole in the wall. one of Aragog's descendants had joined the fight. Ron and Harry shouted together; their spells collided and the monster was blown backward, its legs jerking horribly, and vanished into the darkness.

Aurora opened her mouth, but she, for the first time in her life, failed to come up with a spell.

"It brought friends!" Harry called to the others, glancing over the edge of the castle through the hole in the wall the curses had blasted. More giant spiders were climbing the side of the building, liberated from the Forbidden Forest, into which the Death Eaters must have penetrated. Harry fired Stunning Spells down upon them, knocking the lead monster into its fellows, so that they rolled back down the building and out of sight. Then more curses came soaring over Aurora's head, so close she felt the force of them blow her hair.

"Let's move, NOW!" Once more, her voice sounded strangled, gravelled, barely like her own.

Pushing Hermione ahead of him with Ron, Harry stooped to seize Fred's body under the armpit. He pushed Aurora ahead too, but she didn't want to move. Percy, realizing what Harry was trying to do, stopped clinging to the body and helped: together, crouching low to avoid the curses flying at them from the grounds, they hauled Fred out of the way.

One more body to add to her list.

James Potter. Lily Evans-Potter. Cedric Diggory. Sirius Black. Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody. Hedwig. Riem Bekker. Ted Tonks. Dirk Cresswell. Peter Pettigrew. Dobby.

Fred Weasley.

"Here," said Harry, and they placed him in a niche where a suit of armor had stood earlier.

After making sure that the body was well- hidden, he and Aurora took off after Ron and Hermione. Draco and Goyle had vanished but at the end of the corridor, which was now full of dust and falling masonry, glass long gone from windows, she saw many people running backward and forward, whether friends or foes she could not tell.

Rounding the corner, Percy let out a bull-like roar: "ROOKWOOD!" and sprinted off in the direction of a tall man, who was pursuing a couple of students.

"Harry, in here!" Hermione screamed. She had pulled Ron behind a tapestry. They seemed to be wrestling together, and for one mad second Aurora thought that they were embracing again; then she saw that Hermione was trying to restrain Ron, to stop him running after Percy.

"Listen to me--LISTEN RON!"

"I wanna help--I wanna kill Death Eaters--" His face was contorted, smeared with dust and smoke, and he was shaking with rage and grief.