PotterLock Down (A Crossover Fanfiction)

Chapter 18: The Cavern Confrontation

The detective doubled over, roaring in pain and clutching his head. He whirled around to face the witch, as she stared at him in shock.

"Imperio!" She tried again, sending him into convulsions once more, but Harry remained unscathed.

Dark, malevolent eyes started to slide in Moriarty's direction.

The consulting criminal with the magic wand passed the situation off with a chuckle.

"Uh-oh, Sherlock," he said, "you're not playing by the rules! One of us has to, otherwise it's no fun!" He joined in the onslaught, jabbing his wand toward Sherlock with a spell that made him cry out in pain as if he'd been struck by a whip.

"Maybe," suggested a tall, pale Death Eater, "if we raised the stakes—"

Sherlock's head whipped up and his eyes sought John and Hermione. "Look out!" He cried as the cavern ceiling shattered above them.

Harry pointed his wand and freed Hermione from the petrification spell.

Immediately, she raised her wand over her head and deflected the projectiles.

Moriarty huffed. "Oh dear; that didn't work the way I planned!"

One of the Wizards sent a spell toward the unsuspecting Harry, but just as he finished speaking, there was Sherlock instead, taking the full measure of the magic. He gasped at the force of it, and stumbled backward.

"Don't give up now, Holmes," Moriarty jeered. "Don't you want to know how I did it?"

That brought Sherlock out of his stupor. He lifted his eyes to Moriarty's face.

"I already know how you did it. I talked to that boy from Slytherin."

Moriarty snorted, "Who, Malfoy? You think he's my lackey? Yes, well isn't he so obvious and spiteful and available!"

"Oh, I know it wasn't him countering all those spells and making the charms go wrong. But I also talked to the other one. The one you hired to play the part of the First Evil nonsense."

"I knew it wasn't real!" Hermione whispered.

Moriarty suddenly glared at Sherlock, and a searing pain made it feel like his leg snapped in two, even though from appearances nothing actually happened.

"Well, points for being clever, Sherley!" Moriarty snarled. "I might have known you wouldn't be carried away by the rumors of doom and gloom! What gave me away?"

Sherlock reeled, and Harry could see his skin fade to an ashy grey, much like it had when the Dementor attacked him. Sherlock did something that he had not ever done when facing Moriarty: he laughed. Grinning like a crocodile showing all his teeth, Sherlock started with a throaty chuckle which soon swelled into a head-tossing, full-bellied guffaw.

"Oh my god, he's lost it," muttered John, staring at his friend in horror.

Sherlock staggered drunkenly around the cavern, pointing at various wizards as he shouted.

"You gave yourselves away! All of you! The Death Eater was in the details of every clue! The exploding jellies, the missing potion—the student who vanished before being Sorted... But everybody knew his name, even though nobody knew what he looked like! First Evil, ha! Your first mistake," he swung back to Moriarty, "was trying to cover up the raid on the library. That made it easy to break the Malfoy boy—"

"Break him?" A tall man with the same pale hair cast an angry spell toward Sherlock. The spell caught the lumbering detective in the legs, but Sherlock was so tipsy already, it made little difference except the pain. Sherlock's voice grew more strained as the words tumbled through the agony.