✔️ 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐓𝐄𝐆𝐎 → ℎ. 𝑝𝑜𝑡𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑡𝑤𝑖𝑛 𝑠𝑡𝑜𝑟𝑦

21 | F I R E

 
  "Let her go", Harry pressed through gritted teeth; forgotten was the diadem, that just a second ago had only been inches from his outstretched fingers.

   Ember struggled against Crabbe and Goyle's grips, but she as well as could do nothing at all.

   "Harry?", Ron’s voice echoed suddenly from the other side of the wall to Harry’s right. "Are you talking to someone?" 

   With a whiplike movement, Crabbe pointed his wand at the fifty-foot mountain of old furniture, of broken trunks, of old books and robes and unidentifiable junk, and shouted, "Descendo!"

   The wall began to totter, then the top third crumbled into the aisle next door where Ron stood. 

   "Ron!", Harry bellowed, as somewhere out of sight Hermione screamed, and Ember heard innumerable objects crashing to the floor on the other side of the destabilized wall. Harry pointed his wand at the rampart, cried, "Finite!" and it steadied. 

   "No!" shouted Malfoy, staying Crabbe’s arm as the latter made to repeat his spell. "If you wreck the room you might bury this diadem thing!"

   "What’s that matter?", said Crabbe, tugging himself free. "It’s Potter the Dark Lord wants, who cares about a die-dum?"

   "Potter came in here to get it", said Malfoy with ill-disguised impatience at the slow-wittedness of his colleagues, "so that must mean —" 

   "Must mean?", Crabbe turned on Malfoy with undisguised ferocity. "Who cares what you think? I don’t take your orders no more, Draco. You an’ your dad are finished."

   Crabbe shoved Ember against Malfoy, who stumbled backwards and lost his wand; it landed on the floor with a clatter. Before Malfoy could even notice, Ember grabbed it.

   "Harry?", shouted Ron again, from the other side of the junk wall. "What’s going on?" 

   "Harry?", mimicked Crabbe. "What’s going — no, Potter! Crucio!"

   Harry had lunged for the diadem; Crabbe’s curse missed him but hit the stone bust, which flew into the air; the diadem soared upward and then dropped out of sight in the mass of objects on which the bust had rested.

   "Oh no, you don't!", Ember hissed, as Crabbe once more pointed his wand at Harry. "Protego!" A jet of scarlet light bursted right in front of Harry's face against an invisible shield.

   "Grave mistake, bitch!", Crabbe growled. "Avada —"

   "NO!", Malfoy yelled. "The Dark Lord wants them alive!"

   "The Dark Lord wants him alive", said Crabbe, nodding at Harry. "He doesn't need her no longer. She's useless without her powers."

   "DON'T KILL HER!", screamed Malfoy, and that split second's of hesitation was all Harry and Ember had needed.

   "Expelliarmus!"

   Goyle’s wand flew out of his hand and disappeared into the bulwark of objects beside him; Goyle leapt foolishly on the spot, trying to retrieve it; Hermione from behind one of the piles, Malfoy jumped out of range of Hermione’s Stunning Spell, and Ron, appearing suddenly at the end of the aisle, shot a full Body-Bind Curse at Crabbe, which narrowly missed. 

   Crabbe wheeled around and screamed, "Avada Kedavra!" again. Ron leapt out of sight to avoid the jet of green light. The wandless Malfoy cowered behind Ember, as Hermione charged toward them, hitting Goyle with a Stunning Spell as she came. 

   Ember turned on Malfoy, eyes narrowed. "Two possibilities, ferret", she spat. "Run and hide your ugly face as far away from this castle as you could, or I'll hex the shi—"

   "Harry!"

   Hermione's scream had her whirl around; a roaring, billowing noise behind her gave her a moment’s warning. She turned and saw both Ron and Crabbe running as hard as they could up the aisle toward them.

   "Like it hot, scum?", roared Crabbe as he ran. 

   But he seemed to have no control over what he had done. Flames of abnormal size were pursuing them, licking up the sides of the junk bulwarks, which were crumbling to soot at their touch. 

   "Brilliant", Ember muttered, rolling her eyes. "C'mon!" She pulled Malfoy to his feet, and he immediately started running for Goyle, starting to drag him down the aisle.

   Ember herself had been almost thrown of her feet, as Harry harshly grabbed her hand and pulled her along, Ron and Hermione on their heels. It was not normal fire; Crabbe had used a curse of which Ember had no knowledge. As they turned a corner the flames chased them as though they were alive, sentient, intent upon killing them. Now the fire was mutating, forming a gigantic pack of fiery beasts: Flaming serpents, chimaeras, and dragons rose and fell and rose again, and the detritus of centuries on which they were feeding was thrown up in the air into their fanged mouths, tossed high on clawed feet, before being consumed by the inferno. 

   "Here!"

   Harry seized a pair of heavy-looking broomsticks from the nearest pile of junk and threw one to Ron, who pulled Hermione onto it behind him. Harry swung his leg over the second broom, pulling Ember onto it, and, with hard kicks to the ground, they soared up into the air, missing by feet the horned beak of a flaming raptor that snapped its jaws at them. The smoke and heat were becoming overwhelming. Below them the cursed fire was consuming the contraband of generations of hunted students, the guilty outcomes of a thousand banned experiments, the secrets of the countless souls who had sought refuge in the room.

   And then Ember heard a thin, piteous human scream from amidst the terrible commotion, the thunder of devouring flame. 

   The door was close, and Harry aimed at it.

   "Harry—", Ember piped up, her voice raspy from all the smoke she had inhaled. "We can't leave them here ..."

   "Are you serious?", Ron bellowed right next to her. "If we're going to die for them, I'm gonna kill you!"

   But as Harry turned midair, Ron followed, and soon enough Ember spotted Malfoy with his arms around the unconscious Goyle, the pair of them perched on a fragile tower of charred desks, and Harry must have seen him as well, as he dived. Malfoy saw him coming and raised one arm.

   Ron and Hermione dragged Goyle onto their broom and rose, while Malfoy was climbing up behind Ember.

   "The door, get to the door, the door!", screamed Malfoy in Ember's ear, and Harry sped up, following Ron, Hermione, and Goyle through the billowing black smoke, hardly able to breathe, and all around them the last few objects unburned by the devouring flames were flung into the air, as the creatures of the cursed fire cast them high in celebration: cups and shields, a sparkling necklace, and an old, discolored diadem ...