Chapter Text
“You shouldn’t have come,” Harry said as he twirled his wand in his fingers idly, spread out across the couch in Grimaud Place as if he didn’t have a care in the world.
“You can’t keep doing this, Harry, it’s not healthy. We have a war to win, horcruxes to find. We don’t have time for this,” Hermione insisted, always the optimist.
“‘Mione, you know I love you like a sister, but I’m not leaving. I’m going to keep scouring the books here until I find a way to win. We don’t even have the faintest idea where the horcruxes are, what’s the point of wandering around outside for months?”
“It’s dark magic, Harry. You’re not Voldemort, you can’t just use it willy nilly to solve all of your problems.”
“My problems? My problems? This is our problem. All of ours. Dumbledore is dead and he left this whole mess to us. So for the first time, I’m doing this my way and we will win the war. I’m not going to play their games anymore.”
“You’re still the chosen one. They all expect it if you. You don’t really have a choice.”
Harry scoffed, “Like I’ve ever done what they expected of me. I’m doing this my way Hermione, I don’t care what you think on this. So either come help me or leave.”
She took a deep breath, “I guess I’m leaving then. Ron and I will be trying to find and destroy the horcruxes, send a patronus when you get too deep. You aren’t dark, Harry. You’re not Malfoy and you’re not Voldemort. I don’t want you to lose yourself to this, not now.”
“I know… I know.” It was too late already, Harry knew that from the very beginning. He was always doomed to the narrative, fate holding him gently in its hands. He was always doomed to the tragedy of this world.
Fighting.
Fighting.
Fighting until he broke, shattered into a thousand pieces. A thousand remnants of what he once was, what he once could have been.
Hermione walked into the floo and with a final pleading look at Harry, her eyes saying everything she never could, left.
He’d miss her, but she was only holding him back now. The fight was here and his to win and his alone.
The books that surrounded him were numerous, but helpful. The Blacks were always known for being dark, if anything he was just following in Sirius’s footsteps. Not that the man was necessarily dark, he’d always seemed too pure for that, but there was no way he was completely light either. Not growing up in this house.
He sighed and picked the nearest book, he needed a way to destroy all of The Dark Lord’s soul pieces at the same time. And well, if that meant he became a little darker than he already was, then maybe it was just his stepping stone to taking his place.
While he respected the values of The Dark Lord, minus the blood purity aspect, he was going about it in the completely wrong way. What they needed was to take control of the Wizamgot and prevent more bills from getting passed that took away the rights of dark wix and creatures.
He cared about them all, he really did, magic was magic regardless of sociality assigned colouring, and the sentient creatures didn’t deserve getting hated on for things out of their control. It was about systematic reform and equality for all.
And thus he began to study. Dobby and Kreacher kept him fed well enough between the two of them, leaving him to study alone unless it was mealtime. He had really expected them to bother him more or even just miss the company, but neither really happened.
It was nice being alone for once.
He couldn’t say that the next few months were exactly exciting, but they certainly weren’t boring either. Yes, he was most definitely neglecting literally every single one of his subjects except for the dark arts, but he also didn’t care. He needed to learn as much as he could now that he was able to.
There were hundreds upon hundreds of books in the black family library with a sizable section of them behind devoted to what would be classified as “the dark arts” even if they hadn’t historically always been known that way.
In all retrospects, it didn’t take that long to find the information he needed to complete the ritual. It was dark, as all soul magic is, but more than that it was dangerous. He knew that his core wasn’t dark enough to help sustain him after the ritual, more likely than not it would take his magic with him.
But that honestly wasn’t the part he was most worried about, soul magic was fickle and trying to destroy someone’s soul even more so. If even just a little bit escaped, then Voldemort would be able to come back still.
So preparation was needed and that he did. He might not survive the ritual that would pull every piece of Voldie’s soul together until it was whole only to collapse in on itself, but he had to at the very least live until the end of it.
Only then would he truly win.
And… perhaps it wasn’t wise at all for him to be preparing to do this with no anchor or experience, but he had to try and he didn’t have the time to spare.
It was almost the end of the school year, afterall. There always had been a certain symbolism in waiting until the end of the school year to nearly get killed once again by Voldemort, so once more really only contributed to tradition.
Continuing to get up and try had, he supposed, always been his strong suit. What was just trying one more thing?
By now, he could safely say that arriving at Hogwarts was one of the least climatic things he’d done since he locked himself away to begin with. It was so easy to just apparate into the forbidden forest and walk right up to the castle under his invisibility cloak. Since he was still technically enrolled as a student, he didn’t even set off any alarms in an act of sheer convenience.
The front doors weren’t even locked, a serious oversight on the school’s part, there were many creatures in the forbidden forest that could’ve very well made their way up to the school.
And it was there he found himself in the middle of the night at the end of May knocking on Professor McGonagall’s study door because he knew that she would surely still be up with the amount of homework she tended to assign at the end of the year. It was only right that he would see her once last time before she decided to forsake him. Afterall, dark magic never was approved of in their society, regardless of what one did with it.
For it being so late, he was honestly surprised to see how fast she opened the door, wand drawn at his throat before slowly lowering, “Potter?”
She glanced out into the hall and quickly grabbed his wrist, pulling him inside her office, the door closing behind him. “What the hell are you doing here, Granger told me you didn’t want anything to do with the war anymore?”
Harry furrowed his brow before scoffing, “What, no. I was doing research in Grimmauld for a ritual to defeat him.”
McGonagall swallowed, “Sit, Potter. You know rituals are dark, correct?”
Harry stiffened, “Yes, I’m well aware. But they didn’t have any leads and this is our best shot.”
“Will anyone else be affected by it other than you and presumably he-who-must-not-be-named?” she asked carefully.
Harry shook his head, “No. Just us.”
McGonagall thought for a moment and pushed a plate of biscuits towards him with a cup of tea, “Have a biscuit, Potter.”
Harry smiled and took the biscuit, “Is the Room of Requirement still available? I’d like to crash there until I can do this tomorrow.”
“I think you’ll find quite a few companions for that, the majority of Gryffindor is currently camped out in there for their own safety, given that the Carrows are teaching. I do believe your friends are also there.”
“Ah. Alright then, I should be off I suppose,” he nodded to her and slid his invisibility cloak over his head.
McGonagall looked rather unamused, “Grab some food from the kitchens before you head down, your elf, Dobby was it?, has been missing as of late and the rest are getting concerned.”
“Sure,” he replied and slid out the door into the hallway, casting a muffling charm on his feet to prevent him from being heard while he walked.
The kitchens were a quick breeze, the house elves were happy to see him and Dobby (who had appeared the moment he entered the kitchens). They also quickly provided him with a few meals to feed him while he was in the castle.
And then he was there in front of the Room like it was just another day with the D.A.. He still missed those days, but there wasn’t really any going back at this point.
After what he planned to do, they likely wouldn’t trust him again. But that was what came with doing what was right. He would win and he would take over the dark and finally move into the peace and equality the world had needed for so long.
Pacing back and forth in front of the door under his cloak, he really had only one thought in mind, “ Show me my friends.”
With a quick glance around the hall, he pulled off his cloak so as to keep it secret and shoved it into his expanding purse with the food the house elves had provided. One breath later, he stepped into the room.
At first, no one so much as glanced at him, the majority of students were asleep and just one more kid coming in during the night wasn’t of any concern.
But there were a few groups of students still up, perhaps most notably a small group of Slytherins near one of the fire places. He recognized most of them from their time as his classmates, but there were a few that he couldn’t place.
Most notably, he spotted Zabini standing with Greengrass. Their families were neutral with darker leanings in the last war, but it was no surprise to him that they were here. They’d had enough whispered conversations in forgotten corridors and their claimed third floor classroom in the middle of the night after nightmares for him to know how they felt about the war.
He slid up behind them, “Greengrass, Zabini, can we talk?” They would help, or at the very least keep the others away.
Zabini jumped a little and flickered his gaze over to Greengrass, “Yeah, sure. I presume you’d like to speak alone?”
“That would be preferred,” Harry responded coolly.
“How does the Gryffindor common room sound? No one stays there anymore since the Carrows took to camping outside.”
Harry nodded and they walked there without incident given the presence of his invisibility cloak.
“I’m going to kill him tomorrow afternoon,” he announced after the common room door had snapped shut and he’d raised several anti-listening spells.
“How? I’m not going to watch you try and charge in there with only a few months of duelling practice on your own,” Greengrass replied immediately after the moment of shock wore off.
He glanced at the stairs, “A soul ritual, it’ll destroy all his horcruxes.”
Zabini pinched his forehead, “You’re not dark enough for that and you know it, Potter. You’re going to kill yourself.”
“Maybe so, but it has to be me. I- I don’t really have a choice.”
“Are you being forced into this against your will? You know we could get you diplomatic immunity and a fake identity if you needed one, we owe you that at the very least,” Greengrass asked.
Harry just shook his head, “No, but why doesn’t matter right now. I’m setting up the circle in the morning and I’ll lure him into it tomorrow. It’ll be in the middle of the forbidden forest. But I need your guy’s help. If you can get Malfoy to help lure him into the forest for me, I can advocate for his family and keep them out of jail. I know that neither of you are particularly close with him, but I need it to be him.”
“I can do it. If nothing else, he trusts me. I’ll bring him down to the lake tomorrow afternoon and explain on the way,” Zabini replied.
Harry nodded thankfully, “I’ve already spoken to McGonagall, she knows it’ll be happening tomorrow but none of the details so if she asks, don’t tell her anything other than that I’ll be in the forest.”
They both nodded.
Harry took a deep breath, “I know we haven’t been the closest, but I appreciate you trusting me on this, throughout everything.”
Zabini opened his mouth, but it was Greengrass that spoke first, “We… We both appreciate your help these last few years. Even if we never speak in the light of day, we do consider you a friend. Should you ever need this, we’re here.”
“And I consider you the same. Please just trust me on this, I know what I’m doing.” Harry gave them a faint smile, “Oh, and please do call me Harry. We’ve certainly known each other long enough.”
As they responded in kind to allow Harry use of their first names, he reflected a bit on why hadn’t this come sooner. They’d known each other for years afterall, whispering sleep deprived secrets between hugs in the forgotten third floor corridor the trio called home at night. Maybe, he thought, it was simply because of their relationship in the daylight. The three of them hadn’t been able to be friends once the daylight brushed the skyline.
Then, they just had to be Potter, the golden child and saviour of light, Greengrass, the political heir of the grey, and Zabini, the diplomatically immune heartthrob. And for them, that was just the way that life was. Who could ever change the very way the world was shaped when it had been like that for so \long?
How would they ever win?
The next morning was loud in comparison to the utter silence of the halls at night. Even through the walls of the dorms, he could hear the few Gryffindors that stayed in their dorms getting up and wandering around to get ready. It was so normal and constant like the sounds had always been there. Like he’d always had them.
After they all wandered off to classes and the halls were quiet once again, he took breakfast out of his bag and snacked on it as he walked down and into the woods.
The ritual circle wasn’t difficult to set up per say, even though it was a lot of blood that he had to sacrifice to great the binds that would trap Voldemort into the circle as soon as he stepped inside.
He’d studied and memorised the exact procedure enough that he could’ve built the circle in his sleep. Then it was really just time to wait.
There wasn’t anything particularly special about the random clearing he’d chosen for the trap, but also just felt right in a way that he couldn’t quite explain. It was like just maybe they were meant to die here. Or at the very least for Voldie to die here. He’d always come out of their encounters suspiciously fine, surely now would be no different, right?
It wasn’t like it really mattered if he died anyways. He had already made his peace with the fact that he would live or die here and there was nothing he could do about it.
It was actually really boring, as it turns out, to sit in the woods for over eight hours awaiting your death, but he’d already gotten this far so there was really no point in turning back.
But, when he could finally hear footsteps approach the clearing, he was at the very least ready.
It was really a dumb decision for Voldemort to step into the circle when he entered the clearing, even though Harry had covered it with leaves there was still a fair amount shown.
Was he that dumb or just really that mindless in his invulnerability?
Nonetheless, he stepped into the circle with Voldemort. “Why hello there,” Harry said with a vicious smile, athame pointed directly at his left arm.
“Potter. Dark doesn’t look good on you, little saviour,” Voldemort responded with the tilt to his head.
Harry snorted, “What? You’re not going to try to stop me?”
Voldemort just laughed, a cold pitched laugh that echoed through the clearing. Malfoy just backed into the treeline. “You’re not dark enough to do anything that could hurt me, Potter.”
Harry just cocked his head at him and plunged the athame into his arm, letting the blood from it flow into the runes written in goat’s blood. “Maybe not, maybe I’ll just die. But I can sure try.”
For just a moment, the world went dark of blood red and a figure appeared before him.
“What do you intend to sacrifice for the destruction of his soul?” the hooded figure cloaked in gold, presumably Death, asked. Harry glanced side to side a bit, observing the plane of darkness they stood in.
“My magic, blood, and should it be necessary, my life,” Harry responded without a second thought. He’d anticipated that something similar would have been asked, the ritual, while not particularly well documented, had been similar enough to other more well documented soul rituals that he understood the reasoning behind why each piece was made.
Death tilted his head at him, “What about your soul? You’re barely dark enough to be seeing me right now, why should I care about your magic or life?”
And that… that was the one thing he hadn’t been fully prepared for. Yes, he’d always told himself that he would likely die from the ritual and he was fully willing to do that. But his soul, that was uncharted territory. Was he really willing to give up his afterlife for now? But then again, he supposed that there wasn’t really a choice.
Harry swallowed, “If that’s what it takes to win, for all of them, I’ll give it up, all of it.”
“You won’t be able to see your friends or family again in the afterlife. You will be stuck in the inbetween helping souls move on similar to the fate of your godfather,” Death told him and watched carefully for his reaction.
“I’d rather be remembered for saving them than failing to save them. This is my only shot,” Harry responded with as much confidence as he could muster.
Death chuckled lowly, “Ah. Very well, then. Your price will be as much of your soul as remains to be needed for the ritual and your magic to complete it.”
“Understood,” Harry bit his lower lip and blinked, the world coming back to.
The moment that the world unblurred, the pain began to hit. It wasn’t the traditional type of pain that would come from a traditional flesh wound, more of a bone deep ache centred in his chest that was clawing at the fibre of his being.
He’d always been a little more than a whole soul, the soul piece that Voldemort had stored in him always clear if he paid enough attention, so now having less than a quarter of his soul hurt more than it probably should have. The ring, the locket, and the journal were all gone now, so every piece earlier destroyed just took more from his own soul.
At the very least, the amount of soul he had left probably wouldn’t matter after he was dead.
Not like he was going to live very long, either. Based on the ache in his chest without his magic to heal him, he’d give himself maybe an hour before the stress on his body from not having a complete soul was too much and he fell asleep never to return.
He was no horcrux that could live on a little smidgen of a soul. For any wix, their soul was instrumental in keeping their body running. He was sure that Voldemort was only still alive due to unicorn blood and a bunch of other potions that Snape was probably making for him.
In front of him, Voldemort seemed to have been going through the same thing, albeit expedited in the process. While Harry had managed to stay upright to see the horrified look on Malfoy’s face, Voldemort was crumpled on the ground clutching his chest.
“You fool,” Voldemort spit out, “You’ve doomed both of us.”
Harry just laughed at him, the most real laugh he’d had in years, “Maybe so, but I still won. Are we both going to die? Absolutely. Does that matter to me in the slightest? Not at all.”
“You’re a psychopath,” Voldemort replied and coughed up something dark.
“Says the guy who released a basilisk in a school full of children. I was always meant to be a martyr, it’s just about that time for me,” Harry deadpanned.
“You’re so young, you’re cutting your own life short,” Voldemort pleaded like there was anything that could be done to reverse it at this point.
“I’ve been tempting fate my entire life just by being alive. This is just the end of my rodeo.” Harry looked Voldemort up and down, “And I do believe that is just about the end of yours as well.”
He walked up to Voldemort and stood about a foot from him, “Goodbye, Tom.”
He kicked Voldemort in the head.
The man fell backwards, neck muscles weak enough that they couldn’t even handle the force of his foot.
Harry kneeled next to him and checked his pulse.
Not present.
“Well that was anticlimactic,” he said, mostly to himself.