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“You should not have come here tonight, Harry Potter.”
Harry let out a huff of air through his nose, mouth turned up in a thin smile. He swiped his foot over the leaves in front of him, revealing a shimmering ring in the undergrowth below as the leaves were shifted out of the way.
“No?” he asked, bending down and snatching up the ring – he slipped it onto his ring finger, spinning it three-quarters of a turn with his thumb and catching the bulky capstone with his pinky, completing a full revolution. “Why’s that?”
“Mars is bright tonight,” Firenze said, apropos of nothing – he turned his head up to the sky, as Bane and Ronan had done all those years ago. “Unusually bright.”
“Mmm,” Harry agreed, nodding his head sagely. “Of course, of course. Am I to take it that’s because of me, this time, and not Tom?”
Firenze said nothing, instead choosing to paw at the ground with his front-right hoof.
“I thought so.”
Firenze’s muscled torso shimmered in the moonlight as he walked over to Harry, whose hand delved into his pocket as the centaur approached. He came to a stop five paces in front of Harry, head angled down to face him from his great height.
“It is not my duty to write the fates, Harry Potter; regardless, I would advise you to reconsider. Hallowed or hated, no man is invincible – you will fall just the same as those who came before you. To believe otherwise is to be in error.”
“I don’t think I ever said anything about being invincible,” Harry countered, withdrawing a slender, yellow-white wand from his robes. “And neither did you. ‘Mars is bright tonight’ – that means war, yeah? Well, they’ll have war, alright – and the war will have me if that’s what it takes.”
Firenze took a step back from Harry. His dark eyes were focused, assessing him with great scrutiny – his tail flicked and he let out a small sigh.
“Then it is so,” he muttered. “Far be it from me to stop you. Mars is bright tonight,” he echoed before turning his back on Harry and cantering away into the woods.
Harry spun the ring around his finger again, with his wand trapped between his forefinger and his middle – he listened to the fading beat of Firenze’s hooves until the only sound in the forest was the rustling of leaves above and below him.
He spun the ring again.
With a whoosh, two figures emerged from the capstone – he watched with pursed lips as they arranged themselves into the familiar faces of his two best friends, both outfitted with identical expressions of concern.
“Harry…”
“Mate…”
“Don’t,” Harry said, cutting across them both. “Just… don’t. I’m doing it, whether you like it or not. I just thought it was the right thing to let you know.”
Hermione raised her curled fist to her mouth, biting nervously at her nails, while Ron gave a single, defeated nod.
“Good luck,” he bid.
Harry returned the nod before swiping his thumb over the capstone of the ring – Ron and Hermione dissipated into nothingness like so much snow in the rain.
“Till we meet again,” he whispered into the air, before withdrawing a star-spun cloak from his robes. He wrapped it around his shoulders and pulled it down over his head, disappearing like a thief into the night.
“Mars is bright tonight,” his disembodied voice murmured.
The forest did not respond to his words – the only thing heralding his retreat was the soft crunch of leaves underfoot.