Chapter 105: A Clash of Wills
"Wingardium Leviosa !" And remember, swish-and-flick, he could hear Flitwick's voice. The levitation spell kicked in, causing him to hover in mid-air, and Voldemort's curses, which had been aimed at the spot he would have occupied, missed by a few feet.
Harry smirked as he glanced down past his feet at Voldemort's face, imagining the surprise that wasn't showing on the snake-like visage. The levitation spell took an amount of energy proportional to the weight and height of the object levitated - human levitation usually took ridiculous amounts of power, which was usually why it wasn't done. With his new wand, however, Harry had felt confident to try.
"What are you playing at, Potter!" Voldemort screeched on the ground and shot a killing curse up at Harry, but his target dodged aside as he levitated himself around.
"Why don't you come up here, Tom?" Harry smirked. " Accio Voldemort!"
With a startled yell, the dark lord rose into the air with surprising speed - like the levitation spell, the summoning spell was designed for small items, and summoning something as large and heavy as a person took tremendous amounts of energy, but Harry mused it was well worth the look of surprise on Voldemort's face as he shot past him, high up into the air. And this time, the surprise did show, even as Harry slowly levitated himself to the ground.
" Ventulus !" A gust of wind slammed into Voldemort, buffetting him around in the air above the rooftops, and Harry continued the flowing wand motion into the next spell, with a muttered " Sonitus Laedo ." The shockwave exploding from his wand rattled windows for blocks around and disrupted Voldemort's attempt at casting the killing curse in retaliation.
When his feet touched the ground, Harry dispelled the levitation charm, and raised all of the shield spells he could think of, because when Voldemort came back - and Harry had no doubt that he would, and when he did, he would be pissed - he would need them. True to his prediction, a number of dark curses started raining from the sky, forcing Harry to seek shelter, as he didn't exactly want to test the effectiveness of his shields against an angry Voldemort's curses just yet.
" Arresto Momentum !" The yell echoed across the street, and Voldemort came to a stop an inch above the ground, his eyes wide with rage. "Potter! You will pay !" The hail of spells that followed caused Harry to duck back into cover; Voldemort was truly enraged, and the skill he was displaying, arraying spell after spell, weaving them so tightly together without pause, was frightening. Harry had known that Voldemort was powerful, and the dark wizard had had decades to hone his duelling skills, but this - he was chaining spells so quickly that there was no opening, no chance to get in a counter-attack.
" Procella !"
The spell swept across the battlefield out of nowhere, the hurricane force wind tearing through the street. Voldemort was caught up in the middle of casting a spell and was forced to abandon it to barely remain standing, and Harry let out a sigh of relief as he spotted Albus Dumbledore standing at the other end of the street, Order members and a squad of Aurors behind him.
"Dumbledore!" Voldemort howled in anger as the old mage strode towards him.
"You're surrounded, Tom," Dumbledore said quietly.
"I can still kill your golden boy." Jabbing his wand at the doorway Harry had sought cover in, Voldemort snarled as he began a spell. Dumbledore was casting, himself, when the dark lord disappeared with a crack, the spell he had been building dissipating harmlessly into the air.
"It was a feint," Dumbledore mumbled with a hint of anger as he looked around the carnage that surrounded them. Corpses of Death Eaters and Trazkaban sorcerers were littering the ground, while the remainder of Hiscophney's people and Potter's Legion were bringing in the captives from the other interception points. Neville and the Count were approaching Harry, ignoring Dumbledore's questioning glance.
"I'm sorry," was the first thing Harry said to Hiscophney as soon as they were close enough. "You lost a lot of people today because of me."
The Count waved it off. "That is the nature of warfare. We pledged our alliance to you, and we will uphold it. Voldemort is evil and must be stopped - and every one of them gave their lives gladly to see to it that he will be."
"We only lost people here," Neville told Harry. "I checked right after you and Voldemort started fighting. All of Potter's Legion are alive and accounted for, even if some are a bit worse for wear."
"How so?" Harry asked
"Scratches and bruises, a nothing major. I think Parvati was off the worst - she caught a bludgeoning hex in her shoulder, and it's dislocated. Nothing Madam Pomfrey can't fix."
"And," Hiscophney added, "we only lost six men today. We captured twenty-three Death Eaters, killed five, and you injured Voldemort."
Harry frowned. "But I didn't! None of my spells even came close to hitting him, not with that shield of his."
"Maybe not physically," Hiscophney laughed, "but you definitely injured his pride. You were duelling well, for someone with so little experience, my lord."
"Harry!" All three turned at the sound of Tonk's voice as she hurried over along with Kinglsey.
"Tonks! You're late," Harry greeted her. "Kingsley," he nodded at the older Auror.
"Sorry, Potter," Kingsley replied, "we got the message from the Minister, but there were a lot of bureaucrats trying to hold us back. We had to go behind their backs and talk to Dumbledore to get Order support in order to get the go for the deployment."
Harry's eyes widened in fear, but Tonks spoke before he could voice them. "Don't worry, we didn't tell them where the information was from. We just told them we had it from a reliable source that we could pinpoint Voldemort's next attack. After all, Hermione did it before, right?"
"She did this one, too," Harry told her with a grin. The grin died when he saw Dumbledore walking over towards them. "Count, please tend to your people. The injured can be cared for at the fortress - Neville, if the injured from your group want to come along, they're welcome to, have the Count tell you how to use the emergency portkeys we set up."
The two nodded, understanding that Harry wanted his discussion with Dumbledore to be private, and left to tend to their people. Kingsley and Tonks caught the look, as well, and excused themselves to see to the captured Death Eaters.
"Harry," Dumbledore greeted him neutrally.
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