Blood-Soaked Succession Chapter 25 (Patreon)

Chapter 25: Flight of the Hogwarts Express

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Harry, and presumably his three companions, were finally upon the Hogsmeade train station. He had somehow forgotten how far out in the boonies the Hog’s Head was. Ironic, considering they originally went there because it was so out of the way.

This was why he planned to have everyone go through the caved in passage, it led directly to the train station and James’ shade had told him how to excavate it. They had caved it in on purpose and there was a method to undoing it.

“Are you all still with me?” Aberforth called out.

“Yes.” Said Lavender.

“Yes.” Said Daphne.

“Of Course.” Said Harry.

He looked back the way they had come, concerned by the lack of resistance or even a close calls, and saw that the golden dome of Hogwarts’ ward had fallen. So, the fighting was well underway now. That and the edge of Hogsmeade was now on fire. The dead, dry grass and such near the Hogs Head didn’t react well to Aberforth burning his house down as they left.

With all of the Death Eaters and ministry workers focused on Hogwarts, nobody seemed to be trying to put it out. Were they going to leave all of Hogsmeade in cinders just because nobody noticed it was burning down? He hoped not, but it was too late for them to turn back and do something about it.

“Do you think we should maybe report the fire?” Harry asked aloud as they approached the station doors.

“Nope.” Said Abe as he let his disillusionment fall.

Harry looked around and, indeed, there was no sign of any human activity near the station. He could hear plenty of canons and the sound of a lot of spell fire far off in the distance, but nobody nearby. He let his own disillusionment charm collapse as Lavender and Daphne did the same.

He then walked up to the teller window and knocked on the metal panels covering it. The grills slid open and a familiar blonde face appeared in the window.

“Welcome to Hogsmeade Station.” Said Seamus. “What can I do for you?”

“Four tickets for the Hogwarts Express out of here, if you would be so kind.” Harry requested.

“One senior discount and three adults. That’ll be one galleon. A gold one, not the boat.” Seamus said cheekily.

Ah yes. There had been one of those on the lake, hadn’t there?

Harry removed the galleon from his necklace and handed it to Seamus, who confirmed that it was the real enchantment by touching his own to it, then nodded at the space next to Harry.

Neville, Bill, Dean and George all materialized, having clearly been disillusioned with wands pointed at all four of their heads. Just in case they were impostors, which was unlikely but best to be safe. They lowered their wands and ushered them through the now unlocked doors.

“Hurry! We have the train fully loaded, but it’s got a bit more charging to go.” Mr Weasley, who had been waiting on the other side.

“How much is a bit?” Harry asked as he marched with his soldiers.

Then he saw her, and how busy his men had been. The Ford Anglia was strapped down to the coal cart between the locomotive and first passenger cart. And the girls had decided to start painting the train itself to match the light blue of the car while they applied a fine layer of protective enchantments around its hull.

Luna and Astoria, along with their little posse of teenage girls were nearly done manually applying sections of rust and chipped paint to make it match the warn surface. Fleur was nearly finished enchanting the rear of the last cart. It positively glowed and hummed with magic. Whatever wards or charms she had layered, he looked forward to the first of his enemies testing it out.

“It feels like sacrilege to see them doing that to her.”Harry commented. “I already miss the candy red.”

“Yeah. But it kept the ladies occupied and calm.” Said Mr Weasley. “And more importantly, out of way while we got everything situated. Once everyone is inside it should only be thirty minutes before it’s ready to take off.”

“If we have that long.” Said Harry.“Prepare for a fight all the same.”

“I mean, we could probably get it done faster if we cook some jumper cables to your nipples and use you like a magical battery.” Said Aberforth.

“That’s what I said!” George complained.

Daphne and Lavender looked scandalized at the joke, but whether it what out of affection to him or just being plain offended bby its borderline sexual nature, he couldn’t tell.

“It’s a thought. For now, put a pit on it and lead me inside to see what we’re working with.” Harry ordered. Then as an after thought, turned on Bill. “Make sure to silence or at least quite the engine.”

He nodded and advanced onto the engine proper while they went into the mouth of the front carriage they went, into what was once the prefects meeting room and Slug Club much to do. It was much bigger now. They had unleashed the enchantments to expand the interior space. Enchantments that had gone unused for many decades, since the days when the Hogwarts school year consisted not of dozens of new witches and wizards, but well over a hundred. It was now four times as large as he remembered it, and it was stacked with boxes and dressers and footlockers.

Ginny, Garrick and Griphook were in there sorting through vial and bottle after vial and bottle of potions. He recalled how Slughorn had warned him that potions aged past their expiration date can become more potent, or develop unexpected side effects. There was no telling how long some of those had been marinating in the room of requirement, sans their creator properly labeling and dating them. Could have been years, decades or centuries.

“We’re going to try and turn this into an infirmary, if we have enough time before takeoff, in the meantime we’re putting all of them potions we found in the ROR in here to examine.” Seamus explained. “Some of them could be useful, either in application or misapplication.”

Harry nodded and motioned to go on. He trusted the people present to be careful.

Then walked past the empty confectionery stand and into the next cart. He noticed that the bathroom stalls had also been expanded. Harry appreciated that half of the work they needed to do to make their flying fortress livable was already done and just required changing the train settings from “Normal” to “Maximum” internal space. Seamus led him to the first of the twenty rooms on the cart on the left.

“Hi Harry.” Cho, Parvati and Marietta greeted him in unison.

Their carriage was filled to the brim with jewelry. Watches, necklaces, rings, tiaras, bracelets, earrings, rings that were probably meant to be inserted into other orifices and much much more. There were even jeweled hair ribbons and the occasional engagement ring.

“We’re testing all of these for curses or enchantments.” Marietta said.

“So far, most don’t.” Parvati said. “I’m guessing most of it was just hidden there because it was stolen and they didn’t want to get caught with it, only to not be able to reach the room.”

Harry agreed with her assessment.

“You be careful with all of those. I’ve had bad run-ins with cursed jewelry.” Harry warned.

“We remember Katie too, Harry.” Lavender told him. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll join them.”

He nodded his permission and continued on his way, sharing a long look with Cho as he passed.

The rest of the carts were filled mostly with clothes and books. Each was stuffed so full of them that there wasn’t even standing room. Thank goodness there was more than enough space in the four remaining empty carts for everybody.

“If we hadn’t brought along all of this crap, do you think the reduction in weight would have hastened the amount of charge the train needs to fly?” Harry asked.

“Only a little bit. The weight pales in comparison to the many tonnes of steel.” Arthur told him. “But they may have arrived here upwards of ten minutes sooner. But no point in crying about that.”

Harry agreed.

They moved onto the next train cart to see everyone else hard at work. All of the remaining carts were being made into living spaces. The seats and overheads were being transfigured into beds, with upwards of eight along each wall.

“You are all doing amazing work.” Harry said. “It’s already feeling like a real flying fortress. Our warship in the sky.”

Something nagged at him though. He did a mental head count of the people he’d seen thus far, and came up short.

“I assigned to you a masked woman and instructed you to treat her as my second in command in the event she took charge.” Harry said. “Where is she?”

“The mystery girl vanished when you-know-who showed up. She said she’d handle it. We figured she went straight to you and let you know.” George told him. “Oh by the way, Voldemort showed up then left. We believe he headed for Azkaban.”

“I am Aware. I also sent other people to deal with it, but I didn’t know she took initiative.” Harry said. “If she says she’s handling it, consider it handled.”

Despite his reassurances, he worried. Hermione was the bravest, smartest and one of the most skilled people he ever knew in his entire life. But against Voldemort? By herself? Whatever she was planning, he trusted in her judgment. But still, she was one of only two people he positively could not afford to have fall into Voldemort’s hands.

Now that she and Wormtail were resurrected properly, they could just ditch their bodies like Ron could, and those three were full of every secret that could lose the war if Voldemort got their hands on them.

And so, he worried.

-

Fred tackled his own mother through a door and out of the way of an oncoming spell. They tumbled into the squishy, yet simultaneously crunchy, fungi that they had spent so much time burning away.

They should have tried burning it away faster, because they’d yet to find any intricately carved slab of stone that ought to be housing the wards. Now Voldemort was here. Speaking of, he put his wand to his throat for a sonorus.

“Voldemort is here!” He yelled.

The walls reverberated with his words, and the retaliatory laughter from he-whom-he-just-named.

“That wouldn’t be Fred Weasley, would it?” The Dark Lord’s voice,  a bit distant from down the hall and down the corner. “That’s a shame. I quite liked your shop. I left it alone for so long for a reason. The laughs you bring me are wonderful, but is it enough to warrant sparing your life? I am not too sure. I’m sure we’ll find out soon.”

Boy, he sure was chatty wasn’t he? In the time he was yapping away, his mother had silence the wall behind them and blasted it apart. She dragged him through and lit the room of fungi behind them on fire.

They entered a large sub-chamber filled with far larger stalks of the fungal growths. These ones twitched and vibrated, alive with activity in the oval shapes atop their stalks. They lit these ones on fire too, so that all around them was bright red, orange and yellow.

“We have to hurry!” His mother whispered, her voice audibly changed by the bubble head charm. “We can’t fight him, but he can destroy the ward stone and escape.”

They were both still wearing their portkeys. If they survived long enough to use them, it would be a miracle.

Then there came a loud series of sounds from the fires they had just lit, the sound of squelching and cracking mixed together. He recognized it from landing on some of the fungus just moment ago, but never this loud.

They turned back towards the now lit chamber to see there were dozens of the tall stalks peppered around a large, rectangular shape covered in more of the fungi. The ovals at the top of them were shattering open and spilling forth a rancid-looking liquid into the first, and limbs burst forth after them. They were all scab and teeth.

He had so been hoping not to bear witness to a dementor’s birth today, and yet here he was seeing a lot of them all at once. Worse, they were clearly premature, and their half-formed limbs were fat and sloppy like a babies. Their heads? Those were cleft, like a skull caved in with an ax and had something like a proboscis coming out.

“We have to go!” He yelled.

They ran. Away from the hole in the wall and away from the aborted, but still kicking, dementor babies. With the light of the inferno they could see a grand staircase on either end of the chamber and they made for the right. Upon climbing the first step, he stopped, and turned around.

His mother, who had held his hand as they ran, stopped with him and looked back.

He was staring at the fungus-covered something in the middle of the chamber. The thing that the dementors seemed to be centered on. If he were a betting man…

“Bombarda!” He yelled, pointing his wand at the rectangular shape.

His blasting curse obliterated a layer of fungus along with a nice chunk of the stone beneath. Said stone range like a gong and emitting sharp rays of light from the wound. The air began to spark with magic, like cables being snapped.

“So. Found the ward stone.” Fred told his mom.

They both leveled their wands on it and rained explosion hexes. The newborn dementors, dumb and feble and confused by the light and heat, did nothing save flop around and scream pitifully. Or, it would have been pitifully if they weren’t so disgusting.

The the wall they had entered through came crashing down. The entire wall. Twenty meters high and wide of stone shattered as if hit by a sledgehammer. Said sledgehammer was the snake-faced bastard that walked through the new hole and levied his wand on them.

He automatically stood in front of his mother and pushed her back, up the stairs, but need not have bothered. One of the babbling baby dementors pounds upon Voldemort, going for the kiss, thus sending his killing curse wide.

Voldemort grasped the abomination by the throat, seemed to stare it directly in its soul, and the creator evaporated into dust.

Fred was so busy gaping at the impossible thing he just saw, somebody killing a dementor, that he didn’t register the final blasting curse his mother sent at the wardstone until he felt her grab him by the  shoulder and activate her portkey.

Just in time too, the last thing he saw of Azkaban was Voldemort sending another killing curse their way.

They landed on the grass just outside of Malfoy Manor’s wards. They were the first to arrive, but seconds later Cresspool, Hopkirk and Yaxley arrived too and then came dozens more. They all sprinted the last distance to enter the safety of Malfoy manor and Fred, for his part, collapsed as soon as he did so.

Laying flat on his back he canceled the bubble head charm so as to breeth the fresh air the smell of recently cut grass. Oh god, it was good to be alive.

He was breathing so hard you’d think he just ran a marathon, and so was everybody else.

“So.” Said Cresspool. “What was up with the boats? Nobody told me that part of the plan.”

Everybody was looking at him for an answer as the head of the operation.

“Um. Boats? What boats?” He asked.

-

Voldemort reappeared in Hogsmeade, right in front of the train station. Azkaban may have been lost, but he’d be damned if he didn’t get to lend a hand to prevent Potter’s escape.

Upon arriving he had to blink in confusion, for he found himself surrounded by the same glow and heat he had just escaped from in the subterranean chambers of Azkaban.

Why was Hogsmeade on fire?

A few moments later Bellatrix arrived, having gotten his message to retreat to Hogsmeade.

“Your arm, Bella.” He commanded.

She offered him her dark mark and he pressed his want to the tip of the tongue. In doing so, he summoned all of his Death Eaters to him. They would be feeling the most intense burn, which he reserved for moments like this.

As such, it took a mere moment for them to begin arriving. They too seemed surprised by the fire around them.

“Why is Hogsmeade on fire?” He demanded of Macnair, the first to arrive.

“I… I don’t know my lord, the fighting never reached here.” Macnair said.

That didn’t add up. Either Hogwarts and Azkaban was the distraction and Potter’s real target was burning Hogsmeade down, or there was something else he wasn’t seeing. What was the gameplan here?

The others of his inner circle began appearing, including Severus.

“Did they escape? I see the wards, save apparition, are down.” He demanded.

“Some did, my lord.” Severus told him. “An armada of ships invaded by the black lake before the wards went up, and they took a contingent of younger students away. Potter was witnessed meeting with them, but then returned to the castle.”

Voldemort hummed. That could only be Viktor Krum. They had lost them a couple days ago, now he knew they had been headed. But that meant the older students, including all of the members of Dumbledore’s Army, were still in the castle. Was his real goal to get them out?

“Any word on his activities while there? Also, the rest of you can feel free to start putting out fires whenever the inclination strikes you.” Voldemort groused.

The others rushed away to do exactly that while Severus continued.

“He attacked and killed Sybil Trelawney.” Severus said.

Voldemort actually gaped at that revelation. Potter really had descended if he would orchestrate all of this just to assassinate that wretch of a woman. The motivations were obvious. It was her prophecy that had ruined her life. But why kill her? Unless…

“Did she ever make any other prophecies?” Voldemort demanded.

“One, my lord. On the night Wormtail escaped Hogwarts, one foretelling of your return.” Severus answered.

No. That couldn’t be right. If Potter deemed it so important to murder the woman, it must have been vital information that she could not be trusted with. Perchance somebody else made a prophecy to her? Or she had divined something substantial that could change the war. Dumbledore had gone to such extremes to protect her from him back when she mattered. With Albus’ death nobody knew the exact wording of the prophecy any longer. Unless she had somehow recalled it?

“Then Potter and his army are still within the castle?” Voldemort asked.

“No sign of them leaving was reported, and I had all secret passages that exit being watched.” Severus said. “All of the guards are accounted for, all of the portraits and ghosts report no movement. We were scouring the castle when you arrived.”

Voldemort nodded.

“If theyre still there, find them. Unless they were polyjuiced as children to escape.” Voldemort said. “In the meantime, make sure all of my followers children are safe and accounted for, and put out those fires. Potter takes priority after that, but…”

Then he stopped. Wormtail was their source for all of the secret passages out of Hogwarts. Wormtail had never truly been on his side. This much was proven very recently. Potter, who had both Wormtail and a portrait of Sirius Black, two Marauders who discovered all there was to know about Hogwarts passages.

“There is another secret passage out of Hogwarts.” Voldemort declared. “Potter and his followers are here. In Hogsmeade. They started the fire, likely in a fight when they were discovered.”

“But my lord, if they reached Hogsmeade they could have apparated or portkeyed away.” Severus said. “What makes you think they’re still…”

He was interrupted by an earthquake, or else what felt like one. The noise of steel, glass and wood shattering by the ton erupted from behind him.

He turned around to see the entire roof of the Hogsmeade train station get torn away as the Hogwarts express, now offensively blue instead of the lovely candy red, shot into the sky. Had they planted charges on the train to blow it up? Why?!

“How in the hell did they enchant that to fly?” Severus asked, as stunned as him.

Oh. It was flying. That made more sense than planting enough explosives to level a city block.

“After them!” Voldemort commanded as the last of the train carts followed the engine skyward.

He leapt up and flew towards where he could now feel Potter’s presence emanating from. He was trying to break into his mind through their unnatural connection, but he blocked him out.

Then he noticed it. Every window was opened, and from each one came an arm holding a wand. As one they cast and the bright green light and Voldemort flinched. He tried to fly back away as fast as he could, but all he could do to protect himself was conjure a block of granite the size of avolkswagon in front of him, but he knew it wouldn’t be able to tank all of the killing curses if all of their aims were any good.

The green lights clashed into the barrier and went right through it, and right through him. When he remained in his body he realized he had misjudged the spell they cast, but he couldn’t see anything but the bright green light enveloping him from all directions.

He reached out for his connection to Potter to try and follow him through it, but now Potter was somehow blocking it entirely. He had taken the bait just to have it yanked away at the last second.

He flew back to the ground, the only direction visible, and landed among the sharp steel, glass and stone fragments of the train station. When he looked up again it was to see a sky full of dark marks.

There were at least thirty of them. Every single person aboard that train had cast his mark at once to hide them in their escape into the cloudy night. Now his own mark was painted onto every single cloud as if laughing at him.

Potter had done it. He had stolen his mark to use as his own weapon. It now held no more power for Lord Voldemort, save for self-mockery.

He had lost on every front this night.

-

Harry smiled as he stood up from his meditative pose. He opened his eyes to see the front cart was filling fast with all of the laughing faces of Dumbledore’s army as they came tumbling in.

“The look on his face.” Harry told them.“I couldn’t see it, but I could feel it.”

The gathered were still looked to be on edge and worried. Even Aberforth looked apprehensive, bent over some container and hands at the ready to open it. Arthur’s next question revealed why.

“Okay, so we escaped, but what about the others?” Arthur asked.

“A few dozen died at Azkaban, mostly prisoners, but Molly and Fred survived. Aside from that? Everyone is home free.” Harry announced.

The cheering that erupted at his news could have very well revealed them in the sky if they were being followed, even with the fortress invisible and her engines silenced. Arthur, Bill and Fred did not join in on the cheering.

Aberforth flipped the lid to his container and withdrew the firewhiskey and glasses. Then noted the number of people and went for his wand, charming the many glasses and drinks to come out and fill themselves for everyone.

“Where to now, oh Undesireable Number One!” He heard Ginny yell over the hooting and hollering.

Now even he was smiling and laughing at the atmosphere.

“Wherever we want!” Harry declared. “Our flying fortress can take us anywhere! Or it can remain in the sky for as long as we want, undetected. Anywhere with train tracks shall be our landing strip.”

Fleur came up from behind and kissed him on the cheek before whispering surruptitiously into his ear.

“We should probably get in touch with Viktor’s forces first, and stock this places with supplies. Food, brooms, medical supplies, real bedding. Unload all of this crap once it’s sorted.” She said. “Take us to Chateua Delacour.”

Harry nodded.

“Arthur! Take us to France.” Harry ordered.

“Don’t tell me. Your cousin’s the one who’s driving.” Arthur shrugged.

Harry felt the blood drain from his face.

Dudley didn’t have a drivers license.

-

Voldemort waited for the room to stop spinning. Literally.

Each of the twelve doors was marked with the insignia of the department behind it. One held a brain, one held a skull, one held an hourglass, and so forth. He marched through the one bearing a leaf with a drop of dew on it.

Inside he found all of the people he came to see. All about them were preserved corpses of different organisms, animal, plant and other. Living plants and moss hung from every shelf and free space on the ceiling, and at the far end of the Life Chamber were twelve hooded figures, garbed entirely in grey.

They stood up as he approached and bowed.

“Good evening Lord Voldemort.” Said the one in the middle. “On congratulations on your promotion to Minister of Magic and Chief Warlock to the International Confederation of Wizards.”

God, what a moutful. How did Albus get on with things when it took people so long to say his titles? And that was without him also taking up th role as Headmaster he wanted. Severus would have to handle that for some time then.

“It was a promotion, but me cutting the charade and revealing myself properly. Now, I assume you all know why I summoned you all?” Voldemort said.

As one, they shrugged. His inability to make out their expressions behind those hoods was already infuriating him. Why weren’t Death Eaters, they didn’t get to hide their faces in his presence.

“Remove your hoods.” He commanded.

They did so. It was pointless, because as Minister of Magic and Chief Warlock he knew their identities. Along with the identities of other unspeakables in this and other departments in member countries. But it was good to put faces to their names. His eyes zeroed in on the Head Unspeakable of Life.

“Nicholas Flamel.” He said.

“Yes?” The deceptively youthful man who looked fresh out of Hogwarts asked.

“Your recent project, the shapeshifter. I finished reading the report on its effectiveness.” Voldemort told him. “I am impressed. Can you make more? Can you make them better?”

“I can do that and so much more, and so can my compatriots. But we have been so underfunded these last couple decades.” Nicholas told him. “And the red tape on our experiments has made progress slow.”

“Consider all projects fully funded, and all red tape cut.” Voldemort told them. “All projects useful to the purposes of war are hereby given priority. Do whatever it takes, just bring me Harry Potter’s head!”

-

FINISHED!

It’s over. Thus ends part one of Blood-Soaked Succession. It is halfway done. The other half might be published as a second story, we will see.

In the meantime, I hope this was a worthwhile ending to the arc. Wanted it to have a somewhat happier ending, since the second half will have nothing redeeming about it for anybody.

Gabrielle Delacour Wrath of the Unmaker would technically be part 3, while Fable of the Lightning Struck Hero would be part 4.