Chapter XXXVI – The Battle of Hogsmeade

The Students of S.A.V.E. were ready; third and fourth years got into groups of about ten and members with Portkeys activated them taking these younger students to the hospital wing.

There, those training as healers helped Madam prepared for casualties, others move to get the first and second years who weren't in town back to the great hall where the trained third years, under the supervision of teachers, took assigned defensive positions at the windows and doors of the hall in case the castle was also attacked.

Trained fourth years went to positions on the walls and towers to look for any sign of Death Eaters trying to enter the grounds, and to defend the castle if necessary.

In the center of town, the remaining approximately three hundred fifth, sixth, and seventh years formed a defensive circle as the Death Eaters began moving in shooting spells at the students who began firing back.

All S.A.V.E. members knew the killing curse couldn't be blocked by shields and were trained to levitate objects in front of them to block.

From a nearby hillside, Voldemort looked down on the town and smiled. His plan couldn't have worked any better; the outnumbered and untrained students were surrounded and couldn't hold out very long against his Death eaters.

When the students were all dead, and he controlled the town, he could order an attack against what would be an almost defenseless castle without worrying about re-enforcements from the ministry Apparating in behind his Death Eaters.

He knew that a large number of troops needed an open area like the streets of a town to Apparate in an organized way. A person, or even a few people could Apparate into the forest or onto a mountainside; but a hundred Aurors could not do so effectively.

Apparation theory proved that, because of something called Quantum fluctuations; a person could not accidentally Apparate into a solid object like a tree or into another person in a particular space.

Once his Death Eaters held the open spaces of the town, if a large number ministry Aurors tried to Apparate into the nearby forest, the trees, bushes, and boulders would force the Aurors because of Quantum fluctuations to be spread out over a large area.

That would make it difficult for them to form an effective fighting unit. They would be force to either spend a great deal of time to reorganize, and his Death Eaters could attack them before they could get organized; or, the Aurors would have to attack the Death Eaters piecemeal; then his Death Eaters could destroy them a few at a time.

Yes, Voldemort was happy the way his attack was working out.

Harry and Ginny teleported from their position at the Three Broomsticks to a position behind the Death Eaters on the road back to Hogwarts, Ron and Hermione did the same on the far end of the road, and Luna and Neville went onto a side street. Just for a situation like this, Dumbledore had taught them how to cast anti-apparation and anti-Portkey spells.

Now, they cast what they called their donut defense. From these positions behind the Death Eaters, they raised the spells over the heads of the Death Eaters forming the donut to prevent them from escaping. The center of the town was left open, the donut hole, so wounded students could still Portkey out.

The perimeter of the town was also left open because Dumbledore had arranged a surprise in the event there was an attack, in minutes, more than a hundred Aurors that were waiting at the ministry Apparated to points surrounding the town.

Ginny and Harry then began firing lethal spells into the back of the Death Eaters on their street. It had been decided earlier in a conference between Dumbledore and the six teens that with most of the students only partially trained and without combat experience, using anything other than lethal spells would allow the Death Eaters the time to kill many students.

Cutting curses, Bludgeoning curses, Blood Boiling curses, and strong stunners directed to the left sides of the Death Eaters' backs to stop their heart, dropped eight of the approximately seventy-five in this group before one of the men saw another next to him fall. He yelled and nine or ten masked figures turned to face Harry and Ginny.

Two of the Death Eaters now facing them were Lucius Malfoy and Bellatrix Lestrange. Lucius spotted the teens first and went straight for them firing killing curses.

Harry dodged Malfoy's curses, keeping him busy while Ginny teleported twenty feet to the left. With their mental connection, they timed it so Harry fired a cutting curse that destroyed Malfoy's shield and before he could reform it, Ginny hit him with the Entrail expelling curse.

Her only regret was the fighting didn't give her time to enjoy her revenge on the person that gave her the diary four years ago.

Bellatrix saw Lucius die and saw who killed him; she killed the Auror she had been fighting and went after Ginny. Ginny teleported from spot to spot, not giving her a chance to hit her with a killing curse. When Ginny saw the opening, they reversed roles with her blasting Bellatrix's shield to collapse it and Harry hitting her with a cutting curse. She screamed as her body was sliced in half and fell to the ground.

Ron and Hermione had a similar experience against about forty-five Death Eaters that entered the town form the far side. They killed six before getting noticed and having a group turn to begin firing back.

On their side street, Luna and Neville found themselves in back of only fifteen Death Eaters entering the town from the mountainside. These particular Death Eaters must have been new recruits, because after Luna and Neville eliminated seven and the others finally noticed they were being attacked from behind, they tried activating their Portkey necklaces instead of fighting back.

When they discovered the anti-Portkey spells wouldn't allow them out, they panicked, and it only took minutes for Luna and Neville to eliminate the rest.

While the six teens were attacking the rear ranks of Death Eaters from three sides, the main battle with the students in the center of the town continued. Smaller numbers of Death Eaters were between buildings, firing on the main student body.

After cleaning up their group, Luna, and Neville teleported to the back of the shops on their side of town and moved in on the back of these small groups. They killed three Death Eaters in one spot, two in another alley, four more between two buildings.

While Harry and Ginny, and Ron and Hermione were dueling the Death Eaters that turned to fight them, members of the Order of the Phoenix apparated into the edges of the town to join the fight. The Death Eaters were now caught between the students in the center of town and the newly arrived troops.

When Voldemort saw the arrival of the new fighters, and that his Death Eaters were pinned between the two forces, he amplified his voice and ordered a retreat.

Death Eaters who were being fired on from the center ring of students, and now from the perimeter of Aurors, tried to activate their Portkeys but the wards wouldn't allow it. Some tried to Apparate out, but anti-Apparation wards wouldn't allow that either.

Many Death Eaters were killed because they couldn't produce shields in front of them and behind them at the same time; however a number of students had also been killed or wounded. Trained teams of students used their Portkey chords to send the wounded to the hospital wing for treatment; each chord was tied to the wrist or ankle of a dead student, moving the bodies out of the combat area.

From the hillside, Voldemort was too far away to destroy the wards trapping his Death Eaters; so he was about to teleport himself down to the streets where he would be able to remove them when Dumbledore Apparated in front of him.

In their plan for defending against an attack on a Hogsmeade weekend, there were five major parts. First was the defensive circle in the town center to protect the students. Second was the attack on the rear of the Death Eaters. Third, Dumbledore was to be watching for Voldemort and, if he showed up, keeping him busy so he couldn't remove the wards trapping the Death Eaters. Fourth was finding Nagini and killing the snake Horcrux. Last, but most importantly, was finally killing Voldemort.

The first two parts were going well and now, the third part of the plan began. Dumbledore said, "Your plan has failed Tom; your troops are being eliminated."

Voldemort was furious and fired the killing curse at Dumbledore who simply stepped out of the way and fired a cutting curse back at Voldemort. The two continued to duel, hopefully, long enough to allow the Death Eaters to be wiped out.

In the center of town, things were starting to look bad. The oldest and best-trained members of S.A.V.E. had taken the outside of the circle, and as a result, they received the most injuries. As they were wounded and evacuated to the hospital; the lesser trained people that took their places weren't able to keep the fire; and the size of the circle shrank.

As a result, more Death Eaters were able to turn and face to outside attack by the Aurors and Members of the Order of the Phoenix. If the Death Eaters pushed into the center, they would be out of the wards and able to Portkey or Apparate away.

Where Harry and Ginny were fighting, a group of a dozen Death Eaters, no longer worried about the diminishing fire from the circle, attacked straight at the two teens. Ginny had been mostly been holding her shield to cover her and Harry while Harry was firing a continuing stream of cutting curses, stunners, bludgeoning curses, and blood boiling curses at the Death Eaters.

Now they had only seconds before being overwhelmed and Harry couldn't fire enough curses in time to stop the rush. Still holding her shield, Ginny took Harry's free hand and said, "Give them a full power blasting curse."

Harry pointed his wand at the center of the charging group that were now only twenty feet away, concentrated, and yelled, "Confringo."

The curse knocked all dozen of the Death Eaters back. The bodies of the five or six closest to the center where the curse hit were turned to charred pieces; the others were all on fire with their arms and legs on the side facing where the curse hit blown off. Other Death Eaters behind the blasted group and twenty feet to each side were also burned to some extent.

The sound to the curse drew the attention of both all the Death Eaters and Aurors nearby. The Death Eaters desperately tried to activate their Portkeys, and the Aurors used the panic to attack with more vigor.

Ron and Hermione weren't having as good luck. When more and more of the Death Eaters on their side turned from the reduced fire from the central circle and attacked them they became hard pressed. Fewer Aurous had come to that side because it was the side away from the road to the school and therefore less important to protect.

The teens and the Aurors with them were being forced slowly back and more casualties were in need of evacuation. Ron and Hermione were the only ones with Portkey chords and had to use both of them to get badly wounded Aurors to the hospital. Though they could always teleport themselves out, that would have left the few unwounded Aurors in an even more disparate position.

The group was outnumbered by almost three to one, and in a bad defensive position when, a dark shadow passed over, a blast of fire came down from above killing more than a dozen of the attacking Death Eaters. Hermione looked up as another blast of fire wiped out another dozen Death Eaters.

Erithen banked with his enormous wings and came back for a third pass; but the Death Eaters had already broken ranks and were running for cover into the alleyways between buildings. The third blast of fire only got three more.

Erithen flew over the central circle of student, which terrified them since they didn't know the dragon was there to help. Flying only twenty feet above the ground, Erithen pass harmlessly over the student before releasing another blast onto the backs of the Death Eaters on the far side of the circle.

Luna and Neville were still hunting small groups of two or three Death Eaters in the alleys and in the yards of the houses when the dragon attack caused more panicked Death Eaters to run straight at them. It was a turkey shoot since the Death Eaters weren't even casting shields in their attempt to get away from the dragon fire.

On the nearby hillside, Dumbledore and Voldemort had been dueling for more than five minutes when Dumbledore spotted Nagini coming toward him from the woods. Too busy fighting to kill the snake, he touched the bracelet on his right wrist and said, "On the hill."

His voice came from identical bracelets on the wrists of each of the six teens. They all caught the meaning; Dumbledore spotted Nagini, but needed help to kill it.

After the Erithen had devastated the Death Eaters on their side, Ron and Hermione knew they could leave the Aurors to handle those that remained, so they looked at the surrounding hillsides until they spotted Dumbledore and Voldemort. They teleported to the site appearing fifty feet south of where Dumbledore and Voldemort stood.

Neville and Luna had eliminated the fleeing Death Eaters in the area where they were, so they also teleported to where they saw Dumbledore, appearing close to where the snake was slithering across the rock strewn hillside.

They arrived just as Dumbledore levitated a boulder to block a killing curse. The boulder exploded and pieces hit Dumbledore; he staggered back and stepped on a loose rock.

As he fell, Voldemort shot another killing curse at him. He couldn't block it; but Hermione conjured a knight's iron shield in front of him, which shattered when hit by the curse.

Voldemort turned to see where the shield had appeared from, and spotted Ron and Hermione. He fired several curses at them, all of which missed at that distance. Then he was forced to turn back to face Dumbledore who had gotten back to his feet. He, Ron, and Hermione began to duel against Voldemort.

They needed to keep him busy for three reasons, to give their side time to get rid of all the Death Eaters, to get enough time to kill the snake, and because according to the prophecy, Harry was supposed to kill Voldemort, and Harry hadn't responded to Dumbledore's call that the snake was here.

Hermione thought for one second that it was possible that Harry was killed and they would have to kill Voldemort. Then she rejected the idea, her mind wouldn't accept that Harry was dead; he was just involved in a fight with the Death Eaters and couldn't leave yet.

Luna and Neville had been distracted by the fight; but now noticed the snake. Luna cast a strong Bombarda curse, which exploded next to the snake and blew it up into the air. Neville then hit the snake in mid air with Confringo, which set it on fire. As the burning snake fell, both teens hit it with Diffindo curses slicing the snake into three pieces.

The noise caused Voldemort to look in that direction in time to see the black smoke from that part of his soul to rise from the snake and disintegrate into the air. He screamed and fired a killing curse at the teens, but missed again because of the distance.

Neville touched his bracelet and said, "Last one gone, he's here on the hill."

Erithen had killed many Death Eaters, and after hearing Neville's report that the snake was dead, Harry realized the Aurors could now finish the fight, and his duty was to kill Voldemort.

Voldemort was now fighting five people and realized he couldn't defeat them considering one was Dumbledore. He decided he needed to get away and reorganize with new recruits. He was about to teleport away when Harry and Ginny teleported in.

Ron, Hermione, Neville, Luna, and even Dumbledore backed away; but Ginny said, "Forget it Potter, this is the bastard that possessed me and tried to kill me in the Department of Mysteries, I have just as much right to him as you do."

Harry had thought for years that, when the final fight came, Ginny would insist on standing with him; and he concluded she had the right, even if he worried about her safety. He also knew that Voldemort could teleport away at any second; he needed to make Voldemort so angry he wouldn't want to leave before killing Harry; and at the same time make Voldemort think he had a chance of winning the duel.

Harry said to the others, "The rest of you back off, the prophecy said it has to be me.

Then to Ginny he said, "You're the power the Dark Lord knows not; I wouldn't think of not having you at my side."

Then she smiled and said to Voldemort, "Are you prepared to die Tom?"

Voldemort laughed and said, "You can't kill me, not both of you, not all of you. If you manage to destroy this body, I'll just come back again. Eventually I'll kill all of you."

Harry said, "Wrong Tom, the snake was the last of your Horcruxes; we've destroyed the other two Horcruxes months, including the little piece of you that rested in me since that night. You know it's true, because your connection to my mind hasn't worked for months.

You'll never be able to return again."

Everyone but Ginny stared at Harry, Hermione thought, "Why did he say the other two; we destroyed all six." Then she realized what Ginny already knew, if Voldemort thought all the Horcruxes had been destroyed, and he had no chance to return, he would flee before Harry had the chance to kill him.

Voldemort was furious thinking that three of his Horcruxes had been destroyed, but smiled at the thought that Potter didn't know there were three more and he was still safe.

Voldemort said, "It won't help you and your little whore, I'm still going to kill you both today; and I'll take care of the rest of your friends too."

He shot a killing curse and both Harry and Ginny simply teleported out of the way, reappearing several feet to the left.

Harry said, "You missed Tom, you'll have to try harder."

Then Harry and Ginny began firing curses at Voldemort. They separated so he would have to defend in two different directions at the same time; but Voldemort managed to keep from being hit and still fire curses back.

Ginny moved back toward Harry and said through their mind connection so Voldemort couldn't hear, "If you give a full power curse it should shatter his shield and still have enough left to do damage to him. Let's teleport twenty feet to the right and you fire through his shield before he has time to move out of the way.

On three."

Ginny counted, they disappeared and reappeared together with Ginny holding his free hand. Harry's cutting curse smashed against Voldemort's shield, and the remaining part severed his wand hand from his arm. The hand with the wand still in it fell to the ground.

Ginny was a fraction of a second behind, and her Confringo set his robes on fire; then Harry fired another Diffindo cutting Voldemort's head off. They stood and watched the body burn as the other five walked to join them.

In five minutes, there were only ashes left and Harry said, "We should get back to the village and make sure all the Death Eaters are eliminated; we can also help our wounded."

By the end of the day, the six friends, and all the students, teachers, Aurors, and healers were exhausted. Twenty-two students had been killed and more than one hundred-fifty wounded to some extent. Two dozen of the wounded were so severely they had to be moved to St. Mungos for treatment; most of the others had minor wounds and were treated, and released to their dorms where student healer trainees were constantly checking on them.

The number of Aurors killed and wounded was being kept secret by the ministry for morale purposes; the minister didn't want to dampen the celebration of Voldemort's death by releasing the list of casualties.

Classes resumed, but Dumbledore cancelled exams for the year since so many wounded wouldn't be able to study, and so many healer trainees were busy tending the wounded and also didn't have time to study.

Harry, Ginny, Hermione, Ron, Neville, and Luna were advanced enough in their studies to take their N.E.W.T.'s exams over the summer. That meant they didn't have to return to Hogwarts, and were qualified to get jobs.

Luna and her father continued to publish the Quibbler and go on expeditions seeking exotic animals. On one expedition, Luna met Rolf Scamander, grandson of Newt Scamander the author of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them; they married and had two boys, Lorcan and Lysander

Neville turned his grandmother's greenhouse from growing roses to growing magical herbs for potions, especially medicinal potions. For ten years, he expanded the business, hiring ten people to process and selling the herbs to St. Mungos, Hogwarts, and apothecaries all over Great Britain.

Neville married Hannah Abbot and they bought the Leakey Cauldron when Tom, the old owner, retired. Hannah ran the inn and trained as a healer. When Madam Sprout retired, Neville took over as Herbology Professor at Hogwarts, and when Madam Pomfrey retired, Hannah took over as hospital matron.

Ron and Harry went to Auror training and Hermione into the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. After a few years, Ron left to become a partner with Fred and George as their business expanded. Hermione worked her way up to be the head of MLE, Madam Bones' old position. Years later, Hermione was elected Minister of Magic. Ron and Hermione married and had a boy, Hugo and a girl, Rose.

Harry worked his way up to become head Auror, and took over as the head of MLE when Hermione became Minister of Magic. Ginny played three years as first chaser for the Holyhead Harpies; retiring when she and Harry decided to bring the baby James Sirius out of stasis and give birth. They had two more children, another boy Albus Severus, and a girl, Lily Luna.