Their landing was less graceful than Harry would've hoped. It was also quiet. Until that moment, Harry hadn't realized that he'd already pictured their return home, the wailing crowds suddenly crescendoing when they caught sight of their two champions, Bagman's smug declaration lording over them all as friends and family rushed forward in a stampede of excitement and love… Maybe he'd watched one too many of Dudley's movies to have his expectations set so high.

Instead, he and Cedric had arrived in a desolate, grey courtyard. Slabs of stone rose up sporadically from the ground and a statue of an angel with one of its hands held forward in supplication dominated their view. Grey-white mist hung, suspended in time just as Harry's heart was lodged in his throat, pulse quickening as his senses picked up something he wasn't ready to acknowledge.

"We're in a cemetery," he pointed out the obvious.

"You think this is another challenge we have to go through since there are two of us?"

"They couldn't have known two people would touch the cup."

"Maybe it's faulty… I'll take a look."

As Cedric approached the fallen cup cautiously, like one might entice a frightened animal, Harry held out his wand in front of him and walked up to the angel's statue. What had seemed from afar like a majestic piece of architecture was now less imposing, more worn down and feeble with green slabs of moss covering the angel in random patches and chips of marble having long fallen prey to the elements.

Harry bent down to brush a cautious hand across the dirt and grass covering the name of the deceased and froze in place.

Tom Riddle Senior.

"Cedric! Quick, we have to—" a shuffling, scraping noise had Harry cut off his warning mid-sentence. Simultaneously, both boys adopted defensive stances where they stood, each facing the eastern side of the cemetery as a hunched, limping figure draped in a dark cloak emerged out of the fog Harry began to feel pressure against the back of his left eye, a pressure originating from his mind, he knew—someone was testing him, plucking at his defences with mild interest to see where he was weakest.

Harry made an effort to strengthen his walls, but he might as well have been using his hands to stop the rain from falling, each time he handled a breach, a new one popped up, then another, and another, and another until he couldn't focus anymore and he was forced down to his knees as his brain tried valiantly to squeeze its way out of his skull. Distantly, he heard Cedric's voice calling out—to him, or to the cloaked person coming ever closer, Harry didn't know. His hand closed around his wand until he could feel the wood digging into his palm, his only tangible link to the physical world.

The ringing in his ears had reached new heights, but it still didn't hinder him completely from hearing the cry, "Avada Kedavra!", and neither did the black spots dancing in front of his eyes stop him from seeing the flash of bright green slamming into Cedric. It sliced through the boy's hastily conjured shield and sank into his chest, seeping into skin through to the bone.

Cedric dropped and Harry screamed.

He must have, otherwise why would his throat feel like it was swallowing past glass? Why would his chest feel like it was minutes away from caving into his heart institute mess of coronary tissue and bone? Why would he feel like the cloying pain in his head was only second to the panic and horror shaking the very foundations of his soul?

He felt himself being lifted in the air, his back slammed onto rock and his wrists and ankles tied with rope. He was left, suspended against something as Cedric's murderer removed his cloak, conjured a cauldron with boiling water and dropped something heavy into it. It was followed by the up and down cadence of an incantation that Harry couldn't focus on for the life of him, the pain in his head had faded away to the dull ache of a past injury, but he continued to watch the proceedings from a blurred distance.

There was blood. First, the man's as he cut off his hand, then Harry's as the face of a traitor came forward and slashed at Harry's arm, gathering his blood in a vial to join the flesh and bone already simmering in the water.

The incantation came to an end. Pettigrew was left bleeding out on the ground whilst the cauldron bubbled, flashed a sickly yellow and overflowed. As the wizard of Harry's nightmares rose out of the cauldron, Harry wished that Wormtail would bleed out, that he die right there, licking the dirty floor at his precious master's feet while the latter watched him impassively.

"Harry Potter," said Voldemort, the name rolled around his tongue as though he were trying it on for size—curious and expectant at the same time. "I see you've made it to my awakening. So glad you could join us."

Voldemort bent down over Pettigrew's sobbing frame, hands deftly removing his wand from the other wizard's rags and holding it up in front of him.

"Hmm," he hummed. Wordlessly, he pointed the wand at Pettigrew and the man dissolved into screams, body curved inward and cradling something to his chest as Voldemort passively watched the display. His wand lifted and the screaming ceased, Pettigrew stopped shaking long enough to stagger to his feet, right arm cradling the left where a hand with a metallic sheen had replaced the one he'd cut off.

"Th—thank you, m—my master. It is b—beautiful. Thank you, my Lord, thank you!"

Voldemort wasn't listening. He was staring at Harry.

Harry felt a touch against his mind, almost like a caress. He felt bile gathering behind his tongue. Voldemort's lips twitched, as though attempting a smile.

"I ask you, Harry Potter, what's a party without guests?" his arm snaked back to grasp at Pettigrew and push up his sleeve, thumb pressing down on his Dark Mark.

They began to arrive. There were two, then eight, then twelve, nineteen, thirty-seven—Harry counted fifty-six witches and wizards dressed in long, black cloaks and wearing the same masks as the group that had attacked the Quidditch World Cup all those months ago. They'd formed a circle around their master and Harry, standing eerily still and silent as they regarded their leader with equal amounts of veneration and fear.

"My children," Voldemort began, "my Death Eaters, how long has it been since we last saw each other? How long since we conquered the world and laid to waste the fools of the Ministry and the vermin Muggles? How long?" he let his question hang in the air like the blade of a guillotine. "I'm sure if you ask our guest of honour, he can tell you exactly how long it's been."

"My Lord, we never—"

"Silence!" Voldemort shut down the voice of a woman. "Most of my followers abandoned their master—those who were loyal to me are imprisoned in Azkaban for their dedication, their servitude! I am left with the pitiful dregs that would rather hide their faces behind masks and simper at the Ministry's feet rather than face their righteous punishment!"

One by one, the Death Eaters were subjected to the Cruciatus Curse under the gleeful, red eyes of Voldemort. With each new torture, each new set of screams, Harry struggled harder against the ropes holding him to the angel until he could wiggle his hands free, but by then it was too late. Voldemort had grown bored of torturing his followers and, instead, had his eyes strained on Harry.

"Crucio."

Harry would later realize that he had never really known pain until that very moment. He had never known the crushing agony the likes of which could force his body to undulate and twist into inconceivable positions, how his back could arch into a perfectly formed u with only his head, hands and feet gracing the marble stone. He would've thought that at one point, when the pain became too much, when it hit that point where your nerves couldn't possibly send more hurt for your brain to process, that your senses would cease to function and you'd remain in a state of jelly-like limbo where you would, in theory, still feel the pain, but you couldn't really feel it anymore.

He was wrong.

The curse finally lifted and Harry took in his first breath of. His stuttered out pants echoed in his ears and nearly drowned out the jeering and laughter of the Death Eaters who took pleasure in taunting him.

"Let us see," said Voldemort softly, "how the great Harry Potter fares against the full might of Lord Voldemort."

The ties on his ankles and wrists loosened and Harry didn't have the strength to brace himself as his body swayed forward and crash-landed on the ground, one of the crystals in his glasses shattering upon impact.

The laughter continued.

Something hit him lightly on the back of the head, bouncing off and landing within eyesight—his wand. Harry fought his quivering muscles and rose to his feet, teetered on the verge of falling—to everyone else's amusement—and crouched down to pick up his wand.

"I'm sure by now you know the rules of duelling, Harry. First, the opponents face each other," —Voldemort locked eyes with him— "then, they bow—"

"I'll die before I bow down to you," Harry pushed out through trembling lips and a heavy tongue. It gave Voldemort pause.

"That just won't do. Imperio!"

Harry braced himself for the cloud of euphoria that would drown his senses and brushed off Voldemort's voice when it began to whisper sweet, tempting suggestions in his mind. The whispers got louder and more insistent the longer Harry resisted, but he persevered and pushed off the attack entirely, a hint of a smile playing across his chapped lips when Voldemort stumbled back a step.

The Death Eaters began to look uneasy.

"Enough," said Voldemort. "We duel."

That was all the warning Harry got before a battalion of spells rained down on him like vicious daggers. Sweet adrenaline now coursing through his veins and he flipped into action, rolling, ducking and hiding behind headstones to avoid being hit by Voldemort's attacks. It was unlike any other duel Harry had been in; he couldn't get a spell in edgewise and had to make do with shoddy shields and his naturally fast reflexes to avoid curses of which he didn't even know the names.

His last refuge now rubble in the dirt, Harry dashed behind the statue holding Tom Riddle Senior's remains, but he wasn't fast enough. A cutting curse sliced hotly across his shin and had him screaming out in pain, falling hands first behind a dead woman's tombstone. Blood was rushing down his pant leg, to the tip of his sock and into his shoe, it made his clothes stick to his skin and look like black tar. Dirt caked his hands and nails as he dragged himself across the ground so his body would be covered by the headstone and the resulting rattle from his pockets sparked a desperate idea.

"Harry, Harry, Harry," crooned Voldemort. "Come out and play…"

Shaking, Harry tore a strip of fabric from the cut on his pants and tied it around his thigh to staunch the flow of blood. He hissed through clenched teeth as he moved to a crouch and took his weapons in hand, his wand was tapped against each and every one before he threw the twin's gifts over his head.

An explosion rocked the earth on its axis. Death Eaters screamed questions at each other, firing off spells every which way in the hopes of landing a lucky hit on Harry and more often than not incapacitating one of their own.

Harry's breath rattled in his chest as he sprinted towards his one hope at salvation: the cup. He didn't think about what he would find if he got there, didn't waste a second's worry picturing Cedric's still corpse guarding the trophy, once bright brown eyes now dimmed with a film of death and impending decay as his body was left staring up at the heavens for help.

"I got'im!"

Harry felt pressure on his left shoulder and next thing he knew, he was falling to the ground, legs locked tightly together. The blood pooling in his mouth from a bitten lip muffled his shouts as his wound gathered rocks, dirt and clumps of grass from the ground. He fumbled to point his wand at himself, the counter-spell teetering on the tip of his broken lip, but more Death Eaters must have caught up to him for they began firing blindly in his direction. He kept low to the ground and swallowed a mouthful of blood against the electric shocks of pain shooting up his leg.

A sound like thunder shot into the air to bounce to the edges of the cemetery, only to be reflected back to ten times its power. Harry clapped his hands over his ears and closed his eyes to slits as a vicious wind swept up the dirt, the smog, the last of the Weasleys' magic, into a tornado of sound and light. As sudden as it had appeared, the tornado shrank to the size of a doorknob, twirling on the ground like an oversized spinning top, and got smaller and smaller until it blinked out of existence, leaving Voldemort standing exactly where he had been when Harry had thrown his last attack.

"It's time we end this game once and for all, Harry," he murmured softly. "Twice now, you've escaped my grasp—there will not be a third time."

Harry surged to his feet.

"Avada Kedavra!"

"Expelliarmus!"

The two spells crashed into each other and held taut, a battle for power that neither wizard was willing to lose. Harry couldn't help his utter fixation on the sight before him, his and Voldemort's magic visibly fighting for dominance before his very eyes in thick strands of red and green lightning pushing and pulling at each other as two stubborn children would tumble on the playground—and Voldemort was winning.

Like a game of tug-of-war, the knot of magic where the two spells met was steadily inching its way closer and closer to Harry's end, and from the look of abstract glee on Voldemort's face, he didn't think that was a good thing. He concentrated all his power, every drop of magic he could feel bubbling in his veins, on pushing the knot closer to Voldemort's wand. He felt a shift in himself, in the resistance given by his wand and magic, and the knot came to a stop for a millisecond's time, pulsing with uncertainty as it decided which way to go, before slowly drifting towards Voldemort.

Voldemort's top lip curled up in fury and he brought up both hands to hold his wand, visibly straining against the force of their connection, but it was too late. The knot reached the tip of Voldemort's wand to sink into the wood and then explode into thousand jets of silver electricity. The wand at Harry's fingertips began to heat up, it vibrated in his hands, sent an electrifying buzz up his arms, through his body and to the ground until Harry thought that this is what it must be like to be a conduit between two live wires.

A silhouette of something was emerging from Voldemort's wand—a ghost—first the head, the shoulders, a worn, corduroy jacket and then a late middle-aged man was hovering by the dark wizard's shoulder.

"Would you look at that," he seemed bemused, of all things. "I'll be damned. You're doin' good, kid. Just keep it up for a bit longer, the others are coming."

Harry wasn't given time to wonder at the dead man's words before another spirit sprang out of Voldemort's wand and all the oxygen in the world might have been sucked away into the universe for all the good it did him.

"He's right, you're doing great, Harry." Cedric. "Don't worry, we'll get you out of this one and you can head home, maybe… take my body to my dad, okay? If you can. Tonight's not your night to say goodbye, but it was mine and you let him know I'm okay now."

Harry's throat clogged up with tears. He wanted to crawl over to Cedric—the real one or the one talking to him right now, it didn't matter—and beg for forgiveness. He wanted to change places with the kind, older boy that had let him share in his moment of victory when it should have been his alone to bask in. He wanted him to be alive, to be back home with his father and his girlfriend and his friends and receive the bloody cup that had caused all this mess like the champion he was.

He wanted to trade places with Cedric, because the boy didn't deserve to die.

"Cedric," Harry choked out, "I'm so sorry, please, I'm—"

"It's okay, Harry," Cedric smiled, "this isn't your fault. It was never your fault."

There was so much more left to say, but Harry could feel the magic shifting in the air, could see the tendrils surrounding Voldemort turn weak and frail. He concentrated harder and two more figures appeared.

"My sweet boy," cooed a woman with his same eyes, "you've grown into such a brave young man. We always knew you would, sweetheart."

"We're so proud of you, love," his father had his same unruly hair and the dimple on his right cheek when he smiled that Harry had despised as a younger boy. "Just a couple seconds more and we'll help you get out of here."

"Don't worry sweetheart, it'll be okay."

"Stay brave, son, alright? You've gotten this far and you'll go so much further."

"This isn't the end, Harry, not by a long shot."

"We love you."

Harry lost his fight with his tears and they cascaded down his cheeks in waterfalls of salt and heartbreak.

"Mum," he whispered. "Dad."

His dead parents beamed.

"When we tell you to, let go of the connection with Voldemort and run," his father told him. "We can only hold him off for so long, so make it count."

"Now, Harry!"

He jerked his wand to the side at his mother's shout, connection broken, and began to run. His last image of his parents was of them converging on Voldemort like vengeful angels with the strange man and Cedric by their side.

He spotted the glowing cup before he registered Cedric's body lying next to it. A howl of rage from behind spurred him those last few metres, but someone sprung in his way before he could make it to the cup. Pettigrew.

The sight of the man did something to Harry, called upon a long buried animalistic rage that he didn't even feel towards Voldemort himself, and he stunned him before the rat even had a chance to raise his wand.

Pettigrew crumbled to the ground just as Harry skidded to his side. He threw himself over his and Cedric's bodies and closed his hand around the cup.

He barely registered the tug on his navel before he was greeted by sharp sounds and bright colours.

Harry twisted to his side and fell on his back next to Cedric. He stared up at the moon, chest barely moving as he heaved in minimal bursts of air and let his ears register the change as cheers turned to screams turned to cries turned to terrifying sobs. His left arm graced Cedric's own arm and he was still warm, just like Harry.

He closed his eyes for a second, let the screams get drowned out by the ringing in his head and pretended they were both dead.

A group of people rounded on the three wizards, one dead, one wishing he were and one unconscious. Although he couldn't focus on their words, he recognized the moment they realized Cedric wasn't alive because he began to hear louder cries, and the moment Pettigrew was discovered because all the noise cut off to stunned silence and then to muttered disbelief.

Professor Dumbledore's face appeared in Harry's vision. The man peered into Harry's eyes with a sadness and pity that the young boy would've felt as his own if he wasn't a thousand stars away from planet earth. He didn't attempt to talk to Harry like others were trying to do, he just shared in his sorrow for a moment, allowed the young wizard to see that he was not alone, before retreating from his line of sight. Thick, strong arms wrapped around Harry's back and legs, cradling him in an embrace of fur, shaggy black hair and the smell of firewood.

Oddly, it reminded him of home.

The back and forth swaying as Harry was carried elsewhere lulled him further into the comfort of his own mind. He felt it as he was deposited somewhere, the the back of his legs landed on something plush and warm—an armchair, perhaps. A saucepan of a hand brushed his hair back, lingering on his scar, and then Harry was cocooned in a blanket. Retreating footsteps. A door opens and shuts, opens and shuts, then something hot and minty is being forced down his throat. It scalds his throat on its way down, but it also wakes up whatever had been lying dormant in Harry since he arrived back.

"With us now, Potter?"

Professor Moody sat across from him, both eyes fixed on the young wizard with an intensity that soon became uncomfortable. The man's gruff growl succeeded in breaking the last of Harry's stupor and he became alert.

"Why am I here? Where's everyone? Where's Ced—" Harry choked.

"They're all taking care of business outside. These are my quarters, you'll be safe here until we can get all this mess sorted out," said Moody, "and to do that, I'm gonna need you to tell me what happened."

Haltingly, Harry recalled everything that had occurred from the moment Krum attacked Fleur to touching the cup with Cedric to arriving at the cemetery where Voldemort was reborn and his traitor servant murdered Harry's friend.

"So, you're saying the Dark Lord has come back to full power…" mused Moody.

"You don't believe me now, but—"

"Oh, I believe you. Tell me again, Potter, how many Death Eaters showed up?"

"I counted fifty-six."

Moody let out a derisive scoff. "And what did the Dark Lord do to the few deserters who managed to scrounge up enough balls to show their faces? Was he harsh? Did he punish them for their incompetence? Did he greet them with open arms?"

A shiver curved up Harry's spine and settled uncomfortably on the back of his neck.

"I—he wasn't happy with any of them, I guess, if the tortures were anything to go by."

"Good good," muttered Moody. "The Dark Lord, what was he like? He's always been a…" Moody's tongue snaked across his lip, "powerful presence, and I imagine with his father's essence and your blood, he'll be unstoppable now. He'll be invincible."

Alarm bells surged to power in Harry's mind, flashing luminescent red and blaring foghorns as the professor's words registered. Underneath the mountain of blankets he'd been ensconced in, he reached into his pocket where he could feel his wand digging painfully into his injured leg.

"I never mentioned what Pettigrew did for the ritual," he said softly.

Moody's head immediately snapped in his direction, a manic grin in place like none that Harry had seen on the man before. The frayed edges around his face became even more blurred to the him, almost taunting him as they shifted and distorted the man's appearance to the point where the front of his head wasn't recognizable as a face anymore.

"Potter, Potter, a bit slow on the take there, but no worries, you won't be needing your pretty little head much longer once my master takes care of you. Incar—"

"Petrificus Totalus!"

The impostor disguising himself as Moody—Harry was now certain that this man was not the revered Auror—dove out of the way of the oncoming spell and took cover behind a desk chair. Harry clambered out of his own chair, throwing the blanket up into the air to work as a distraction as he searched for cover. Crouching behind a desk as best he could with his leg, Harry began firing off spells at Not Moody, but when none of them even came close to hitting its mark, he re-evaluated and settled for destroying anything and everything in the wizard's vicinity.

But the man was good. His skills in combat and duelling were clearly better than Harry's, he was able to shield himself from the exploding wreckage and still be able to shoot offensive spells back at Harry in the interim. It wasn't long before he gained the upper hand and, with nothing left for Harry to destroy, rose to his feet and advanced on him.

Harry cursed in his head, still parrying magic against magic, but growing steadily more desperate as the Not Moody came closer and closer.

Surely someone must have heard the explosions and were now on their way, Harry thought. And even if they weren't close enough to hear the chaos, the telling lights of rapid spellwork could be seen from outside through any window into the room.

But so far, no one had come and Harry wasn't wasting any time hoping they would. He steeled himself, conjured a shield and limped to the corner of the room where he could see a blackboard having been tossed on its side during the fight. He could feel the pit-pit-pat of spells and curses colliding with his own defences before he dropped behind the blackboard and the spells were suddenly flying over his head and battering the wood at his back.

His change of landscape hadn't been for nothing, he'd gotten a somewhat clearer view of the room at hand and now knew that if he just waited long enough for Not Moody to get in place, then he'd have a shot at stopping him.

Not Moody took one step forward, two, four, and he was right in place. Throwing all caution to the wind, Harry cancelled his shield spell and swivelled in place, putting him face to face with the other wizard.

"What do you have for me now, boy? Ready to give up already?" Not Moody sneered.

Whatever he'd been expecting, it wasn't Harry aiming for the ceiling right above his head. Sparks flew as the spell hit its target, raining down on the other wizard's head before a light fixture followed in its place. Not Moody was knocked over the head by a lamp and his legs surrendered under the structure's weight as it fell on top of him.

His breathing was harsh in the newfound silence in the room. Harry was staring at the pool of blood gathering underneath Not Moody's head when the door to the office rattled against its hinges, as though someone were pushing their weight against it, then was blasted open. Shards of wood and pieces of metal flew into the room, clearing a path of destruction for professors Dumbledore and McGonagall, Minister Fudge and a group of Aurors. They took in the sight before them with cautious looks.

"You're late," intoned Harry, voice as harsh and brittle as pine needles under frost. His own legs gave out under him and he fell to the dirty floor. Professor McGonagall descended upon him before he was properly splayed on the ground. She shook out her cloak and draped it over his shoulders with a tenderness she took pains not to make known.

The Aurors had separated into two groups, one group was checking on the pinned wizard in the middle of the room while the other had their wands trained on Harry. Dumbledore strode past them to kneel before the boy.

"I'd like you to tell me what happened here, Harry," he said gently, yet with a hint of unquestionable authority that told the young wizard he didn't have to worry about a thing anymore. It was okay.

"Professor Moody," —Harry licked his lips— "or whoever he is… he was always blurry to me, makes sense now… he started to ask questions about what happened when—when Cedric died and Voldemort came back. But his questions were off, he slipped a bit and then attacked. We fought," then Harry added, almost as an afterthought, "he's a good fighter. I shot down the light and it fell on him and he was knocked out… He's knocked out, right? He's not—he can't be—I mean, he's just—I'm not, I've never—"

He couldn't breathe. His chest was expanding, in and out, in an out, but nothing was coming in, his lungs weren't getting any air. He could taste his beating pulse in the back of his throat, every undulation brought with it a tighter grip around his airway until he could no longer pull in any oxygen and his vision was clouding over, black spots danced in the back of his eyes and he cried out because he couldn't think he couldn't breathe couldn't…

Something warm spread through his body, from his head down to his toes. It was a comforting warmth, like the first sip of hot butterbeer after a long day out in the cold. The vice around his throat came loose and he could breathe again (inhale, three counts, exhale), he sucked in lungfuls of air desperately.

"There you go. Nice and easy."

Madame Pomfrey kneeled before him, uncaring of the shards of glass digging into her knees as she peered intently into his eyes and kept a hand on the back of his head, fingers pressing against his scalp. Although he could breathe again, great and big lungfuls of air, his hands couldn't stop shaking and he could feel the panic rising up again and threatening to swallow him whole this time.

"—not responding how I'd hoped… should be better by now. I apologize for this, Mr Potter," murmured Madame Pomfrey.

He didn't know anything else after that.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Professor McGonagall watched from the sidelines, one hand covering her heart, the other curved around her hip holding her wand. She stared helplessly as one of her favourite students (though she'd never admit it), a young boy who'd been put through hell in his short life in this world, finally broke underneath the weight of his trauma and they could do nothing more for him than offer him a few hours' rest.

"These games were supposed to be safe, Albus," she rumbled. "You promised me when we first spoke of the Tournament that our children would come to no harm. Then Mr Potter's name came out of the Goblet and you said we'd look after him, but now Mr Digg—" she bit back a distressed cry, "Mr Diggory is dead and H—Harry… we had to sedate him, Albus! You saw what this was doing to him! He's just a child, for Merlin's sake!"

"And yet, we both know he isn't just any normal child," said Dumbledore. "Not even fifteen years old and he's already faced Voldemort more times than almost any other witch or wizard I know. That does not excuse what happened here," he hastened to add, "but it's time we face the fact that Harry Potter is no longer an ordinary student, and hasn't been for quite some time.

"Voldemort has finally returned—Harry may not have been able to say as much, given the circumstances, but I see no other explanation for Mr Diggory's death, Harry's entrance in the Tournament, Pettigrew's reappearance and, perhaps most incriminating: Severus' mark has returned."

Neither Professor McGonagall nor Madame Pomfrey made their reactions to this news overtly known other than through the minute pursing of one's lips and a shaky inhaled breath which was drowned out in the noise of the room.

"You failed to mention that in any of our latest meetings, Albus," McGonagall's tone could freeze the hottest of deserts. "How long have you known of Professor Snape's mark? Were you ever planning on sharing your suspicions with the rest of us?Of would you have waited, even after the Tournament had finished, if Mr Diggory hadn't shown up murdered."

"Minerva, you must understand—"

"I must do no such thing, Headmaster Dumbledore," she rebutted. "Do not tell me to listen to your poor excuses when there is a boy lying dead at our feet and another one who would've gotten there himself if it weren't for some quick thinking and dumb luck!"

"This boy has been to my infirmary a minimum of twice a year for four years," said Madame Pomfrey, levitating Harry to manifest a stretcher underneath him. "I've mended broken bones, muscle strains, cured exhaustion, replenished his blood, and I also noted past scars, badly mended bones and trauma which speak of injuries that I've seen all too much of in children of abuse. It is clear that Mr Potter is not safe at home and yet, he is not safe here, either. If we can't say that he is better off here, with us, than he is in a home where he is violently mistreated, then how can you say we must understand when you dole out excuses for what has happened today."

Professor McGonagall was brimming with something unspoken as she listened to Madame Pomfrey's impassioned statement and she took her gaze away only to pin unforgivingly on the Hogwarts headmaster who had never looked more his age.

"I…" Dumbledore swallowed harshly and closed his eyes, "I am ashamed to admit that, in spite of everything I did know, what little I could decipher, it was never enough, I could never put it to use, I merely… Every year since Harry has joined us, I've strengthened the wards around the school to the best of my ability and yet, Voldemort keeps finding new ways to rush past me to gain access to him, to Harry," Dumbledore admitted.

"Perhaps if you had clued us in on what you were doing then we each could have lent our skills and expertise on the matter," McGonagall was unforgiving in her reprimand of the older wizard. Dumbledore took the words as a physical blow and visibly shrunk in on himself. "This school and the children housed inside of it are as much our responsibility as they are yours. For Merlin's sake, Albus! We had a basilisk living underneath the girl's bathroom and no one had a clue. It took the combined brain power of three twelve year olds to figure out a decades' old mystery that we couldn't be bothered to solve until it was almost too late.

"And now," she said, "we have a murdered sixth year student who could've used our help, our protection, and a traumatised fourth year student whom we've continuously failed to protect lying at our feet, unconscious. What will it be next? Who will have to be next before you get it through your head that all these secrets have finally come back to haunt you and they are taking lives."

All three adults fell silent. The Aurors in the background had already cuffed the Moody impersonator and were in the process of searching the room for any hidden objects, traps or escape routes that the wizard may have installed in his time as professor.

"I must admit, there came a time when, after years—decades—of everyone telling you how great and infallible you are, you start to believe it. That is my mistake," Dumbledore admitted, his gaze unseeing as he twirled his wand between his two index fingers.

"It is," stressed McGonagall.

"The past cannot be changed, not even I have that power," Dumbledore smiled with only his mouth.

"I am not asking you to change the past. Right now, out there, there are children—scared and terrified children—who need us more than ever before. Your mistakes and secrets end here. Today." McGonagall swept back her cloak with a twist of a shoulder and advanced on Dumbledore with her head held high. "I am the Deputy Headmistress of this school and I vowed to go above and beyond my capabilities to protect and instruct every student who walked through our doors. These past four years have threatened that vow with every cryptic answer you dealt onto us, every dug up secret to surface for air and every piece of information you kept to yourself for reasons I do not want to hear.

"It is far too late to change what has already happened, but that does not mean we cannot change how we handle these situations from here on out. We have hundreds of people depending on all of us, Albus, not just you."

"I apologize, Minerva," whispered Dumbledore, finding it difficult to look his deputy in the eye. "You are right, of course. If my silence on certain matters was ever to anyone's advantage, that is the case no longer. You are not the only person I owe an apology to."

McGonagall's shoulders dropped a millimetre and her grip on her wand loosened. "I do not need your words telling me you're sorry, Albus. I need you to let your actions speak for themselves, prove to me that you can change for the better and do it soon."

A crash from another side of the room startled them both and cut the tension their discussion had wrought. McGonagall carefully stepped away from Dumbledore and watched as the man methodically ran a finger along his beard and squinted his eyes at nothing in particular.

"The Tournament was a failure," he began. "No doubt the press is already swarming the stands and descending upon the scene of the crime as we speak, but we shall let the Ministry deal with that themselves. In the meantime, we have two distraught parents to take care of, a school of students to reassure and a castle to secure. Madame Pomfrey, please take Harry to the infirmary and do not allow anyone in to see him unless they have been first checked by either myself or any senior member of staff."

Madame Pomfrey nodded to the headmaster and levitated the stretcher in front of her as she prepared to walk out of the room. On her way to the door, her eyes met with McGonagall's and their gazes held fast to one another's for an indescribable moment. Neither of them said anything as Madame Pomfrey walked out the room, leaving the two professors and the group of Aurors behind.

"There is not enough time to ward the school properly unless we plan on implementing extreme safety measures which would shut down any and all contact with the outside world," said McGonagall.

"You are right, of course," Dumbledore replied. "The castle's warding stone is ancient and powerful, but it would require more time than we have available to set it up in the manner we need to. We will have to take temporary measures to ensure everyone's safety."

"Surely you don't think the school is under threat of attack so soon?" asked McGonagall, looking positively sick to her stomach.

"I wish to say with certainty that no, Voldemort would not risk showing his hand so soon after his resurrection, but I've underestimated him before and others have clearly paid the price—we are not taking any chances this time."

Professor McGonagall shook her head in agreement.

"Headmaster! Headmaster Dumbledore!" called one of the Aurors. "We've found something, sir."

Dumbledore and McGonagall strode over to where three Aurors stood around a black, wooden chest.

"This chest has a very strong magical signature. We think that there is something in here that the attacker didn't want anyone to find," said a young woman.

Both McGonagall and Dumbledore made some complicated gestures with their wands, nodding and tutting at whatever it was that their tests showed.

"There is definitely something in there...a life-form of some kind, perhaps human," stated McGonagall.

"I concur. Professor McGonagall, if you would do us the honour of prying this chest open, myself and these fine Aurors will stand at the ready in case anything with less than friendly intentions should pop out," said Dumbledore.

No more discussion was to be had, the three Aurors defected to the headmaster's wisdom and took up their positions around the chest while Professor McGonagall muttered a mix of spells under her breath, wand pointed at the brass lock securing the trunk. The lid swung open with a hiss and a spark of blue. Professor McGonagall adopted a defensive stance and fearlessly stepped up to peer into the mouth of the trunk.

"Alastor!" she cried. "My word! Albus, quick, get someone down here right now!"

One of the Aurors was quick to volunteer, heaving himself inside the chest with his front turned towards them, only to disappear entirely as he descended into the depths of the magical trunk. Moments later, the body of an unconscious, dirty and malnourished Alastor Moody drifted out and was efficiently secured to a stretcher by the two remaining Aurors as they waited for their colleague to step out of the trunk before carting their patient off to the infirmary. The fourth Auror followed behind them, the face of a cuffed and unpolyjuiced Barty Crouch Junior on the body of the man that had single-handedly wrought chaos and destruction upon the world mere minutes ago.

Dumbledore watched the procession disappear around the corner with the broken body of one of his most trusted and oldest friends. He pushed back the other memories it brought about, of wizards and witches in different uniforms carting off innocent victims to a war that he had at first encouraged, and then officials of similar garb trudging off with the bodies of more innocent victims to a second war, which he failed to stop.

"He will pull through this, Albus," said Professor McGonagall. "He is too stubborn not to."

"I have all the faith in the world that Alastor will make it through this, if only to have the chance to hunt down the man that did this to him in the first place. A man thought long to be dead."

Professor McGonagall's face contorted into an unreadable expression. "I was hoping it to be a trick of the light, surely some of my faculties were finally starting to recede with age," she said.

Dumbledore chuckled mirthlessly. "The day you cease to be anything less than who you are right now, the world will know it's the exact moment to lose all hope."

"This is the start of a second war, Albus."

"My dear Minerva, I'm not entirely sure the first war ever ended, we just let ourselves be fooled to believe it had… In any case, the school—our students—come first. Call every other professor in the castle, the students are to be led to their common rooms, prefects will perform the duties they were entrusted with and keep them calm whilst we secure the school." McGonagall looked like she was about to question how, exactly, they would do that when they couldn't alter the spells on the ward stone just yet, when Dumbledore spoke again, "We may not be able to draw upon the ancient magic in this castle and that is alright for now, but our bodies contain plenty of magic themselves, do they not?"

"You want us to become the anchors," Professor McGonagall realized, "with no ward stone to tether our magic to the castle, you want us to act as conduits, the wards will reflect off each one of us and protect the school so long as we are inside of it."

"Similar to a Secret Keeper, yes, although vastly different in other ways," said Dumbledore. "We will not be able to keep the magic going for very long before we become exhausted ourselves, but it should last long enough for the school year to come to a close, and then we can begin to work on the ward stone."

"I'll alert the staff immediately," Professor McGonagall left without a single word goodbye, excited by the prospect of doing something to ward off the storm that was surely headed their way.

At her departure, Dumbledore let the thread that had been holding him together unwind and drift to his feet. He no longer looked like Albus Dumbledore, Grand Sorcerer, Supreme Mugwump, Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot and Headmaster of Hogwarts—he was just Albus Dumbledore, one hundred and thirteen year old wizard.

He looked around at the mess that spoke of a battle well-fought and wanted nothing more than to clean it all up, wipe away any and all evidence of what could have happened had a certain fourteen-year-old wizard not been as resourceful as he was. He feared he'd be cleaning something else entirely if that had been the case and then didn't let himself linger on that thought that any further, he needed to save his strength to fortify the castle.

A ball of fire erupted over his head, dousing his beard in sparks which he was quick to put out. Fawkes' phoenix song washed over Dumbledore, it surrounded him in its wonderful melody.

"You're right. Time to get to work, old friend."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Had he been in a muggle hospital, it would have been the beeping of the heartbeat monitor that woke him up, or the old television mounted on the wall which always showed the same cowboy movie, or perhaps the murmur of nurses and the echoing announcements from the main desk as life in the hospital continued to go on without him.

Since he wasn't in a muggle hospital, what woke him up was something wet, slimy and warm moving across his hand. Still in a dreamscape, he'd tried to move his hand away, had succeeded, but the feeling had followed him there, had seemed to get more insistent and enthusiastic the more he twitched away from the bothersome sensation. Whining followed his last attempts to escape and Harry finally opened his eyes to the face of a familiar black dog standing next to his bed, front paws poised on the mattress while he stared intently at Harry.

"Ms Pomfrey doesn't allow pets in the infirmary," is the first thing Harry managed to croak out, prompting Padfoot to begin licking at his hand in earnest amidst jubilant barks and tail wagging.

"Padfoot!" hissed a voice. "What's all this racket? Do you want Poppy to kick you out again? Because she will…" Remus' threat trailed off when he caught sight of glassy, green eyes staring back at him from the bed. "Cub, you're awake! How are you feeling? Do you need anything? Just tell me what you need and I'll go find Madame Pomfrey right now."

"I… Moony, I…" Tears came out in place of words he couldn't even find.

"Hey, hey, hey, no, it's alright."

In between Padfoot's whines, Remus approached Harry's bed and stood by his head, reaching out a hesitant hand to his hair and pulling his head close to his chest in an attempt at a hug. Harry squeezed his eyes shut. He felt a warm weight on his hand and peeked down to see his godfather watching him with bright eyes and downturned ears, a portrait of sadness.

"How long?" asked Harry.

"Fifteen hours. Poppy—Madame Pomfrey—said you needed the rest after…"

Harry felt his head shake into a nod. He disentangled himself from Remus.

"For obvious reasons, the end of the Tournament was cut short," continued Remus. "Dumbledore sent everyone away who wasn't a student—except us two—and no one has been allowed in or out of the castle ever since. News has spread fast around Britain and I think Dumbledore has received more than twenty dozen Howlers from worried parents, but they seem to be mollified once he tells them about the new measures that are being implemented in the castle."

"If everyone's here, why aren't they…?"

"Here here? Poppy kicked them out a couple of hours ago and told them not to come back until they'd slept a full eight hours," Remus smiled comfortingly. "They were worried about you, we all were."

Padfoot barked once, softly, to show his agreement.

"Wh—what happened after I came back with…with Cedric and Pettigrew? What's going to happen to—to them?" he couldn't bring himself to refer to Cedric as anything else other than a person. Calling him a body seemed wrong, disrespectful almost, given everything that the other boy had done for him, even in death.

"Perhaps we should call Poppy and have her take a look at you first," Remus appeared ready to bolt out the door.

"Tell me, Moony. Please."

Remus sighed.

With a hand busy absently scratching Padfoot's head, Harry listened as Remus told him about the Aurors that had been immediately called upon the scene of Harry's arrival and declared Cedric's death. The officials had carted off Pettigrew to the Ministry with promises of a thorough interrogation and had left behind a bumbling, sputtering Minister Fudge to deal with the flock of reporters demanding answers. His predicament wasn't made any better when another group of Aurors was witnessed escorting an unconscious Alastor Moody and a previously thought to be deceased Barty Crouch Junior. Not even the minister's personal bodyguards could've helped him evade the onslaught of reporters.

"...Dumbledore came to get us, told us what happened with you and Crouch, and we came to meet you here at the infirmary. Moody is here as well," Remus gestured somewhere beyond the curtain enclosing Harry's bed. "Other than the two of us, Mr and Mrs Diggory are also somewhere in the castle. They came to visit you once and..."

Harry stopped listening after that and turned his face away to look out the window where a storm was gathering in the distance, black clouds approaching in swarms as the wind howled and pushed them forward.

Padfoot and Remus' vigil by his bedside became a silent one. Madame Pomfrey came by once to check over his progress and feed him some potions to speed his recovery, but she left once he made no effort to engage her back in any kind of conversation. He must have fallen asleep after that because when he opened his eyes again it was to see Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Luna and Neville huddled together at the bottom of his bed, building a house out of cards on a small round table.

He didn't want to disturb them, but a movement from his leg had Ron glancing in his direction reflexively and double back with a happy, "Harry! About time, mate!"

The house of cards fell to pieces as his friends rushed to his side. They didn't seem to know what to do with themselves once they were close though, their lips twitched with suppressed with worried smiles and shook with the effort of keeping their questions at bay.

Ginny pushed Ron from Harry's side to make room for herself and barely hesitated in bending down and planting a warm kiss on his lips. He kissed her back and felt it as her lips moved to his forehead, right atop his scar, to deliver one final press.

"Harry."

"Gin," he said, just for her. "Hey guys."

Hermione, Neville, Ron and Luna relaxed.

"Hey Harry, how are you feeling?" asked Hermione.

"Tired," he said, "and like I fell a thousand feet from my broom. Also, thirsty and a bit hungry."

"Lunch will be served soon," said Neville helpfully. "We were going to head to the great hall in fifteen minutes or so if you didn't wake up."

"You could've just gone anyway, I would've been here when you came back."

"We've been waiting two days for you to wake up, Harry," said Ron, "lunch could wait a few more minutes."

Harry thought that was the most thoughtfully Ron thing that he had ever said.

"Plus, it wasn't fair that Remus and Padfoot got to talk to you and we didn't," added Ginny.

"Sorry to have kept you waiting then," Harry felt his first smile in days threatening to make an appearance.

"I survived, but you'll have to make it up to me sometime."

"This is how it works then? I'm the one laid out in the infirmary and I have to make it up to you?"

"Hey, I'm not the one that makes the rules," Ginny grinned and Harry smiled back, the movement felt foreign on his face.

Whatever awkwardness had been present when Harry first woke up was gone. His friends still treaded a considerate line around the more sensitive subjects of Cedric's death, Pettigrew's capture and Voldemort's return, but they still managed to treat Harry like they always had and even succeeded in telling him what had been going on in the castle without receiving a complete shutdown like Remus had.

Other than Ginny, who kept a comforting grip on his hand and occasionally popped kisses on his brow, Luna, in particular, seemed to be able to be able to tell when Harry's emotions were getting the worst of him and took the job of directing the conversation in a different direction. She was the recipient of many grateful nods which she just acknowledged with a playful twirl of her fingers around her coin necklace.

Madame Pomfrey made an appearance with a tray of food for him at around midday and was then forced to summon five more trays from a house-elf when his friends refused to leave his side, arguing that they could wait until dinner to eat. Not much talking could be done with mouths full of food and drink, but Harry didn't care, just the fact that he had friends that weren't willing to leave his side while he was recovering, even for an hour, said more than words ever could.

After lunch was taken care of, a game of cards was suggested, which ended up being another attempt at a house of cards, only this time they all pitched in to help. Twenty minutes later, they'd built a house fit for a king (if the king was poor and couldn't afford proper materials, Neville joked) and Harry loved it. It was wonky, sure, it pitched a bit to the right and looked as if a sneeze would tear it down, but it was strong enough to hold its own for now and that was all Harry could offer at the moment. The others seemed to understand.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

They left at ten with promises of coming back the next day. Madame Pomfrey warded the door shut after them, aware of how precious her two charges were, and dimmed the lights in the infirmary before retiring to her own quarters. She left her bedroom door open and kept her wand close to her side as she got into her side of the bed. Out of habit, her hand swept across the other side of the bed and when she was met with nothing but cold sheets, she forced back her upset, resolved to deal with the issue in the morning.

This would be the first night that her patients would spend without the effects of a Sleeping Draught or a Dreamless Sleep potion aiding their rest. She expected a restless night for everyone.

She was woken up a total of seven times by her two patients. Moody appeared to know how to deal with his night terrors better than Poppy had thought and waved her away after he'd successfully calmed himself down. Harry was a different matter entirely.

Her heart broke each time she heard his cries, his sobs, his screams and his pleading.

"Ain't nothing you can do about it now, Poppy," grumbled Moody as she was tucking him into his bed, much to his embarrassment.

"You think I don't know that, Alastor? I've been playing this game for a long time now and it still hurts like it were my first day on the job," she said.

"What that boy needs, now more than ever, is support. No one will be able to understand exactly what he went through—his friends will try their best, but sympathy can only go so far," Moody murmured. "He's young, he'll have a hard time of it, but he'll make it through."

Moaning had them both turning their heads in the direction of the bed next to them. Although it was covered from sight by curtains, they could still hear the sound of rustling sheets, haggard breathing, stuttered whimpers.

"Eventually."

"Eventually," Poppy agreed with a sigh. "And don't think that doesn't apply to you as well, Alastor," she waved a wagging finger, "I've seen the way you deal with your own brand of demons and let me tell you, I am not impressed."

"Whaddya want me to do, Poppy? I'm old, tired and too set in my ways. I thought I had it right, constant vigilance I'd say, but even that ended up with me on my ass, locked up in a dead man's coffin," Moody groaned as he leaned back on his pillow, scarred face taking on an expression of pain as the movement pulled at his injuries.

"Never too late to teach an old dog new tricks," said Poppy, fluffing his pillow one last time. "That boy though… he's not even an adult yet and already he knows more about life than half the people in the world. I know I shouldn't get personally involved, but I worry about him more than I've worried about anyone else before… except maybe poor Remus, but he had his friends looking out for him—most of them."

Moody suddenly stiffened and growled, "Don't remind me. I spent years with that rat scurrying right under my nose and never so much as sniffed a thing wrong with 'im. I tell ya, I'm gonna kill that son of a bitch Crouch if it's the last thing I do and I'm takin' Pettigrew with me."

"No! Cedric—help him! Ced—don't… NO! Stop, please!"

Poppy sighed. "I can't argue with you on that one."

Brief words goodnight and Poppy was standing by Harry's bed, one hand on his shoulder shaking him awake and a cup of chamomile tea in the other hand serving as the only comfort she could give him. He woke up with a start, face drenched in his own sweat and tears, and downed the cup of tea, burning himself as he forced it down, but he didn't say a word and turned on his side, shivering beneath the covers.

The same routine was repeated four more times that night before Harry finally passed out from sheer exhaustion at around five in the morning, only to wake up four hours later, like clockwork, just in time for breakfast. His friends would begin to arrive after breakfast and stay by his side until well into the afternoon, taking turns to ensure someone was always keeping Harry company.

However, as each day passed and Harry missed more of his queues to speak, let his eyes gloss over for more and more time, and intermittently began to lose his trail of thought mid-sentence, his friends began to pick up on the dangerous pattern and voiced their concerns, but to no avail.

Poppy had walked in one too many times on his friends or Remus (always with that dog nearby, either curled up on top of Harry's feet or snuggled into his side) gently broaching the subject on separate occasions, but Harry had become an expert at misdirection overnight and held minute long conversations in which he talked a lot without saying anything.

It came to the point that Poppy had begun to question Moody's certainty on Harry's recovery.

That is, until two days before students were bound to take the train back home.

Poppy hadn't meant to walk in on what was clearly a private moment, she really hadn't, but there she'd been, frozen solid under her doorway, arms clutched tightly around the potion bottles she'd meant to refill. At first, she thought Harry had fallen asleep in the worst position possible, bent over double on the bed with his head resting on Ginevra's lap as she sat on top of the bed..

But when she'd looked closer, taken another minute, she noticed the shaking, how his shoulders heaved irregularly, how Ginevra's hand sometimes stuttered as she ran her fingers through his hair. And then came the sounds. They were barely discernible—if she hadn't seen the couple like this, she would've thought it was the wind whistling through a crack in the window. It was a low pitched keening, it was the sound babies made after they'd calmed down from crying for a long time, little hiccups of dried tears and used sobs.

"I know it's not the same," she heard Ginevra say, "but if anyone knows what it's like to have something inexplicably horrifying happen to you and then have no idea how to even begin to deal with, then it's the two of us."

Poppy remembered blood on the walls, mandrakes wailing, the beds of her infirmary occupied by statues of children.

"And we're still here," continued Ginevra. "Every breath we take is another strike to Voldemort's ass—it's more proof that he's not all-powerful. He couldn't even kill two children!"

Harry let out a wet chuckle and sat up.

"Only you would think talking about Voldemort's ass would make me feel better."

"It did, didn't it?"

"Maybe."

"Then why are you complaining?"

"Coz I wish I hadn't been the only one to hear that in this room," said Harry, voice suddenly dripping in grief, "I wish Cedric was here to hear that. He's dead because of me."

"That's not true, and somewhere in here," Ginevra poked a finger at his chest, "you know it, too."

She'd seen and heard enough. Poppy didn't stay to listen to Harry's response, she'd already encroached herself enough into this intimate moment, she wasn't going to tally up her crimes any higher. She took another path out of the infirmary—one which originated at her office that not even the Weasley twins knew about—all the while thinking that with Ms Weasley at his side, perhaps all was not as lost for Harry Potter as Poppy had thought.

She chose to ignore, for the moment, what it signified about this coming war that the people who have been most so far are only children.