Scenes
Read the Harry/Draco scenes that have taken place in the books. |
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE: THE BATTLE OF HOGWARTS
Deeper and deeper into the labyrinth he went, looking for objects he recognized from his previous trip into the room. His breath was loud in his ears, and then his very soul seemed to shiver: There it was, right ahead, the blistered old cupboard in which he had hidden his old Potions book, and on top of it, the pockmarked stone warlock wearing a dusty old wig and what looked like an ancient, discolored tiara.
He had already stretched out his hand, though he remained ten feet away, when a voice behind him said, "Hold it, Potter."
He skidded to a halt and turned around. Crabbe and Goyle were standing behind him, shoulder to shoulder, wands pointing right at Harry. Through the small space between their jeering faces he saw Draco Malfoy.
"That's my wand you're holding there, Potter," said Malfoy, pointing his own through the gap between Crabbe and Goyle.
"Not anymore," panted Harry, tightening his grip on the hawthorn wand. "Winners, keepers, Malfoy. Who's lent you theirs?"
"My mother," said Draco.
Harry laughed, though there was nothing very humorous about the situation. He could not hear Ron or Hermione anymore. They seemed to have run out of earshot, searching for the diadem.
"So how come you three aren't with Voldemort?" asked Harry.
"We're gonna be rewarded," said Crabbe: His voice was surpisingly soft for such an enormous person; Harry had hardly ever heard him speak before. Crabbe was smiling like a small child promised a bag of sweets. "We 'ung back, Potter. We decided not to go. Decided to bring you to 'im."
"Good plan," said Harry in mock admiration. He could not believe that he was this close, and was going to be thwarted by Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle. He began edging slowly backward toward the place where the Horcrux sat lopsided upon the bust. If he could just get his hands on it before the fight broke out...
"So how did you get in here?" he asked, trying to distract them.
"I virtually lived in the Room of Hidden Things all last year," said Malfoy, his voice brittle. "I know how to get in."
"We was hiding in the corridor outside," grunted Goyle. "We can do Diss-lusion Charms now! And then," his face splint into a gormless grin, "you turned up right in front of us and said you was looking for a die-dum! What's a die-dum?"
"Harry?" Ron's voice echoed suddenly from the other side of the wall to Harry's right. "Are you talking to someone?"
With a whiplike movement, Crabbe pointed his wand at the fifty-foot mountain of old furniture, of broken trunks, of old books and robes and unidentifiable junk, and shouted, "Descendo!"
The wall began to totter, and then the top third crumbled into the aisle next door where Ron stood.
"Ron!" Harry bellowed, as somewhere out of sight Hermione screamed, and Harry heard innumerable objects crashing to the floor on the other side of the distabilized wall: He pointed his wand at the rampart, cried, "Finite!" and it steadied.
"No!" shouted Malfoy, staying Crabbe's arm as the latter made to repeat his spell. "If you wreck the room you might bury this diadem thing!"
"What's that matter?" said Crabbe, tugging himself free. "It's Potter the Dark Lord wants, who cares about a die-dum?"
"Potter came in here to get it," said Malfoy with ill-disguised impatiance at the slow-wittedness of his colleagues, "so that must mean —"
"'Must mean'?" Crabbe turned on Malfoy with undisguised ferocity. "Who cares what you think? I don't take your orders no more, Draco. You an' your dad are finished."
"Harry?" shouted Ron again, from the other side of the junk wall. "What's going on?"
"Harry?" mimicked Crabbe. "What's going — no, Potter! Crucio!"
Harry had lunged for the tiara; Crabbe's curse missed him but hit the stone bust, which flew into the air; the diadem soared upward and then dropped out of sight in the mass of objects on which the bust had rested.
"STOP!" Malfoy shouted at Crabbe, his voice echoing through the enormous room. "The Dark Lord wants him alive —"
"So? I'm not killing him, am I?" yelled Crabbe, throwing off Malfoy's restraining arm. "But if I can, I will, the Dark Lord wants him dead anyway, what's the diff —?"
A jet of scarlet light shot past Harry by inches: Hermione had run around the corner behind him and sent a Stunning Spell straight at Crabbe's head. It only missed because Malfoy pulled him out of the way.
"It's that Mudblood! Avada Kedavra!"
Harry saw Hermione dive aside, and his fury that Crabbe had aimed to kill wiped all else from his mind. He shot a Stunning Spell at Crabbe, who lurched out of the way, knocking Malfoy's wand out of his hand; it rolled out of sight beneath a mountain of broken furniture and boxes.
"Don't kill him! DON'T KILL HIM!" Malfoy yelled at Crabbe and Goyle, who were both aiming at Harry; Their split second's hesitation was all Harry needed.
— (American Edition; 628-631)
"Harry, let's get out, let's get out!" bellowed Ron, though it was impossible to see where the door was through the black smoke.
And then Harry heard a thin, piteous human scream from amidst the terrible commotion, the thunder of devouring flame.
"It's — too — dangerous — !" Ron yelled, but Harry wheeled in the air. His glasses giving his eyes some small protection from the smoke, he raked the firestorm below, seeking a sign of life, a limb or a face that was not yet charred like wood....
And he saw them: Malfoy with his arms around the unconsious Goyle, the pair of them perched on a fragile tower of charred desks, and Harry dived. Malfoy saw him coming and raised one arm, but even as Harry grasped it he knew at once that it was no good: Goyle was too heavy and Malfoy's hand, covered in sweat, slid instantly out of Harry's —
"IF WE DIE FOR THEM, I'LL KILL YOU, HARRY!" roared Ron's voice, and, as a great flaming chimaera bore down upon them, he and Hermione dragged Goyle onto their broom and rose, rolling and pitching, into the air once more as Malfoy clambered up behind Harry.
"The door, get to the door, the door!" screamed Malfoy into Harry's ear, and Harry sped up, following Ron, Hermione, and Goyle through the billowing black smoke, hardly able to breathe: and all around them the last few objects unburned by the devouring flames were flung into the air, as the creatures of the cursed fire cast them high in celebration: cups and shields, a sparkling necklace, and an old, discolored tiara —
"What are you doing, what are you doing, the door's that way!" screamed Malfoy, but Harry made a hairpin swerve and dived. The diadem seemed to fall in slow motion, turning and glittering as it dropped toward the maw of a yawning serpent, and then he had it, caught it around his wrist —
Harry swerved again as the serpent lunged at him; he soared upward and straight toward the place where, he prayed, the door stood open: Ron, Hermione, and Goyle had vanished; Malfoy was screaming and holding Harry so tightly it hurt. Then, through the smoke, Harry saw a rectangular patch on the wall and steered the broom at it, and moments later clean air filled his lungs and they collided with the wall in the corridor beyond.
Malfoy fell off the broom and lay facedown, gasping, coughing, and retching. Harry rolled over and sat up: The door to the Room of Requirement had vanished, and Ron and Hermione sat panting on the floor beside Goyle, who was still unconsious.
"C-Crabbe," choked Malfoy as soon as he could speak. "C-Crabbe..."
"He's dead," said Ron harshly.
— (American Edition; 633-634)
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