Chapter Text
Harrie couldn’t take her eyes off Cedric’s body as Voldemort began his rambling tirade, but her heart was jackrabbiting in her throat, her body felt like it was on fire, and something screamed in every inch of her to run. But she couldn’t. She was bound to the gravestone of Voldemort’s father and pain pierced through her from when Voldemort had pressed his hand to Harrie's head.
Hermione had stressed over and over again that they could die during the Tournament, and yet here they were, at the end, and it wasn’t the Tournament that killed them. Harrie felt like if she had anymore sense of awareness in that moment that hysterical laughter would have bubbled up out of her throat.
Suddenly, the ropes loosened and fell around her and her wand flew at her, landing lamely on the ground in front of her. She refocused on what the insane prick in front of her was saying.
“Pick up your wand, Potter.” Harrie blinked owlishly through the white noise in her head, and then Voldemort’s face contorted with fury, “I said pick it up, get up!”
Harrie was loath to do anything the man demanded of her, but it would be stupid not to grab her own wand when she was alone, outnumbered in a graveyard by a dozen or so adults who all knew Dark Magic like the back of their hands. She pushed herself to her feet, and Voldemort made a high, gleeful noise that grated against Harrie’s whole body.
Why did her body feel like it was on fire? She could feel the sweat - the summer air closing in on her, thick and too humid, but it felt like everything in her body was too heavy, a deep ache in her bones and muscles comparable to how she felt after running drills for Wood the year before for Quidditch.
“Good,” the word felt almost like a purr against her skin, a balm to the ache in her bones. Her hair stood on end, her skin covered in bumps as she shivered, and she wasn’t hearing whatever it was Voldemort was saying-
“ Bow ,” a voice hummed through her mind, and Harrie choked again, something clawing inside her chest because there was no fucking way in hell she was going to bow for this donkey of a man. She raised her head even as her neck and the voice in her head screamed to do the opposite, and she glared at the man. However, her moment of bravado was broken when her knees gave out, and she lost hold of her wand.
There was a horrible sort of silence in the clearing. Every figure stood stock still and Harrie panted, digging her hands into the soil, trying to anchor herself. There was an ache between her legs, but she’d powered through bull like this before and she’d do it again. She shoved it all behind her into the tiny corner of her mind that had a banner reading “PROBLEMS FOR FUTURE HARRIE” as she pushed herself back to her feet, panting. She needed to get out of here before Voldemort, or any of these pillocks, tried to kill her. Whatever was going on with her body would have to wait.
“If only Dumbledore could see you now, girl,” Voldemort hissed, staring at her like she’d done a neat trick, and Harrie wanted to curse the man. “Maybe I will keep you alive if only to break you apart in front of him.”
A red light shot from Voldemort’s wand, and Harrie thrust all her weight to the side. She tried to duck into a roll, but the pain threw her off balance. The curse struck, and Harrie found herself writhing on the ground in pain. She started to scream but cut it off at the pass, gasping as she curled in on herself. Her stomach convulsed, and she gagged. Then the pain stopped, and she swallowed the bile down at the back of his throat, coughing.
Her wand, where was Her wand?
Her chest ached, her throat burned, and her nails and skin felt like they were itching to crawl off her body.
Voldemort’s robes swished into view, and suddenly,pineforestfiresmoke flooded her senses. Her body went lax, the itching slowing to a halt as a hand fisted her hair, pulling her up to her knees. Voldemort’s body was crowding her against one of the gravestones. Even as the absolutely insane desire to shove her face into Voldemort’s robe rose inside of her, Harrie became horribly aware of two things at once.
Voldemort’s leg had slotted between her, and Harrie was rubbing onto it. The ache between her legs was so intense now that it was practically pulsing. She let out an involuntary noise at the contact, the smell and touch overwhelming her. She’d never known something could both hurt and feel so good at the same time.
“Pathetic, the great Harrie Potter, the Girl Who Lived. An Omega ,” Voldemort hissed, and Harrie froze in panic, trying to jerk her head away. No, no, she couldn’t be- all of her classmates had already presented, the last being Bulstrode in Slytherin at the beginning of the year- everyone else had presented in their second or third year.
Voldemort’s face was too close to her neck for comfort, teeth bared with the threat to bite the mating gland on her neck. And while the omega half of Harrie was still practically melted at the smell of pine forest and campfire, the other half of Harrie, the one that ran the show and knew this was not a good alpha, not someone to trust with anything let alone their fecking body or virginity , took over the reins and she turned and sank her teeth into the only thing she could- Voldemort’s forearm.
The elder[ly] man let out a litany of curses, and Harrie dropped and rolled. She reached blindly for her wand, willing it with every fiber of her being into her hand. Once she felt it, she threw up a shield even as a section of headstone blew off the one closest to her.
“I am going to bite you and mount you and then rip your throat out in front of that wizened, decrepit old fool!” The man screamed and another gravestone exploded. Harrie ducked once and then again, scrambling, trying to find a way to get back to the portkey.
The next curse hit just over her ear, and she could feel the heat and magic of it. She bounced out from her cover, screaming, “Expelliarmus!” louder than she ever had before.
Red and green strikes smashed together in a horrible, blinding display, and her hand burned, so she clutched onto the wood with both hands, trying to push through whatever was happening.
Even as she heard Voldemort screaming, she saw the green of the killing curse and the red of her disarming spell blend and bleed until they became a bright gold, almost white in its blinding brightness. Harrie tried to look away, only to realise the bright lights were destroying his night vision and all she could see were crackles of more gold sparking off from the connection and feel and hear the shifting of the Death Eaters around them.
Harrie blinked as her eyes tried to focus on the images in front of her . There was a hand for a moment, but it disappeared as rapidly as it appeared, and then Cedric was there, floating towards her. Her heart caught in her throat. She wanted to reach out, but she was so afraid to release either of her hands from her wand. They hurt so much, they burned and ached, and she was certain if she tried to unclasp them that she wouldn’t be able to grip her wand again.
A woman and then a man. The man she recognised- he was the one from her dream the summer before, the muggle man. And then her parents stepped into her field of vision. If Cedric had caused her heart to jump into her throat, her parents made her heart stop. She could feel tears at the corner of her eyes as she gasped, struggling to take in every part of them.
She wanted this to stop. Her heart ached so hard it felt like it was tearing in two as she heard a terribly beautiful song- a phoenix song, like Fawkes had sung for her before. She wanted all of this to stop. She didn’t want to fight anymore. She was tired- her body hurt, her heart hurt, and she wanted to lie down and die so she could hold and be held by her mother and father and cling to them as she sobbed.
Her mother was there suddenly, right in front of her as if she could hear Harrie’s thoughts. Her eyes looked watery, and her hands cupped her cheeks as the tears poured down them. She gasped for air through the pain and tears.
“My Beautiful Daughter,” her voice was light and airy and barely there above a whisper, almost as if she spoke louder, she was worried she’d also break down, but it still triggered something deep inside her, like a melody she’d forgotten. She knew this voice better than anyone’s, but she wouldn’t be able to recall it if asked directly. “You’re so strong, be strong for just a little longer.”
Harrie shook her head and gasped again, sobbing as her father wrapped an arm around her shoulder and pressed his cheek to her’s. She could feel that hand on her back.
“Please,” Harrie begged, not really knowing what she was asking for. “Don’t let go,” James said, his voice also sounding heavy with unshed tears, “Don’t let go until we say.”
“Harrie,” Cedric said, there on the other side of his mother, the spirits making a tight little half-circle around her, blocking Voldemort and the Death Eaters entirely from view. Honestly, she didn’t care. If this was how she died, then she’d take it. “Harrie, please, take my body back to my father,” Cedric asked, reaching up and pushing hair out of Harrie’s face. “You can do it.”
“Harrie,” her father, her dad said, and Harrie felt so overwhelmed in every capacity- physically, mentally, emotionally. “When the connection breaks, you must get to the portkey,” his grip tightened for a moment like he was steeling himself. Harrie wanted to let go of the wand and grab him and her mother and never let go, but her father shook his head as if he knew exactly what she was thinking, “We can delay him for a moment to give you time, but it will only be a moment, do you understand?”
Harrie swallowed all the excess saliva and mucus that had disgustingly pooled in her mouth as she’d cried and nodded her head. She didn’t want to, she wanted to give up, she wanted to lie down, but she looked at Cedric and took a deep, shaky breath and nodded her head- Cedric deserved to have a proper send off. If she could power through this for anyone, it was him. Cedric deserved to get back home.
“It’s time,” his mother said, her forehead bumping gently against Harrie’s. She could see a single tear on her cheek. “Let go, sweetheart, and run .”
The connection broke, and Harrie was desperately glad for Cedric’s shout of “Now!” to shove Harrie into action because both of her hands were shaking, and she was barely able to unclutch one hand as she dove towards Cedric’s body. Death Eaters were running towards her, and the portkey was just there, out of reach-
“Accio!” She screamed, and the cup flew at them. There was screaming as she felt a jerk in her stomach, and the world spun around them. She clung to Cedric’s body- lights and colours and sounds.
Harrie and Cedric landed inelegantly on the ground, tumbling across the grass and Harrie clung to the older boy’s body, her tears back, the grief and pain and horror of everything ripping through her now that she was no longer worried about immediately being tortured and/or killed in front of Malfoy’s father and a bunch of other bigots.
Someone was screaming her name. There was a lot of noise, but none of it made sense to Harrie; her whole body was strung so tight, the pain and the overstimulation grated. Her hands were burned, and she couldn’t get either to loosen their grip on Cedric or her wand, and she curled more tightly into herself over the body.
“Harrie! Tell me what happened!” A voice shouted too loudly. She flinched.
Harrie stared, her eyes unseeing for a moment, unfocused as she tried to process what those words meant- she could hear a ringing noise in the background, high-pitched, more voices, lights flashing, and then screams.
Dumbledore , Harrie practically sagged when her brain put it together; it was Dumbledore! The headmaster was trying to gently uncurl Harrie’s burnt hands from Cedric, pulling her off the boy’s body.
“He’s back,” Harrie managed to finally say, staring at the headmaster, her voice sounding hollow and distant. “Voldemort’s back. Cedric- he asked me to bring back his body-” Someone was jostling them and Harrie realised her legs weren’t working. The full-body ache had returned now that she was no longer in a life-or-death situation, and her stomach felt like someone was trying to cut her open from the inside.
“I couldn’t leave him,” he managed to get out. The words felt odd- like someone else was saying them. It felt like she was floating.
“It’s alright, Harrie, you’re home, you’re both home-” Dumbledore was saying, and Harrie felt her head nod slowly. Then, she smelled worn parchment and books and leather and realised Dumbledore had lifted her up; she didn’t know Dumbledore could do that. Her head was turned, breathing in the man’s scent, and the distraction it provided was just enough to keep from… From what?
What was happening? What was she doing?
Dumbledore was talking to someone, so many people, but when someone tried to take Harrie, Harrie felt her whole body flinch again. She was shaking and gasping for air like her lungs were burning. Despite the burns covering her hands, she clung to the Headmaster. She knew if she didn’t, she was going to start screaming and then wouldn’t be able to stop the absolute panic inside of her.
Please let me know if you find mistakes or if something looks or sounds strange. I will be trying to make a podfic of this at some point but idk how fast those will come out cause my area is very very loud so we shall see.