RoLP Ch.89: Tiara and Tonks

13th July 1996

Room of Hidden Things, Hogwarts

Red eyes glared at them, as Tonks casually twirled her wand, wisps of magic spiraling in the air. Harry’s grasp on his wand tightened as he eyed the thin, colored wisps of magic that drifted through the air lazily.

“Hello, professor,” Tonks' smooth voice rolled over their spines, and Harry felt a shiver run down his body. “How… delightful to see you here today.”

“Tom,” Dumbledore slid between the Order members and Tonks, giving her an assessing look, before his eyes moved to the tiara on her head. “I will give you one chance. Leave Nymphadora alone and surrender peacefully. Throw the crown on the floor and leave her.”

The wisps of magic shone brighter, and Harry tensed, gathering magic at the tip of his wand.

“Now, now, professor, we cannot have that, can we?” Tonks smiled, her red eyes gleaming like drops of blood. “If I leave her, you’ll destroy me. That’s what you’re here for. But you won’t harm her.” 

The last part came out as a hiss, and the wisps turned to snake-like constructs that lunged at the order members. Harry stepped back, magic roaring from his wand, wrangling the snakes in mid-air before they could touch the others. With a growl, he poured his will down the wood of the Elder Wand, smothering the spell out, leaving the faintest ripples in the air.

At the same time, a dozen stunners crashed against Tonks’ glimmering shield, sparks of red scattering across the floor as whorls of crimson bled across its surface. Beside Harry, Dumbledore thrust his wand forward, and the shields shattered like glass, sending Tonks stumbling.

“Stun her!” Bill shouted, and another volley of stunners rained toward her, only to crash against a wooden cabinet that burst into flames. 

With a flick of his wand, Harry vanished the cabinet, another spell on his lips, only to stop short as he noticed that Tonks was nowhere to be seen.

“Where’s she gone?” Sirius yelled.

“It is no longer Nymphadora, Sirius,” Dumbledore’s grave voice echoed through the piles, before he waved his wand, and a shimmer rose around them. “It is Voldemort. And he’s running.”

“The good news is that he cannot go out of the room,” Harry said. “The bad news is we’re surrounded by mountains of things, and I cannot just change the room. And that we cannot hurt her. It may be Voldemort controlling her, but Tonks is still in there.”

“She couldn’t have gone far, though.” Daphne bit her lip. “If we spread out, we could find her.”

Harry nodded, looking around. “Groups of five, at least. Be on guard because Voldemort won’t hesitate to kill you. We’ll surround her and get the tiara off her. Once it is off, we take Tonks away immediately, bound and unconscious. No risks till the crown’s destroyed.” Harry raised his wand. “Once you see her, take a sturdy cover before engaging, and keep an eye on the piles of stuff around. Understood? Good. Homenum Revelio.”

Everyone around Harry lit up in a pale blue light, which spread across the piles and around the room like water over a stone.

“I cannot sense her,” Harry whispered. “Shit. He must’ve warded against the spell. Or it may be the tiara at work, not wanting to be found.”

“Spread out, and find her,” Dumbledore said. “It may be Voldemort controlling her for now, but that control is brute, much akin to an Imperius curse. She may even be fighting him from within, which would make it easier to get him away. Aim for the tiara. Knock it off her and get her away from it. Don’t touch it, though, come what may. Only Harry, Perenelle, or I will touch it.”

The group split up quickly, going to the closest person they were— either Harry, Dumbledore, or Perenelle. 

Daphne, Fleur, Sirius, and, surprisingly, Professor McGonagall stood near him, and Harry blinked in surprise at the latter, only to receive a stern glare.  

“It is imperative that each group has a Hogwarts Faculty with them, Mr. Potter,” McGonagall said. “You’re under our roof. And regardless of all your glowing accomplishments, you’re still our student and hence our responsibility.” 

Harry nodded quickly and looked around. Dumbledore had Susan, Kingsley, Fred, and George, who had been clearly eager to steer clear of McGonagall, with him. Perenelle had gotten the rest, namely Hestia, Bill, Professor Flitwick, and Remus.

“Good luck,” Dumbledore breathed, and they split up, hurrying in different directions.

Harry led his group through a narrow aisle flanked by teetering shelves,  as the faint murmurs and footsteps of the other groups faded. Piles of forgotten things loomed over them like tombstones, casting long shadows in the dim, eerie light that hovered across the massive room. 

“Should we call out to her?” Daphne whispered. “Maybe it’ll help her fight it?”

“Possession is tricky, I’m afraid. It would require an extremely strong will on her part, enough to overpower Voldemort’s to even begin. Frankly, it is not something she has after… the depression she is going through." Harry sighed. "Even with the help, she isn’t back to where she was before her mother died. It is why Voldemort picked her, I reckon. She was the easiest target amongst us.”

“You mean the spell on the tiara is sentient, Mr. Potter?” McGonagall asked sharply. “The headmaster and you are being awfully tight-lipped about what it exactly is, beyond stating that it is extremely dangerous.”

“Even if I tell you what it is, Professor, I doubt you would know," Harry said. "Even Dumbledore and I had to dive into some of the worst tomes of magic to find out what it is. And Voldemort created them. Several of them. Between Dumbledore and me, we’ve already taken care of three of them. This is the fourth.”

“Merlin.” Sirius sighed. “Then again, up to par with what I’ve heard about him. He’s pretty much the worst dark magic user since Herpo. Not even bloody Grindelwald comes close.”

“You don’t know how right you’re on that,” Harry muttered, tensing as he felt the hairs on his arms tingle.

Harry raised his hand, and everyone behind him froze, their eyes scanning the shadows that danced on the broken stone floor. A faint trail of ash drifted lazily in the air, curling through the stillness like smoke from a snuffed candle.

“Magic,” Harry breathed. “Active casting.”

A scrape rang from above, a deep metallic clang reverberating through the piles around them. Harry squinted in the darkness but saw nothing. Fleur, on the other hand, flicked her wand, murmuring a detection charm under her breath.  A shimmer of orange light arced into the air and dissipated against the piles, and she shook her head at him. 

“She’s around here, but where?” Sirius scowled. “Come out, if you have the guts, you cowardly dementor-fucker!”

“It may not be the best idea to—”

Suddenly, a burst of motion caught Harry’s eye as something launched from above them, tumbling down a stack of broken desks. Fleur shouted a warning just in time as a jet of sickly green light shot downward, straight at Sirius.

Harry conjured a large marble block, which exploded into dust, raining over his godfather, covering his robes and head. Beside him, McGonagall’s wand lashed out, transfiguring a broken desk to steel ropes which snaked up the pile with a loud clatter.

A pair of spells rained down from above, and Harry followed the trail up as the chains were torn apart, little metal bits tumbling down to the floor. Perched atop the mountain of junk, Tonks crouched—her form distorted, her skin pale and stretched too tight. Her red eyes burned with inhuman fury, and her wand hand twitched, a spell tearing through the air toward McGonagall, only to hit a shield with a bone-jarring gong. 

“You think you’re clever,” she hissed, voice layered with two tones—hers, and a cold, oily undertone. “Locking me in this room so I cannot leave. But you missed something. I’m not trapped here with you. YOU’RE TRAPPED IN HERE WITH ME!”

Spells burst through the end of her wand, hammering against Harry’s shields with deep gongs, sparks of magic scattering in the air.

“What’re you doing? Take her down!” Daphne jabbed her wand at Tonks, a stunner flying off her wand, only to be swatted away.

“Let her tire out. This is not Voldemort in his own self. He’s running on Tonks’ power.”

“Tonks!” Sirius stepped forward, lowering his wand slightly. “It’s me, it’s Sirius! You can fight him. You can throw him off.”

She laughed—no, he laughed through her. A bitter, broken cackle that echoed through the room.

“I’ll give you that the girl has spirit,” Voldemort said, using her mouth, her voice. “But she’s weeping inside like a pathetic, little vermin. So much fear. So much guilt. So much anger… and so easy to mold.” He smiled widely. “A part of her hates you all for taking her mother away from her.”

“You know who she probably blames more? A lot more? You.” Harry scowled. “And you’ve probably just pissed her off.” Tonks' eyes narrowed. Her wand jerked slightly, and a blast of magic flew off her wand, going wide and hitting the ground. “Case in point.”

“She’s no match for me!” Voldemort thundered, firing another curse, which hit the space in front of Harry instead of him. 

“Let her go peacefully, Riddle,” Harry said, his voice low and dangerous. “Before we make you. I know you’re afraid. You know you cannot take us all. Not with Dumbledore here. That’s why you tried to run. But there’s nowhere to run. So, you can give up peacefully or painfully.”

“You don’t know pain,” Tonks snarled. Her hair had begun to darken at the edges, streaking black, the magic of the tiara pulsing like a heartbeat against her skull. “But you will!”

She pointed her wand upward and released a burst of red sparks—decoys, Harry realized a second too late—as the piles of artifacts around them shuddered. From the stacks, objects began to move—shields, swords, rusted suits of armor, and broken chairs with legs like spiders. 

“Bloody hell,” Daphne muttered.

A rusted mace slammed into the floor beside her with a heavy crunch, missing her by inches as she dove aside, raising a shimmering shield. Around them, more objects stirred—suits of armor clanking to life, a cascade of broken, bladed things skittering like insects across the stone.

Behind them, a pile of discarded desks as tall as Salazar’s Basilisk swayed forward dangerously. Harry poured his will through the Elder Wand, and the mountain stabilized, the desks creaking. He transfigured a charging suit of armor into a vast net and banished it at Voldemort, who vanished it with a sneer.

“Back!” McGonagall shouted, drawing a line in the air that flared to life as a stone barrier surged upward in front of them. A sword thunked into it a second later, vibrating like a struck tuning fork.

“Some of them are cursed!” Fleur hissed as her shield trembled, before blasting apart the suit of armor mid-charge. “He’s waking up the worst of it. Anything with enough magic left in it to move, he’s pulling strings on.”

A suit of armor lunged at McGonagall with a halberd. She flicked her wand, and the weapon transfigured into a shower of moths mid-swing, which fluttered away harmlessly.

Above them, Tonks moved like a wraith, leaping from pile to pile. Her wand flared with pulses of magic, and more things flared to life. 

Harry scowled, conjuring a domed shield to stop an assault of fanged frisbees which burst like grenades against his shield.

“We need to separate her from these things!” Sirius yelled, deflecting three flying daggers which sank into the floor like hot knives through butter. “We can’t reach her with all this junk in the way.”

“If you can defend yourselves, I’ll go after her. I can fly; you can’t.”

“Are you mad!?” Daphne spun on him, eyes wide. “You won’t kill her, but she’ll kill you! You’ll have to fight Voldemort with one hand behind your back. Alone. And if she disarms you…”

“She won’t,” Harry said tightly. “I just need to get one hit in.”

“Do it.” McGonagall gave him a sharp look. “Go, Mr. Potter.”

Harry nodded, darting away into the attacking junk, using a cleaving curse to tear through an army of animated textbooks— something which he noted would’ve given Hermione a heart attack or sent her on a killing spree.

Wind whipped through his hair as he flew up, hovering above the mountains of junk that stretched below him. In the distance, he spotted Perenelle and Flitwick bolting through the narrow alleys, their wands out as they made their way toward his team, who were causing a ruckus below.

‘Good.’ He thought, looking around, squinting through the flashes of magic below. ‘Now to get him to me.’

“TONKS!” he bellowed up at her. “You’re stronger than this! You’re stronger than that two-bit dark lord! You don’t have to let him win!”

For a moment, the only sounds were the clatter of metal and the sizzle of spellfire below him. Then, a dark blur flitted, bouncing atop the piles of junk until she appeared at the edge of a broken bookcase, red eyes narrowed, teeth bared.

“I—” The hiss changed to a strangled voice, and the red eyes flickered to a shade of violet. “I can’t.” The next second, the red eyes were back, glaring at Harry. “Avada Kedavra!”

Harry summoned a sturdy bench from below, which burst into wooden flakes as soon as the curse hit it. Seizing the fragments with his magic, he transfigured them into ropes, banishing them at Tonks. With a jab of her wand, the ropes burst into flames.

“Legilimens.” Harry poured the spell down the wand and dove into Tonks’ mind, pushing past the resistance.

For a second, darkness engulfed him. Then, he found himself in a desolate, dark house that lay in tatters. Cracks crawled up the wall, disappearing behind the broken photo frames that hung on it. The floorboards beneath his feet cracked dangerously as he stepped forward, taking a deep breath.

“Tonks?” He called, his voice echoing through the house.

Black tendrils lunged at him, but he swatted them aside, burning them to a crisp, flooding his own memories of Tonks at it— a happy Tonks, whom he had seen before Andromeda had died.

The room seemed to brighten, and a few cracks vanished, a lone photo frame repairing on the wall.

Harry’s jaw twitched and he continued, climbing up the stairs, thinking of all the good memories of Tonks he could on his way, pouring it into her mind. The house seemed to heal, a few of the lights flickering back on as he walked up.

“Tonks?”

A soft whimper drew his attention, and he turned to what was probably the worst part of the house, where rot had crept in. Mold grew along the walls, and he felt a shiver run down his spine.

Fortifying his own mental shields, he stepped through, feeling a chill of hopelessness creep onto him. Ahead of him, black vines surrounded a pale pink door full of cracks, through which mold seeped, a putrid smell hanging in the air.

Harry pushed the door open, finding it locked.

“Tonks, it is me. Harry. I need to come in. Let me help you out.”

The floor beneath him tilted, throwing him back, away from the door. A faint pink streak shone through the gaps in the door, washing over Harry.

“I’m not Voldemort. Please, Tonks. I need to get to you to help you. It is I, Harry.”

The pink light receded, and the floor righted itself. Harry slowly went ahead and pushed the door open, looking around the small bedroom.

Tonks sat in the corner, her knees drawn to her chest, hands clutching at her arms. Her hair hung limp, devoid of color, and her eyes were dull, red-rimmed, locked on the floor. Shadows squirmed around her like vines, whispering things Harry couldn’t quite hear. But as he neared, he could feel them—words of guilt, of blame, of grief. 

Harry felt his heart clench as he drowned out the whispers, kneeling slowly in front of Tonks. 

“Tonks. It’s me. Harry.” She didn’t look up. “You’re stronger than this,” he said softly. “You’re not alone. We’re here. Sirius, Fleur, Daphne, Dumbledore, McGonagall… we’re all here for you. We’re all fighting to get you back.”

A flicker passed in her eyes, and she lifted her head slightly, her eyes trembling.

“But I let him in,” she whispered. “I was weak. He wanted in and I… I didn’t stop him.”

Harry clenched his fists. “You were grieving. You were hurt. That’s not a weakness, Tonks. That’s being human.”

“He feels everything I do,” she continued in a trembling voice. “He knows what I hate, what I regret, what I’ve lost. He twisted it all. I’m not strong enough.”

“You are strong enough. He can’t twist what you don’t give him,” Harry said. “Fight him. You’re not his puppet. You’re Nymphadora Tonks. You’re brave, and loyal, and maddeningly reckless, and you don’t let anyone control you. You are a woman your mother was damn proud of. And from what I knew of her, she would’ve told you the same.”

That drew the faintest ghost of a smile on her cracked lips. And then the shadows screamed. Harry flinched as the mold along the walls bloomed suddenly, black vines writhing toward him like snakes.

“NO!” Tonks cried out, lifting her head, and the vines froze.

Then the whole house trembled, and her eyes began to glow a faint pink.

“I can’t hold him off forever,” she whispered.

“You don’t need to. Just enough,” Harry said, extending his hand toward her. “Let me in. Just a little. I can tear him out. We can tear him out.”

She nodded slowly, tears rolling down her cheeks.

“Once I pull you out with me, you've got to get the tiara off your head,” Harry added. “Throw it down. Don’t care where it goes. Tear it off your head. Voldemort’s trying to take you over. I probably gave him a nasty headache on my way in, but you’ve got to tear it off. It is the safest way to save you.”

“And if I can’t in time?” She asked in a small voice.

“Then I’ll find another way. I will get Voldemort out and destroy that Tiara. I promise.” Harry said solemnly.

“Okay.” She took his hand, her fingers wrapping around his.

“Think of the happiest thing you can. Think of your mother. Of the good times.” Harry poured every bit of magic he could muster into their connection, feeling warmth blossom from her into him. “Ready? Here we go.”

The world exploded.

Harry was thrown backward, physically and mentally. His eyes snapped open as he felt the tiara’s magic recoil from the connection. Above him, Tonks—no, Voldemort—screamed, clutching her head, reeling on her perch.

Her red eyes flickered. Violet bled through them, and Tonks raised her arm, grabbing onto the tiara and wrenching it off her head, chucking it away.

The tiara sailed past Harry as he stabilized himself, and watched it soar through the air, dark tendrils lashing out from it.

Before he could be torn about caring for Tonks and chasing after the tiara, the Tiara floated in the air, and a bubble of magic formed around it, trapping it inside. Below, on the ground, Dumbledore stood, his wand stretched as he motioned with his free hand, layering all the magic he could into the bubble.

Harry grinned and rushed toward Tonks, catching her as she stumbled.

“You’re alright,” Harry said, watching as Tonks’ eyes rolled into her head and she fell unconscious, going slack in his arms. He lifted her off, flying back to the ground to Dumbledore, hearing the sound of footsteps thunder from all around as the others rushed to them.

“Harry, is she—”

“She’s fine. As well as she can be anyway.” He looked up to see a group rush toward them. “Perenelle—”

“I’ll take her to the hospital wing.” Perenelle breathed. “Master Flitwick, if you could help me out.”

“Of course,” Flitwick levitated Tonks from Harry’s arms. 

Dumbledore cleared his throat, casting one last assessing look at Tonks’ floating form. “Clear the room, the rest of you. Harry and I will destroy the tiara.”

“I think we shouldn’t wait for it.” Harry stepped toward the bubble of magic, the sword of Gryffindor appearing in his hands. 

Dumbledore nodded and let the bubble float down, till the tiara settled on the ground while the other Order members stepped back.

“Wait.” A gravelly voice interrupted as Harry raised the sword. Tonks, barely conscious, glared at the Diadem of Ravenclaw on the floor, which pulsed with angry black tendrils. “I want to do it.”

“Tonks—”

“The sword will destroy it, right?” She floated to her feet, and Flitwick let go of his spell, sending her stumbling slightly toward Harry. “Then I want to stab it. Please.”

She snatched the hilt of the sword from Harry’s hand, scowling at the crown. Behind her, Harry tensed, his grip on his wand tightening.

“You bloody bastard,” Tonks whispered. “I hope you rot in hell.” 

A horrible screech rattled through the room as Tonks stabbed the sword down, piercing through the bubble of magic and cleaving through the Tiara.

Harry breathed a sigh of relief, watching the darkness fade away, the sides of the crown sizzling. In front of it, Tonks fell to her knees, breathing heavily, as she looked up to the sky, tears rolling down her cheeks.

“I avenged you, mum. I avenged you.”

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

AND… DONE! Hope you all liked the chapter!

Phew, I finally got through the block on the story, I feel, and was able to write this. The scene, I’ll admit, was draining, though. And frankly, turned out a lot longer than I anticipated. But it was worth it.

(If you found any grammatical errors, please ignore them for now. I am not home tomorrow and hence, cannot give this for betaing tonight. So, I am publishing it as it is.)

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Stay Happy! Stay Safe! Keep Smiling! Keep Reading!

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