Disclaimer: I do not have any rights of ownership for the characters used except the OC's. All the credit goes to the authors. Only the plot belongs to me. All characters are aged up (above 18) and are consenting adults. This is a work of fiction and does not resemble reality in any way whatsoever.
Chapter 18
~ Harry Potter ~
With sluggish movements and the maximum alertness that he could muster in his thoroughly exhausted state, Harry dragged himself deeper into the treeline, inching closer to the imposing, jagged silhouette of Nott Castle.
Every step was a monumental battle against the screaming agony of his own body.
The snow beneath his dragon-hide boots was freezing and the chill had started to pick up, biting at the exposed skin where his robes had been shredded by the Dark Lord's spells. His right calf, still burning with the phantom, venomous bite of Nagini's venom and hastily knitted together by Narcissa's emergency Wiggenweld potion, throbbed with a sickening pulse that perfectly matched his racing heartbeat.
He leaned heavily against the rough, frozen bark of a massive pine tree, his breath coming out in white clouds of vapour in the frigid night air. The wind howled through the skeletal branches above, a mournful, hollow whisper that seemed to be a sign for the violence that had just unfolded in Godric's Hollow and the precursor to the salughter that was about to unfold here.
Harry closed his eyes, his chest heaving as he forced his breathing to equalize.
He was running on fumes, his magical core drained by the colossal effort of shielding against Voldemort's fury, trying to keep his body intact while Nagini tried to saw his leg off. Yet, beneath the crushing weight of that physical and magical exhaustion, a dark rage burned within his chest. The kind of rage that didn't scream or thrash, but simply observed and executed.
As he waited for Fawkes to return from Grimmauld Place, he mapped out a tactical plan in his mind. He would apparate using Fawkes directly near the edge of the sprawling estate, knowing full well that Anti-Appartion wards for a Phoenix's flame travel do not work since Dumbledore was able to escape the ministry and leave Hogwarts without any obsrtuction.
He would target the vast, glass-domed greenhouses he could barely make out through the driving snow, owing to the Nott's being one of the few suppliers for potion ingredients. From what he could spot through the dense, frosted treeline, that particular sector did not have any visible patrols. The Death Eaters, arrogant in their false sense of absolute superiority, likely assumed the harsh winter cold and the sheer terrifying reputation of the Nott family name were deterrents enough.
And even if it did have guards, Harry mused, his lips curling into a smirk, he could take care of them instantly.
Silently.
Permanently.
From the greenhouses, he would start sneaking around the perimeter, taking care of things one by one. He would sweep the interior of the castle first, moving through the opulent corridors like a ghost of vengeance, and then later deal with the sadistic filth out in the open courtyard who were currently torturing innocent Muggles and Muggleborns for sport.
He could not risk them alerting enforcements. He could not afford a drawn-out, explosive siege that would bring Voldemort or his heavier battalions crashing down upon him before he was ready.
He needed to be careful. He had to be entirely, unapologetically lethal.
Ruthless.
He was done playing by the old man's rules. Albus Dumbledore's philosophy of second chances and merciful stunning spells had paved the road to this exact hellscape. Dumbledore had left the monsters breathing, allowing them to break out of Azkaban, to regroup, and to murder the very people Harry loved.
Harry would not repeat that catastrophic failure of leadership.
If a Death Eater stood in his path, they would not wake up in a Ministry holding cell to fight another day. They would either wake up maimed or not wake up at all.
As he was finalizing the bloody details of the entire area out in his mind, a sudden, brilliant flash of golden-red light illuminated the snow-swept forest.
Fawkes flamed back into existence, materializing with a soft, comforting rush of warmth that instantly pushed back the biting winter chill. The magnificent phoenix landed gracefully on Harry's shoulder, his razor-sharp talons gripping the thick leather of Harry's combat robes with a gentle, grounding pressure.
Harry immediately noticed that the bird's weight was noticeably heavier. He turned his head, wincing as his stiff neck popped, to see what the phoenix had brought. Carried securely in Fawkes's golden beak was a small, intricately embroidered velvet pouch, heavily enchanted with extension charms to hold essential potions and medical supplies in cases of any emergency. And draped meticulously over the bird's broad back, shimmering like under the moonlight, was his trusted Invisibility Cloak.
"Thank you, Fawkes," Harry whispered, his voice a hoarse, grating rasp.
Fawkes let out a low, soothing trill, dropping the velvet pouch directly into Harry's waiting, outstretched hand. The cloak slid smoothly off the phoenix's feathers, and Harry caught the ancient relic, immediately feeling the familiar, comforting hum of the Peverell magic vibrating against his skin.
Harry opened the enchanted pouch, his fingers bypassing the standard healing salves and immediately closing around a pair of slender, crystal vials filled with a violently bright, bubbling orange liquid. It was a pepper-up potion, but not the standard, foul-tasting swill concocted by Madam Pomfrey that left the drinker with steam aggressively pouring out of their ears for hours—a dead giveaway for anyone attempting a stealth infiltration.
This was an alternate, highly refined version that Cissy had personally brewed for him. Narcissa Malfoy, with her exacting, aristocratic perfectionism, had been an aspiring potioneer once and had channelled that particular skillset to modify the recipe, balancing the invigorating properties of the potion to help exponentially increase his focus and physical stamina without the constant, cartoonish steam pouring out of his head. He was extremely proud of her for what she had accomplished the moment she had left the dark. Maybe he should gift her a business in Diagon Alley once all this was over?
Without a moment's hesitation, Harry uncorked the first vial and downed it in a single, burning gulp, immediately following it with the second.
The reaction was instantaneous. The potion tasted of crushed ginger, sharp peppermint, and raw magic. It hit his stomach like a bolt of lightning, the heat radiating outward through his veins, flushing the agonizing cold and the heavy, dragging lethargy from his limbs. His vision, which had been blurring at the edges, snapped into hyper-focused, crystal-clear clarity. The dull, sickening throb in his right leg faded to a manageable, distant ache. His magical core, previously running on fumes, surged with a renewed burst of vitality.
He focused his head, the sudden rush of energy making his emerald eyes glow in the dark forest. He turned to the phoenix perched on his shoulder, and in a low, quiet voice that barely carried over the howling wind, he narrated his plan to Fawkes.
"We go to the greenhouses first," Harry murmured, his breath no longer pluming in the cold, courtesy of Narcissa's brilliant brewing. "You flame us directly inside the glass. I'll drop the cloak over us. From there, I go to work. We are going to clear this entire estate, Fawkes. Every single one of those masked cowards who helped Tom Riddle cast this cloud of despair over our world is going to pay the toll tonight."
Harry paused, looking deeply into the phoenix's highly intelligent, ancient black eyes. He needed the creature of light to understand the darkness of the path they were about to walk.
"I am not going to stun them," Harry confessed, his voice hardening into unyielding steel. "I am going to kill them. I am going to be a monster tonight, Fawkes, because that is the only way to protect the innocent. I have to make sure that no more innocent people die. I have to make sure that Dumbledore's mistakes do not get repeated. I am doing this for the generation after me. For the generation where kids... where my children get to live their lives without the constant, suffocating fear of Voldemort returning to slaughter them in their beds."
Fawkes stared at him for a long, profound moment. As a creature born of pure light, of healing and rebirth, the phoenix was naturally against murder. The bird abhorred the taking of a life, finding the shedding of blood to be a tragic stain upon the soul.
But Fawkes was also old.
He had been around for centuries. He had seen the rise of Grindelwald. He had seen the first rise of Voldemort. He had watched Albus Dumbledore's mercy cost thousands of lives.
And as the phoenix looked into the soul of the young Lord Potter, feeling the absolute, pure intent to protect his family and the innocent, the bird understood. When the situation demanded it, when the darkness threatened to consume the very light of the world, the Phoenix knew that this was the right thing to do. The sword must sometimes be swung so the shield can rest.
Fawkes let out a solemn, confirming note, nodding his majestic head along as if understanding every single word Harry had spoken.
"Alright then," Harry breathed, his wand back in his holster as he draped the cloak over his shoulder and pocketed the small velvet pouch of supplies. "Let's go hunting."
And then, they sprang into action.
There was no crack of displaced air, no loud popping sound that usually accompanied magical travel. There was only a sudden, silent swirl of heat, and a flash of golden fire that was completely masked by the thick, frosted glass of the Nott family greenhouses.
Harry materialized in the dense, humid environment of the greenhouse interior. The contrast from the freezing snow to the sweltering, magical climate-controlled dome was staggering, but Harry didn't miss a beat. He dropped into a low crouch behind a massive, writhing Venomous Tentacula, his wand already drawn and humming with lethal intent.
Through the thick, condensation-streaked glass, he could see the courtyard in the distance, where the screams of the tortured Muggles still echoed over the wind. But inside the greenhouse, it was quiet.
Too quiet.
He crept forward, his dragon-hide boots making absolutely no sound against the damp, soil-covered floorboards. As he rounded a row of towering, flesh-eating Snargaluff pods, he spotted them.
Two Death Eaters, clad in heavy black robes and silver masks, were slacking off their patrol, huddled around a small, conjured fire, passing a flask of Firewhisky back and forth. They were laughing, their voices muffled by the heavy masks, joking about the screams outside.
Harry felt absolutely nothing for them. No pity. No hesitation. #
He didn't speak an incantation. He didn't offer a warning.
With a brutal, horizontal slash of his holly wand, a silent Diffindo ripped through the humid air.
The spell hit the first Death Eater squarely in the throat. The man's silver mask fell forward as his entire head was cleanly, brutally severed from his shoulders. A fountain of dark, crimson blood erupted into the air, splattering violently across the glass panes and the surrounding exotic flora.
Before the second Death Eater could even process the sudden, horrific decapitation of his comrade—before the flask of Firewhisky had even hit the floor—Harry's wand was already moving in a second, upward arc.
An invisible blade of force sheared through the second man's wand arm, amputating it just below the shoulder. The Death Eater opened his mouth to scream, a sound of absolute agony building in his lungs, but Harry stepped out from the shadows, dropping the Cloak just enough to reveal his glowing, emerald eyes, and jammed the tip of his wand directly under the man's chin.
"Sectumsempra," Harry whispered.
The man's chest exploded outward in a spray of gore, his body collapsing backward into the Snargaluff pods, dead before he even hit the dirt.
Harry didn't pause to admire his handiwork. He pulled the cloak back over his head, adjusting his grip on his wand. Two down. Dozens to go.
He cleared the castle exterior exactly as he had planned, moving like a grim reaper, a phantom of death through the shadows. He slipped out of the greenhouses and hugged the dark, stone walls of the castle perimeter. He encountered a patrol of three Snatchers loitering near the servant's entrance. A silent, wide-arcing cutting curse amputated the legs of two of them at the knees, dropping them into the snow where Harry swiftly ended their suffering with pinpoint blasting hexes to the skull. The third turned to run, only to be beheaded by a conjured disc of spinning, razor-sharp iron that Harry launched from the shadows.
He was making absolutely sure that no innocent died in the crossfire.
He bypassed the courtyard for now, knowing that an open confrontation there might cause the torturers to turn their wands on their bound captives in a panic. He had to sever the head of the snake first. He had to secure the interior.
Harry slipped through a heavy, iron-bound side door that had been carelessly left unlocked by the dead Snatchers, stepping into the wide, dark-wood-panelled corridors of Nott Castle. The air inside smelled of expensive cigars, old blood, and dark magic.
He moved silently down the hallway, the Invisibility Cloak shielding him from the magical portraits that lined the walls, their painted inhabitants completely unaware of the infiltrator walking past them.
As he approached the grand foyer, the sound of loud, boisterous voices drifted out from an open set of double doors leading into what appeared to be a lavish drawing room. Harry pressed himself against the wall, peering around the edge of the mahogany doorframe.
Inside, lounging in high-backed leather armchairs by a roaring fireplace, were two men Harry recognized instantly from the dossiers the Order had compiled, and from the memories Narcissa had shared with him during their evenings at Grimmauld Place.
Theodore Nott Senior, a gaunt, skeletal man with stringy brown hair and cold, sunken eyes.
And Avery.
Avery, the weasel-faced, uncouth bastard who had spent decades lusting after a woman who was infinitely out of his league. Avery, who had cornered Narcissa in her own home, when Lucius's standing had fallen, attempting to force her into becoming his mistress. He had threatened her. He had laid his filthy, unworthy hands on the Lady of House Black.
A dark, possessive fury ignited in the very core of Harry's being.
Narcissa belonged to him now. She was under his protection, she served him, she loved him, and she was the anchor that kept his sanity intact. The sheer, unadulterated pleasure he was going to take in destroying the man who had harassed her was going to be something worthy of being mentioned in DADA classes from this day forth.
Harry stepped into the drawing room.
He didn't cast a spell from under the cloak. He wanted them to see it coming. He wanted Avery to know exactly why he was dying.
With a flourish, Harry pulled the Invisibility Cloak off his shoulders, letting it pool onto the expensive Persian rug.
"Evening, gentlemen," Harry said, his voice loud, confident, and dripping with an arrogant, banter-heavy swagger that would have made Sirius Black weep with pride.
Nott and Avery froze, their glasses of wine halting halfway to their mouths. They stared at the sudden appearance of the most wanted wizard in their world, standing casually in the centre of their highly secure stronghold, covered in soot, blood, and a terrifyingly cocky smirk.
"Potter?" Nott Senior gasped, stumbling to his feet, his hand scrambling for the wand holstered at his hip. "How did you—"
"Through the front door, mostly," Harry interrupted lazily. "Well, technically the side door. Your security is remarkably terrible, Nott. I've left pieces of your guards scattered all over the snow out back."
"You're a dead man, Potter!" Avery snarled, his ugly, rat-like face contorting with rage as he drew his wand. "The Dark Lord will reward us beyond measure for your corpse!"
"Funny you should mention him," Harry grinned, taking a slow, predatory step forward. "I just left Tom bleeding out in a cottage in Godric's Hollow. Burnt his bloody snake to ash, too. You should have seen his face. He was crying like a little bitch."
The sheer blasphemy, the absolute disrespect of the Dark Lord's name, made both Death Eaters hesitate for a fatal fraction of a second. It was all Harry needed.
"But I'm not here for him," Harry continued, his emerald eyes locking onto Avery with a gaze so intensely hateful it made the older wizard physically flinch. "I'm here for you, Avery. I have a message from Narcissa."
Avery's eyes widened in sudden, horrifying realization.
"She sends her regards," Harry whispered.
"Reducto!"
Harry didn't aim for Avery's chest. He aimed low. The over-powered blasting curse slammed directly into Avery's right knee. The joint exploded in a shower of pulverized bone, tearing the leg completely off at the mid-thigh.
Avery let out a high-pitched, agonizing scream, collapsing to the floor in a geyser of arterial blood.
Nott roared in anger and fear, slashing his wand forward. "Avada Kedavra!"
Harry didn't even bother putting up a shield. He sidestepped the green light with the casual grace of a bored duellist, raising his left hand. Wandless magic, fuelled by the immense power of his renewed vigor, surged outward. He caught Nott in a telekinetic grip, disarming the man with a casual flick of his wrist as he turned his wand on him.
"Not your turn, Nott," Harry said coldly. With a sharp twist of his wand, Harry snapped Nott's wand arm at the elbow, the bone protruding through the dark fabric of his robes. Nott screamed, clutching his arm as blood flowed onto his robes. Harry casually threw him against the far wall, where his head struck the stone fireplace with a sickening crack, knocking the senior Death Eater entirely unconscious.
Harry turned his full, terrifying attention back to Avery, who was writhing on the rug, frantically trying to stem the massive blood loss from his amputated leg.
Harry walked over, his boots splashing in the growing pool of crimson. He looked down at the pathetic, whimpering man.
"You thought you could threaten her," Harry said softly, his voice a lethal, vibrating baritone. "You thought because Lucius was a failure, you could put your filthy hands on a daughter of the House of Black."
"P-please," Avery sobbed, his face deathly pale, looking up at the monster he had assumed was just a child. "Please, Potter... I'll give you gold... information..."
"I don't want your gold," Harry sneered, leaning down, the tip of his holly wand pressing directly against the centre of Avery's forehead. "I want you to understand that when you disrespect my Mistress, you forfeit the right to breathe my air."
Harry took great pleasure in watching the absolute, unadulterated terror fill Avery's eyes in his final moments.
"Ignis Violaceus," Harry murmured.
Violet flames erupted from the tip of his wand, not blasting Avery, but igniting him from the inside out. The dark, soul-burning magic consumed the Death Eater, his screams echoing through the drawing room for a mere three seconds before his body was reduced to a pile of fine, grey ash upon the ruined rug.
Harry stood up, feeling a profound, dark satisfaction settle in his chest. He turned to the unconscious form of Theodore Nott Senior. He walked over, pointing his wand at the man's chest.
"For the innocents you tortured," Harry stated flatly.
A silent severing charm took Nott's head clean off his shoulders. His body slumped, dead.
Harry took a deep, steadying breath, wiping a speck of blood from his cheek. The interior command structure was broken. It was time to take out the trash outside.
He threw the Invisibility Cloak back over his shoulders and marched out of the drawing room, heading straight for the massive front doors of the castle. He blasted them open with a concussive shockwave that sent the heavy oak doors flying off their hinges, crashing into the snow of the courtyard.
The Death Eaters outside, previously engaged in their sadistic games, spun around in shock at the explosion.
Harry didn't give them a chance to react. He unleashed a storm of magical devastation. He was moving too fast for them to track, invisible and deadly. He cast wide, sweeping curses that amputated limbs, shattered chests, and severed heads. Blood sprayed across the pristine white snow, painting the courtyard in gruesome pattern of crimson stained snow. The torturers fell one by one, their screams of terror replacing the cries of their victims. Within two minutes, the entire courtyard was a graveyard of masked corpses.
Harry dropped the cloak, revealing himself to the terrified, half-frozen Muggles and Muggleborns who were still chained to the posts. They looked at him with wide, disbelieving eyes, seeing a blood-soaked wizard with a glowing wand standing amidst a slaughterhouse.
"You're safe," Harry said, his voice softening, silently casting a cheering charm and a confounding charm, projecting a calming aura to counteract their panic. With a wave of his wand, the heavy iron chains binding them shattered into dust.
They collapsed into the snow, weeping, shivering violently from the extreme cold and the trauma. Harry moved quickly among them, casting strong, sustained warming charms that enveloped them in magical heat, staving off the hypothermia. He healed the most severe of their lacerations with quick, efficient Episkeys and Ferula incantations, making sure no one was in immediate danger of bleeding out.
But he couldn't leave them with the memories. The Statute of Secrecy, and the trauma of what they had endured, required a heavier hand.
"Look at me," Harry said gently to the nearest group of trembling Muggles. He raised his wand, his green eyes locking onto theirs. "Obliviate."
He moved methodically, altering their memories. He erased the castle, the Death Eaters, the magic. He planted false memories of a terrible winter storm, a bus crash, a state of confusion. It was delicate work, but the enhanced focus from the potions and the adrenaline kept his mind sharp.
Once they were Obliviated and sedated, Harry looked up into the sky. "Fawkes."
The phoenix appeared instantly in a flash of golden fire, hovering above the group.
"Please take them to the nearest Muggle hospital," Harry instructed. "In groups. I'll meet you there to handle the reception."
Fawkes trilled, swooping down and expanding his magical aura to encompass four of the sleeping Muggles. With a flash, they vanished. Harry apparated a few moments later after disabling the wards so he could travel freely, arriving in the dark, snowy alleyway behind a large Muggle hospital in central London.
Over the next ten minutes, Fawkes worked tirelessly, transporting all the freed prisoners to the alley. Harry levitated them inside the emergency room, moving under a thick Disillusionment Charm. He used Confundus charms at will, dropping the powerful mind-altering spells on the exhausted, overworked night-shift doctors and nurses. He planted the suggestion that these people were victims of a massive pile-up on the highway, caught in the blizzard, and that they needed immediate treatment for exposure and shock.
The Muggle medical staff, eyes glazed over with the compulsion magic, immediately sprang into action, rushing the victims onto gurneys and into trauma bays, completely unaware of the magical intervention that had brought them there.
Harry watched from the shadows, ensuring they were all being treated under disguise, safe from the war that raged in his world.
He had done it. He had saved them.
But his work at Nott Castle wasn't entirely finished.
~ Harry Potter ~
Harry apparated back to the bloody courtyard of the compound, his boots touching down amidst the carnage he had wrought. The snow was heavily stained now, the bodies of the Death Eaters beginning to freeze in the harsh winter air.
He ran surveillance once more, sweeping the perimeter with detection charms, extending his magical senses to see if any other people had been captured or if any guards had managed to hide from his initial assault. The upper floors were clear. The grounds were clear.
But as he was moving through the castle, his senses picked up a faint source of magic beneath the castle.
There was a basement. A dungeon level that he had missed in his initial sweep.
Harry's heart sank.
He gripped his wand and strode back there, navigating the dark hallways until he found a heavy, reinforced iron door hidden beneath the main staircase. It was locked with heavy dark magic, but Harry shattered the wards with a concentrated blast of raw power, blowing the door inward.
He descended the narrow, spiralling staircase, the air growing colder and damper with every step. The stench hit him before he even reached the bottom—a horrific, suffocating smell of stale urine, copper, and rotting flesh.
Harry cast a bright Lumos, the light flooding the cavernous basement.
He was absolutely horrified, a fresh wave of rage and profound sadness crashing over him.
The basement was a sprawling network of rusted iron cells, and they were littered with the blood and bodies of many. The Death Eaters had not just been torturing people in the courtyard; they had been starving and murdering them down here in the dark. Men, women, children, magical and non-magical alike, lay crumpled on the cold stone floors, their eyes glassy and vacant, their bodies bearing the horrific marks of prolonged, sadistic abuse.
Fawkes, who had flamed back to Harry's shoulder after finishing the hospital transport, let out a heartbreaking, mournful cry. The phoenix sang a sad, beautiful tune, a lament for the souls that had been lost in this miserable, forgotten hellscape, the haunting melody echoing off the damp stone walls.
Harry stood there, his jaw clenched so tightly his teeth ached, staring at the absolute depravity of Voldemort's followers.
This was why he killed them.
This was why he had burned Avery to ash and taken Nott's head.
Because monsters who did this did not deserve a cell in Azkaban.
They deserved annihilation.
Cough.
The absolute silence of the tomb-like basement was suddenly broken.
It was a weak, rattling sound, barely audible over the crackle of light at the edge of Harry's wand, but to Harry's ears, it sounded like a gunshot.
Someone was alive.
"Fawkes, there!" Harry commanded, sprinting down the central corridor of the dungeon.
The phoenix took flight, blazing with an intense, golden-red luminescence that illuminated the dark cells, pushing back the shadows. Harry ran past three empty, blood-stained cages, his eyes darting frantically, searching for the source of the sound.
At the very end of the corridor, in a cell completely devoid of light, separated from the others by a heavy iron grate, he saw her.
Harry skidded to a halt, his hands gripping the rusted bars of the cell door.
Hanging from the far wall, suspended by heavy, cruel iron manacles that shackled her wrists high above her head, was a girl. She was wearing the shredded, filthy remnants of what might have once been an expensive silk dress, now stained with grime and dried blood. She was barefoot, her toes barely brushing the freezing stone floor, forcing her to bear the agonizing weight of her own body on her dislocated shoulders.
But even through the grime, the blood, and the horrific starvation, she was beautiful beyond words. Her hair, a curtain of pure, spun blonde silk, was matted and tangled, falling forward to completely cover her face as her chin rested weakly upon her chest.
Harry didn't bother looking for a key. He didn't bother picking the lock. He pointed his wand at the heavy iron hinges of the cell door and blasted them into oblivion, kicking the heavy grate aside with a resounding crash.
He ran into the cell, closing the distance in a heartbeat.
"Bombarda!" Harry cast, his wand aimed at the heavy iron chains embedded in the stone wall, careful as he underpowered the spell to make sure he didn't accidentally maim her.
The magic struck the manacles with a small, red spark. The heavy iron shattered instantly, breaking the bonds that held her.
The girl's body went completely limp, collapsing forward as gravity took hold.
Harry dropped his wand, lunging forward with both arms outstretched. He caught her just before she hit the hard stone floor, gathering her frail, weightless body against his chest, cradling her in his arms.
She was freezing.
Her skin was like ice, completely devoid of warmth. As Harry held her, he felt her entire body shivering—not just the shudder of the cold, but violent, uncontrollable muscle spasms. Her limbs jerked erratically against him, a terrifying, rhythmic twitching that Harry recognized instantly with a sickening lurch in his stomach.
It was the tell-tale sign of prolonged, repeated exposure to the Cruciatus Curse. Her nervous system was completely fried, her body trapped in an endless echo of the torture she had endured.
"I've got you," Harry whispered, his voice cracking with emotion as he gently lowered himself to sit on the floor, pulling her onto his lap to share his body heat. "You're safe now. I've got you."
He quickly retrieved his wand from the floor. Pointing it at her trembling form, he cast a series of powerful warming charms. The magic wrapped around her like a thick, heated blanket, sinking deep into her frozen skin, slowly easing the violet hue from her lips and the extreme chill from her bones. The violent tremors lessened slightly, though the Cruciatus spasms remained.
She let out a soft, pained whimper, her head lolling back against Harry's shoulder.
Harry reached up with a gentle, blood-stained hand. He carefully, tenderly brushed the curtain of dirty blonde hair away from her face, tucking it behind her ear so he could see her features, so he could check her breathing.
As the light from Fawkes's fiery plumage illuminated her face, Harry's breath caught in his throat.
The high cheekbones. The pale, flawless skin beneath the bruises. The delicate, elegant line of her jaw. He hadn't seen her in months, not since the end of his sixth year, but she was unmistakable.
The Ice Queen of Slytherin.
Daphne Greengrass.
Author's Note
Finally, Daphne is here. Let's see how our hero deals with her frosty nature.
Also, someone had highlighted why Harry keeps using the same spells over and over and is not using anything new from the Family Grimoire. Guys, he has carried 7 books and 8 movies with one Expelliarmus. I think I am doing the character and canon justice.