Wishmaster

Chapter Six - Ghost Flight

"Checkmate!"

Ron crossed his arms and grinned in triumph as his remaining chess pieces pounced on Dean’s king. Dean pouted huffily while they watched his king make a bid to escape.

Dinner was over, and Shell cottage had returned to some semblance of peace after the previous excitement of the morning. Hermione, still worried about Harry, had finally decided to go out and look for him, glaring at Ron for not accompanying her. Ron had taken this treatment serenely. When Harry was found, he knew, Hermione alone would be the best one to deal with any of his best friends moods.

Ron was just about to suggest another game when they both heard it.

Both boys leapt to their feet and dashed for the door as a loud crack rang shattered the silence like a gunshot, followed by Hermione's scream. As they thundered through the hallway, they saw Fleur already striding out into the garden, a fireball in one hand and a fearsome spatula in the other.

Skidding to a halt in the doorway, Ron and Dean stared, horrified as they saw Hermione kneeling beside a still figure on the grass. Ron could hardy believe his eyes, didn’t want to believe them...

"Harry!" He heard Dean gasp.

As he began to stumble after Dean and Fleur towards the prone figure on the grass, other details began to work their way through Ron’s glaze of shock. The two tiny beings on either side of Harry, Hermione shaking Harry, desperate. Harry lying there – unmoving, unbreathing, unseeing. Once living emeralds staring glassily into the clouds above.

Ron felt hot tear begin to run down his face as he dropped too his knees beside the body of his best friend. Beside him he could hear Hermione sobbing.

"No...Harry...not Harry, please...no..."

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The world was grey and still. Harry drifted through the blank silence across a panorama of greyscale sky and mountains. There was no wind. Hogwarts, drained of colour, looked strangely like some fantastically clear but old photograph. Hogwarts, like an old photo, as it shrank far away into the distance. Harry rubbed his eyes, and realised that his left arm seemed somehow heavier than his right.

He looked to his left, and to his surprise, saw a small boy. The boy was quite naked as he clung desperately to Harry, as if he were going to slip away into the sky at any moment. Feeling a faint surge of alarm, Harry quickly grabbed the small figure and pulled it closer to him. He realised as he did that he was also naked and a hot flush of embarrassment washed over him.

"Um..." He said awkwardly.

The boy opened his eyes and Harry saw that they were a deep, startling shade of blue. He tried again.

"Er...How did-"

= How did I get here? = Harry jumped as a soft, hoarse voice spoke inside his head. The greyness around him gave a strange shudder.

= I’ve always been here = The voice came again. The child frowned. = but before that I was someone…no, something else... =

The little boy frowned, his jet-black hair ruffling as they flew on. Harry noticed that they were now over a large city. The city lights made long patterns twisting in the darkness and Harry wondered when it had become so.

= You’d better ask him = said the voice, Harry looked back at the boy to see that he was pointing at something strangely blurred by the greyness around them.

Both watched nervously as the thing flew along side them, getting nearer all the time. The shape resolved itself and Harry’s eyes widened as the familiar face of Albus Dumbledore swam into view.

"Harry"

Dumbledore’s voice was urgent.

"Harry, was it the hallows or the horcruxes?"

"The hallows." Said Harry, a hard knot of guilt deep in his stomach. "Voldemort found out about the horcruxes"

In his arms, the small boy shuddered and huddled against Harry like a survivor clutching a lifeboat. Dumbledore sighed, then a fierce expression came over the old headmasters features.

"You got the wand?" He asked. Harry’s stomach pulled tighter.

"Yes, sir I’m-"

"Good" Said Dumbledore decisively "Harry, Lord Voldemort knew of the Hallows."
Harry’s jaw dropped as Dumbledore continued

"They were always on his agenda, like Grindelwald before him."

Dumbledore’s face clouded over as he said Grindelwald’s name and he shook himself as if fighting off a bad memory.

" Listen carefully Harry, there’s not much time. Retrieving the Elder Wand was the best you could do, more than anyone could possibly ask for, but Voldemort will not stop until he has his hands on all three, to conquer death has always been his goal."

"Harry, to avoid this ever happening you must make sure they are so well hidden that he will nether find them, no matter how long he searches, and believe me Harry, as long as both you and he still breathe, he will have a very, VERY long time to look." Harry’s heart sank.

"So you mean," he whispered "That I’ve got to destroy them? The wand, and the snitch, an-and my dads-"

Dumbledore shook his head. "You, and both your friends" He said heavily "Must hide them in the same way that you yourself have hidden young Riddle here. Inside your very soul."

Startled Harry looked down at the small child he was holding, the child version of Riddle looked back at him and Harry gasped in recognition.

= You will still keep me safe now that you know my name, wont you? = The voice in Harry’s mind was fearful.

"You must merge or perish" Said Dumbledore urgently "Harry, your body will have deteriorated by the time you reach it, only the reactive energy of your soul and the fragment of Riddles soul merging will be enough to restore it. Do you understand Riddle?"

= Yes = thought/spoke the fragment of Tom Riddle. He looked up at Harry = Hold on, were almost there now =

Looking down Harry saw with a jolt that they were plummeting towards Shell Cottage. At the same time, he felt a surge of energy so massive that for a moment he thought he must explode. He looked down to see light radiating from the fragment of Riddle. He watched in horrified fascination as the small boy began to sink into him, causing ripples to spread out across his body like ripples on a pond. He looked down and saw clearly his body, lying there on the grass in Fleur’s garden as he sped towards it. The force inside him built as Riddle sank fully into him, disappearing altogether, and Harry suddenly knew what would happen when he finally reconnected with his physical self.

Too late, Harry opened his mouth to yell as loud as he could, to warn the people on the ground of the danger.

With a shock wave that sent Ron, Fleur, Dean, Luna and Hermione all flying, The Boy Who Lived became The Boy Who Lived Again.
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Authors Note : First off, a big thank you to Seaedame, who, starting with this very chapter ( The one just now ) has began to Beta my writing, so a big bowl of virtual cookies for him/her *claps with delight*

To the people who have so far reveiwed this fic, thank you again, your reveiws add alot the writing of this fic. :)