Chapter 384: The Dementors Swarm Out
Dudley could feel it with brutal clarity. In that bank of storm clouds, dementors packed together in dense layers, hundreds of them.
That many gathered in one place created an influence far beyond what ordinary witches and wizards could handle.
"Dementors?" Ron's face drained. He had felt the chill too, and now the cold seemed to sink straight into his bones.
"Where are they?" Hermione asked tensely. "What do we do?"
She had her wand out, but she could not see a single dementor.
Dudley swept his gaze across the stands. The match had to be stopped. Dementors appearing like this was never simple, and this time it felt deliberate.
"Sonorus."
He cast the charm on his throat.
"Stop the match at once. Dementors are coming!"
In an instant, Dudley's voice rang across the entire stadium. Everyone heard him, but for a moment, no one knew how to react.
Even the match, vicious as it had been, faltered under the force of his shout.
But they were at a crucial moment. The instant Dudley finished speaking, Gryffindor's side wavered, thrown off balance, and the advantage they had just gained vanished. Slytherin seized the opening and pressed them hard.
Slytherin did not heed the warning at all.
Especially Malfoy. As Slytherin's Seeker, he had already spotted the Golden Snitch. When Harry hesitated, Malfoy shot upwards at once, driving into the rain-wracked sky.
"Damn it!"
Harry's expression changed on the spot.
He hesitated for a fraction of a second, then twisted his broom and chased after Malfoy.
He could not let Malfoy catch the Snitch. If Malfoy did, Gryffindor would lose.
Seeing that Slytherin had no intention of stopping, Gryffindor had no choice but to move as well. They could not afford to let Slytherin steal the match in the confusion.
"Dudley, what's going on?" Professor McGonagall cried.
She still had not grasped the scale of it, only assuming a few dementors had slipped past the perimeter.
Dudley's face turned grim. He snapped his head towards her and shouted.
"Professor McGonagall, there are hundreds of dementors. We have to stop the match, or someone will get hurt!"
That finally landed.
McGonagall's face went pale.
"Madam Hooch, stop the match immediately."
"All students, leave the pitch at once."
She began issuing orders at once, but the storm had already turned the stadium into chaos. Even McGonagall could not carry her commands cleanly through the wind and rain.
On the ground, Madam Hooch did not know the exact reason, but she moved immediately, trying to halt the match first and ask questions later.
"Harry, come back!" Dudley bellowed.
With the magic still on his voice, it cut straight through the thick cloud cover, reaching Harry's ears.
Harry's movement faltered.
"Coward! Can't do it now?" Malfoy shouted, taunting the moment he sensed Harry waver. "The Snitch is mine!"
That lit the fuse.
Harry's anger flared, sharp and sudden. He drew his wand even as he leaned forward, forcing his broom after the Snitch.
He had to catch it. He had to beat Malfoy.
As for dementors, as long as he could cast the Patronus Charm, it should be fine.
"Ahhhh…!!!"
Suddenly, Malfoy screamed and jerked aside as if something had appeared right in front of him. He yanked his broom down in a steep dive towards the ground.
His face was twisted with terror. He did not care about the Snitch anymore. He did not care about anything.
Harry did not hesitate. He shot past Malfoy and snatched the Golden Snitch out of the air.
And then, before the joy could even reach his face, the entire world went silent.
In the storm clouds, black shapes emerged in vast numbers, floating in the air, greedily drinking in the happiness spilling out of the Quidditch pitch.
They noticed Harry as well.
They could taste it, the rich, bright happiness pouring from him, the sweetest food of all.
"Expecto Patronum!"
Harry did not even have time to think. He cast the charm at once, and forced his broom down towards the ground.
A thin, pale mist burst from his wand and spread into a half-transparent shield, wrapping around him.
But the chill did not lift.
If anything, it only grew worse, thicker, more suffocating.
And the dementor in front of him did not seem afraid of his Patronus at all. It continued its slow, relentless lunge.
Whoosh.
It struck the feeble barrier, making the already thin shield shudder, thinning further.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh…
Then Harry saw the most terrifying sight of his life.
Dementors poured towards him in a swarm, hundreds of them.
His Patronus shattered almost at once.
His body dropped, falling fast. The light around him was swallowed bit by bit, everything slipping away from him in that moment.
Like death itself, dragging him down into a bottomless darkness.
"Harry!"
From the stands, people watched helplessly as Harry plummeted towards the ground, his fist still clenched tight around the Golden Snitch.
Gryffindor's players tried to fly to him, but it was too late, and behind Harry, hundreds of dementors surged forward, sweeping down towards everyone below.
"Harry!" Hermione screamed, frantic with horror.
"Arresto Momentum!"
Dudley saw Harry falling and cast the slowing charm at once.
Harry's speed dropped visibly, but the dementors behind him did not stop. They closed in again, attacking, feeding, greedily drinking in what little happiness Harry had left.
The entire stadium had descended into madness. Students screamed and ran.
There were too many dementors. The sheer number had tipped into something else entirely. People felt as if they would never be happy again. They went numb, hollow, sinking into despair, letting the dementors strip their emotions away.
"Expecto Patronum!"
Dudley's expression went solemn. He raised one hand and pointed straight at Harry.
A violent burst of white light erupted, tearing through the darkness of the sky and punching through the raging wind and rain.
A gigantic silhouette of light formed above the Quidditch pitch.
It was Dudley's own outline, magnified hundreds of times over, suspended in mid-air.
He hovered there, looking down on everyone below, radiating an unbearably terrifying sense of majesty. The cold around him was driven back, and his gaze turned ice-hard as he stared at the converging dementors.