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Harry Potter and all of its characters belong to J.K. Rowling.
I own nothing but the original characters I make.
"Dialogue"
'Thoughts'
-Author notes-
Chapter 110: A Destined Battle Part 2
Fiendfyre was far from an ordinary flame. It was a living fire, and it screamed as it poured out from Voldemort's wand like a roaring inferno that immediately took the form of a giant snake.
The serpentine figure wrapped around its master, creating a protective cocoon and burning away Harry's creations.
The trees outside shrieked and retreated their branches, pulling them back through the floors as the cursed fire chased after them.
Voldemort watched with a satisfied grin on his face. "You see, Potter? Nature can't win against me. My power can destroy anything that you summon."
Harry said nothing for a moment. The cheap attempt to provoke him was not going to work.
He watched the Fiendfyre spread across the ceiling and drip down the walls. He studied it for a moment before making his decision.
Then, he planted his staff on the floor again and exhaled slowly.
The flames closest to him began to behave strangely.
They slowed down, and the fire serpent twisted its head toward Harry, looking at him with hesitation.
Voldemort's eyes narrowed. "What is this?... Kill the boy!" he commanded.
The cursed fire construct refused to obey.
"Fiendfyre is a living thing. And despite its cursed nature, it remains a force of nature, like all fire," Harry said calmly. "Nature responds to my call, Voldemort." He tapped the staff again. "You would do well in remembering that."
The serpent convulsed violently, its mouth opening wide as if it were screaming.
The Dark Lord hurried to snuff the flames he had created, for fear they might turn against him.
"Damn you!" Voldemort moved immediately, sending three rapid curses in succession: a blasting hex, a bone-shattering curse, and the Killing Curse, all fired within the span of seconds.
Harry sidestepped the first. His staff intercepted the second, absorbing it with a deep, resonant hum that shook the room. The third...the green flash, he blocked with a wall of stone he pulled from beneath the floorboards. The Killing Curse punched a hole through the stone before dissipating.
Voldemort clenched his fists. "How can a boy fight like this?... It is not possible. It makes no sense." The Dark Lord felt a flicker of hesitation. His opponent was clearly someone who had mastered the use of magic to an extreme degree, perhaps more so than Albus Dumbledore, whom, up to this point, he had considered the only potential threat to his person.
"Looks can be deceiving, Mister Voldemort. An experienced wizard such as yourself should know better." Harry spoke to him as if addressing a child. "But perhaps I expected too much from you. Rumors tend to be exaggerated, after all."
Voldemort snarled and unleashed a torrent of dark magic at Harry, every curse layered into the next, so that deflecting one brought you directly into the path of another. It was a technique that required extraordinary skill and years of practice.
Harry didn't deflect them, for he had no need.
The ground rose up...slabs of stone and wood forming a thick wall of matter that swallowed the curses before they could reach him. Harry walked behind it calmly as he advanced, drawing closer.
Then, he touched the wall with one finger, and it shot toward Voldemort like a projectile.
The Dark Lord was fast. He twisted away with a sharp crack of displaced air, reappearing at the far end of the living room. His robes were slightly torn by the sudden movement, and his expression turned murderous. He pressed a hand to his ribs, where a piece of debris had caught him.
Voldemort was not used to being hit.
"Is that all you can do? Use wood and stone as blunt instruments? What kind of wizard are you?" The frustration in his voice was tangible.
"I was just warming up, Mister Voldemort," Harry responded sharply. He raised his left hand, fingers spread, and called to the earth beneath the manor.
The whole building groaned.
The foundations began to crack as roots...enormous roots from deep underground forced their way up through the stone floor. But these did not come from the summoned trees from before. These were older, and they moved more slowly.
However, Voldemort could feel the danger emanating from them.
These roots had been growing in the darkness beneath that land for over a millennium, undisturbed, and Harry had simply asked them to wake.
They rose like the fingers of something that had been buried alive.
Voldemort was already moving, but the roots chased him with relentless determination, crashing through walls and tearing down what remained of the ceiling.
One of the roots managed to wrap around his arm, and the Dark Lord tore free with a curse that left it smoking, but two more were already reaching for him.
"Tsk!" He knew he could not call upon Fiendfyre again. Not when Harry could turn it against him.
He vanished once more, reappearing on the roof of the manor. For the first time, there was something other than contempt on his face. The Dark Lord was getting concerned about his current situation.
Harry soon appeared as well, rising from the floor below with the assistance of one massive root, while others followed behind him.
Malfoy Manor had been left unrecognizable. The luxurious hall was filled with broken furniture, torn wood from the walls, and shattered stone from the floor. Massive holes riddled the structure, exposing multiple levels at once.
The building shook and trembled, warning them of its imminent collapse.
Voldemort stood at the edge of the ruins and looked at Harry across the wreckage. He was bleeding...a thin line of dark blood running from a cut above his left brow. He touched it with one pale finger and looked at it for a moment.
"You… you are stronger than I anticipated." He had to admit that, despite everything he had heard about the Boy Who Lived since his return, he had believed he could handle him.
Now, he was not so sure.
However, the Dark Lord was not ready to concede. He still had some hidden cards up his sleeve.
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