BY THE DIVINING LIGHT

Chapter Two: The Star Stairs

Harry stared at the enchantment before them, a great feeling of misgiving settling firmly into his stomach. He looked up to find Dumbledore regarding him with a calculating gaze.

“Harry, things shall get much darker the deeper we penetrate into the depths of this world, horrors for which the heliopath we just encountered was merely a gatekeeper,” said Dumbledore his voice steady, though Harry could sense the reservations in his tone. “Wizards scores of years your senior have fled from challenges lesser than those that you have faced already. I do believe nobody would think any less of you if you wished to withdraw to the surface.”

“I would,” countered Harry, simply. Dumbledore nodded and then looked to the enchantment before them. “This is, as you said, just our leg of a journey that we truly cannot hope to understand. This is my test. I will not shy away in the face off death.”

“To that, I would take my hat off to you Harry, were I wearing one,” said Dumbledore, a proud smile crossing his features again as he examined the stoic boy before him. “In that case, Harry, I shall elaborate a little on the tests that stand before you.”

He stepped forward, extinguishing the fire held in his hand and then held it out over the star stairs, his eyebrows knit in concentration. After a moment he withdrew his fingers sharply, as though burned and then glanced down at Harry.

“Old magic comes in threes,” said Dumbledore, thoughtfully. “Whatever we encounter on the first step, will be of the same nature as the challenge we shall encounter on the fourth, seventh and tenth. On the fifth, eighth and eleventh-”

“We’ll get the same as on the second. I get the idea,” cut in Harry. Dumbledore nodded and continued to peer into the darkness. “What are the challenges going to be?”

“It is difficult to say,” replied Dumbledore frankly. “It is safe to assume that you will not be expected to engage a dragon in mortal combat, but be ready for anything.”

Harry laughed at the joke, his eyes lighting up for a moment before they fell heavy again, his mind focused on the task at hand. He gently removed a leather string from his pocket and wrapped between finger and thumb on his left hand. After hours and hours of careful practice, he’d learned to tie a simple knot with one hand in under a second, provided he gripped it in exactly the right place. What it had in speed, it sacrificed in the strength of the bind. It was a crutch, something to allow Harry just enough time to prepare a more powerful spell.

With his old magic at the ready, Harry stepped forward to the edge of the stairs. Dumbledore joined him.

“It would be beneficial for us to walk single file,” he said. “Then if the stair below one of us gives way, we won’t both suffer the same fate.”

“Don’t trust me to complete my challenges, sir?” asked Harry slyly.

“Hardly,” said Dumbledore, amused. “I just don’t particularly wish to be responsible for the demise of the greatest wizard of his generation.”

“You flatter me,” said Harry sarcastically.

“It wasn’t flattery,” said Dumbledore quietly. “It was veracity.”

Harry looked up at Dumbledore who smiled back kindly.

“And Harry,” said the headmaster, as though in afterthought. “These challenges require you to be true to yourself.”

And then he stepped forward before Harry could stop him.

There was a brief moment where Harry’s heart lodged in his throat and he was sure Dumbledore was going to just drop straight down. But surely enough the headmaster’s foot came to rest a foot below the platform he’d just stepped on, appearing to stand in mid-air.

“Ah,” said Dumbledore, turning to Harry. “Was that instantaneous for you?”

“Yes, what happened?” asked Harry.

“I believe I passed,” replied Dumbledore.

“What happened?” demanded Harry impatiently, but Dumbledore shook his head with a sad look on his face.

“I worry that imparting the first test to you may influence the result.” Harry scoffed but Dumbledore suddenly looked severe. “It is essential that we do not discuss the challenges we face. It may trigger the enchantment’s wrath.”

“If you will be patient a moment longer, Harry,” said Dumbledore and stepped forward again, coming to rest of a solid step. His face became worried and pale and he turned to speak to Harry, but then thought better of it.

Harry leaned out over the edge, staring down into the nothingness that he was supposed to just jump down to. A slight sliver of doubt pushed its way forward in his mind, but he gritted his teeth and stepped forward.

A dragon’s tail swooped out of the darkness and Harry flung himself to the side to avoid it. The horns on the end of the tail crashed to the rocks below and flicked to the side, forcing Harry to dive to left again, landing painfully on one arm, his wand jutted into his side. He rose and pushed a powerful kinetic shield above him; it radiated heat against his face and almost blinded him with its radiant orange glow.

The dragon brought its tail down once more and it struck the shield heavily. For a split second Harry was sure it was going to give, but with a crack like a bolt of lightning and the hiss of a bug zapper, the dragon withdrew its tail with a screech of agony. The crowd roared in triumph.

“Harry Potter of Hogwarts actually blocks a full assault from the tail of the Horntail!” yelled a voice that Harry recognised from somewhere. His mind felt hazy, as though he were in a dream. “What a stunning piece of magic!”

Harry glanced around him in confusion and was struck with a terrible sense of déjà vu. All around him on three sides was a crowd of cheering teenagers, behind him was the Hogwart’s castle and before him, a Hungarian Horntail. Why was he here? What had he been doing moments before? The dragon belched flames at him and Harry instinctively diverted them with a flick of his wand, scattering them high into the air. The crowd went wild again.

“Merlin!” yelled the voice again in astonishment. “He actually blocked dragonfire! Albus Dumbledore, eat your heart out!”

Harry spun to the side as the dragon tried to crush him with its tail again and saw a familiar face behind the Horntail; Albus Dumbledore.

Instantly remembering why he was here, Harry collected his thoughts and blocked another jet of fire, teasing more roars of pleasure from the crowd. He was back in the triwizard tournament, or a memory of it, at least. But unlike reliving them in a pensieve or when they were being used against him in legilimency, Harry had control over events. Was he just supposed to beat the dragon?

Harry lifted his wand and roared “Avada Kedavra!” Suddenly, his legs began to slip through the floor as though they it were made of jelly. His vision drained of colour and he was hearing everything as though it was through a thick sheet of glass. Dumbledore’s words flashed through his mind.

Be true to yourself.

Cursing himself, Harry pointed his wand at his feet and shouted “Salirius!”

The bounding charm allowed Harry to kick away from the floor and fly into the air, the colour restored to his vision and the sounds suddenly deafened him again. The dragon had clearly not been affected by his killing curse, because it just blinked at him.

“A tickling curse?” roared the voice of Ludo Bagman, half outraged and half amused. “Get serious Mister Potter, no more showboating!”

Harry landed softly on the ground twelve feet to where he had previously been standing and offered a little bow in the direction of the Judge’s podium. He knew now what to do, he hadn’t killed the dragon in reality as it would have been unnecessarily cruel. However, a dragon in his mind couldn’t feel, so he’d opted to kill it as an easy way out but it wasn’t being true to his nature. Harry mentally kicked himself for so elemental a mistake and casually ducked another raking blow from the tail.

He leapt into the air again, narrowly avoiding the dragon’s voracious bite, his bounding charm carrying him up as though he was affected by a fraction of Earth’s gravity. He spun forward into a neat somersault and half-twist to avoid the added burst of fire that the dragon followed him with and blocked another swing from the dragon’s tail.

The dragon withdrew warily, glaring at Harry with unmistakeable intentions, but it had clearly decided that Harry was not going to as easy a kill as he’d first appeared. Ludo Bagman’s commentary rent the air again. “He’s actually got the Horntail backing away from him, Ladies and Gentlemen! Astounding stuff!”

Harry took a moment to focus his wand movements and quickly slashed out two figures of eight in the air. A half second later he leapt forward, along with two carbon copies of himself that ran in differing directions. The two illusions he’d produced were perfect, they would look, smell, sound and move exactly like him. One he directed to run directly at the nest, knowing it would get the attention of the dragon first. He instead opted for a slower route that wouldn’t get him obliterated.

He couldn’t help but admire the graceful way the dragon moved, now that it wasn’t trying to kill him. Each sweep of the tail was perfectly aimed and counterbalanced, even as it thrashed the tail about trying to kill his illusion, it didn’t lose footing or even graze the eggs behind it. Harry tossed a disillusionment charm over his head and hissed under his breath as the horntail came dangerously close to clobbering his illusion. The crowd echoed his displeasure.

“Oooh, that was a close one!” cried Ludo Bagman, sounding as though he was clearly thoroughly enjoying himself. “If that’s you Mr. Potter, watch out!”

Wasting no more time, Harry darted forward. He slipped easily around the dragon’s hind legs, his disillusionment disguising him well enough to get close to the eggs. He turned sharply however at a scream and saw the dragon rearing and fluttering over his illusion, horned tail whipping out at its side and a jet of fire closing in on the illusion. Both Madame Maxime and Barty Crouch at the judges table leapt forward and hurled shields into the arena to protect the illusion, thinking it was actually Harry. It would be this event that would leave the scores of the first task so wildly disputed and Harry open to claims of preferential treatment.

He seized the egg, tucked it under his cloak and fled away from the nest. The illusion of Harry had been completely demolished by the dragon; no illusion could have survived direct contact with dragonfire. People in the crowd screamed as the smoke cleared and the trainers rushed out into the paddock to restrain the dragon. Dumbledore however, looked Harry right in the eyes, as though he could see straight through the disillusionment charm, smiled a small smile and gently clapped his hands in appreciation.

Giving an extra few seconds to heighten the suspense and playing to his inner showmanship, Harry leapt onto the largest rock in the enclosure. With a double flick of his wand that removed the charm and conjured a crack and a puff of smoke, Harry revealed himself and lifted the egg above his head. There was a moment of confused silence where everyone turned to see the newest spectacle.

Harry, now smiling broadly, took a small bow and the crowd went ballistic.

He felt himself fall a split second before his vision returned and he spun, reaching out for the platform his feet had just left. His left hand closed upon the ledge, supporting him momentarily. Luckily he’d managed to keep a grip on his leather string but it was useless to him at the moment as it was trapped between his hand and the rock. Dumbledore reached out to grab him, but Harry waved him off.

“Don’t touch me,” said Harry, far more calmly than he felt. “I’ve got it under control and I don’t want you falling too.” With a considerable amount of effort Harry put his other hand on the edge and using his feet to lever himself up, climbed onto the edge of the platform where he sat for a moment, trying to catch his breath and steady his body whilst adrenaline coursed through his veins. Eventually he levelled his eyes to meet Dumbledore’s who was as white as a statue.

“I failed,” said Harry softly. Dumbledore shook his head.

“No. You survived; this is a powerful enchantment, you’d have fallen if you’d failed.”

“So I half failed?” asked Harry in bemusement, Dumbledore smiled and a little of the colour returned to his face.

“It would appear, as usual, that you are once again the exception to the rule, Harry.”

Harry smiled back and stood up, dusting off his robes. He looked at the distance between he and Dumbledore. “Should I jump it?”

“I think that would be advisable,” replied Dumbledore. “I shall endeavour to prevent you from falling any further.”

Harry waited for a moment for Dumbledore to move to the next step, when it became apparent that he wasn’t going to, he steeled his resolve once more and took a running jump to the same stair that Dumbledore was on.

He crashed headfirst into a wall, with a blow that rightly should have broken his nose. He fell flat on his back his head spinning. He rose, checking his nose with one hand to ensure its integrity and then looked around him.

He was in a long, thin room. The wall he’d jumped into was covered in Roman numerals, the opposite wall held a door which appeared to be the only way out of the room. The other two longer walls sloped inwards to form both the walls and the roof. The floor between he and the door was broken up into a grid of large square tiles which were labelled I, II and III.

Harry paced up and down before the first line of three tiles pensively, trying to recall the arithmetical properties of the numbers up to three. One was aggression, two controlled emotion and three symbolized creativity. But what did those numbers imply? One and three were the square root of two and eleven; twenty two and thirty three were all master numbers. But none of this seemed particularly relevant; there was no noticeable pattern in the tiles either. With a sigh, he turned to the wall of numbers behind him, they read in a triangle from the top of the top of the wall to the bottom with one line left purposely blank.

‘I - I.I – II.I – .I.I - I.I..II.I – III..II.I.I –?– I..II..II.I.I’

He stared at the numbers for a long time trying to make some sense of them and even tried reading them back but to no avail. Harry was tempted for a moment to just jump on a random tile to see what happened. To make things easier on him, Harry picked up a small pebble and used it to scratch in the blank line with all of the numbers in sequence and then translated them to the numerals he was more used to functioning with.

‘1 – 11 – 21 – 1211 – 111221 – 312211 -?- 113213211’

Nothing seemed to leap out at him, frustrating and wearying Harry. Although he appreciated and was adept at logic puzzles, number puzzles always vexed him; he hadn’t even been good at muggle maths. But this wasn’t something he could skive behind the rubbish bins, he had to beat this, to save Neville. After a deep, calming breath Harry decided to start talking to himself in order to try and ease his way into a more conducive frame of mind.

“Dumbledore said stay true to myself, but staying true to myself in this situation would be giving up and that’s not an option. Unless that’s the point of the task? To just run straight into the tiles and hope for the best. I suppose that can always be my last option. No, common sense, that's what I need. What was it Neville said? 'An awful lot of the brightest wizards haven't an ounce of common sense'. Sounds like something Hermione would say. Common sense would dictate that if I've got to stay true to myself, so do these enchantments. They don't care about ability, it's all about integrity! It would be stupid for these challenges to be impossible, it's challenging my ethic. That means it's got to be a logic there’s an awful lot of ones for it to be a-”

Then in the moment after Harry deliberated giving up, the entire puzzle unfolded in his own brain and he could have kicked himself for not seeing it sooner.

“Merlin be dammned! You’re not numbers at all! You’re words! One! One one! Two ones! One Two, One one!” he roared in joy and punched his fist into the air in celebration. Then took another deep breath and allowed the solution to come together in his head. “One one, one two, two ones,” he whispered. “Three ones, two twos, one one.” He smiled broadly as he deduced the missing eight numbers. “One three, one one, two twos, two ones!”

He stepped over to the tiles on the floor, reciting the numbers like a mantra in his head. ‘One three, one one, two twos, two ones.’

With a confidence that he’d never before had when dealing with numbers, Harry stepped onto the first tile marked I and put his weight upon it. Nothing happened. He stepped forward onto the tile before him marked I and as he put his weight upon it, the tiles behind him fell away to reveal the nothingness below. Harry gulped, still reciting his mantra and stepped onto the ‘I’ before him and was relieved that it held under his weight.

He stepped through the door way at the end of the room and found himself standing next to Dumbledore, the headmaster's arm gripping Harry’s arm tightly. The headmaster gave him a proud smile and patted him on the shoulder.

“Excellent,” he said proudly and looked down at the next stair. “Are you ready to continue?” Harry nodded.

“I’ll go first this time,” said Harry firmly and held up a hand to Dumbledore’s protest. “It’s my turn.”

Without allowing any time for Dumbledore to prevent him, Harry stepped down to the next stair.

He found himself immersed in darkness. As his other senses began to become less confused by the sudden transposition, he slowly came to realise that he was laying in bed. He reached out instinctively and his fingers closed around his wand.

“Lumos,” he whispered and his surroundings were instantly illuminated. He found himself in a rather odd position. He appeared to be in his bed in Gryffindor tower, but his body seemed to have shrunk; his fingers were no longer elongated and calloused from hours of magical experimentation, there was no longer the dull omnipresent ache of sphinx claws emanating from his belly and as he reached up to touch his face, there was no curse scar stretching across his face. Just as he was marvelling at this astounding revelation, he heard raised voices somewhere nearby.

He crept from between the sheets and stilling his lumos, peeked his head out of the curtains around his bed. As he had guessed, he was in his dormitory at school. Quietly but amazingly sprightly, he leapt from his bed and tiptoed across the floor, the balls of his feet and toes stinging on the freezing stone floor. He paused at the top of the stairs, listening to the voices below.

“Neville, you heard what McGonagall and Snape said, you'll be expelled!” said an exasperated Hermione Granger.

“EXPELLED?” roared Neville, his fingers clenched so tightly that his knuckles were white. There were shades of lavender rising to his cheeks. Harry could have warned them that this was serious, a matter over which Neville would never stand down, but he was too busy remembering this evening and discussing the possibilities in his mind. “Don't you understand? Don't you see? If Voldemort returns, what does it matter if I'm expelled? My mum and dad died to protect the world, to protect me from him. If you think I'm going to dishonour their memories by ignoring the sacrifices they gave to get me here by just ignoring this, you're both fools.”

This seemed to cow both Hermione and Ron and after a few muttered apologies, all four of them left the common room together. Harry sat for a while, pondering his predicament. In reality, this is where the memory ended, the Harry-that-was, being the self indulgent prick that he had, considered Neville to have made the whole thing up and Hermione and Ron as gullible and returned to bed. Was Harry supposed to be true to that Harry or the Harry he was now?

After a moment of deliberation, Harry followed, if only to see how far he could push the enchantment. He'd never seen what had occurred below, but had heard accounts from the headmaster and Neville, would that be enough for the enchantment to create the scenario in his head?

He passed, bear footed through the halls of Hogwarts, remembering the way perfectly. He too, of course, had visited Fluffy. Partly out of a sense of duty to Hagrid, when he was abducted by the ministry for attempting to raise a dragon in his house and partly from his own curiosity. So it was of no shock to him when he opened the third floor door to face a massive three headed dog.

Instantly, Harry began to hum, which very gently eased the dog to the floor, its eyelids closing further with each note. He paused at the open trapdoor for a moment then stepped forward, dropping through into the darkness below.

He landed abruptly upon the next stair star and wavered for a little while on the edge, trying to regain his balance. He turned to Dumbledore and gave him a sad smile that was mirrored on the headmaster's face. Dumbledore nodded him on and Harry stepped down to the stair below, half expecting what came next.

The basilisk lay dead upon the floor, the sword of Gryffindor buried to the hilt in the roof of it's mouth. Neville lay on the floor, looking up into the wand point of a pale, older boy whom Harry recognised as the young Tom Marvolo Riddle. Dumbledore's phoenix, Fawkes, lay between them in a small pile of ash. Riddle kicked it viciously to the side as he stepped over Neville.

“You're going to die, Longbottom; I'm going to tear your heart out and feed it to you,” he said viciously, leaning over him, his pale eyes colder than Harry could ever remember them being as Voldemort. Harry stepped over, neither boy seeming to notice him.

“Are you?” asked Harry quietly and both of them jumped and turned to face him. Riddle straightened up and stared between Harry and the wand held lazily in his fingers. His face became a smirk and he glanced back at Neville.

“I stand corrected Longbottom; he sent you an old hat, a song bird and a squib,” he laughed shrilly, his eyes alight with something that couldn't quite be described as delight, it was very slightly darker than that. Neville looked Harry in the eyes, a wide expression of surprise and fear in his eyes.

“Run Harry!” he cried, “You don't understand!”

Harry ignored him and stepped forward, wand still tipped delicately between his fingers. They felt slightly longer now, more gamely, there was a spring in his step, he felt alive and powerful. Riddle raised his wand and casually tossed an eviscerating curse at Harry, which he blocked with a flourish.

“Tom Marvolo Riddle,” tutted Harry in mock disappointment. “All these years I've waited to meet you and you open with that sloppy piece of wandwork? Five points from Slytherin, I should think.”

Riddle's eyes narrowed and he turned to face Harry fully now, his nose turned slightly skyward, he looked so much like Draco Malfoy that Harry felt like thumping him.

“Harry, it's Voldemort!” shouted Neville again, Harry ignored him once more.

“Oh he knows,” said Riddle softly, his eyes finally blossoming into comprehension, a slight smirk spreading across his features. “How long have you been waiting for this Potter? How long have you been hiding yourself from these worms?”

“Long enough,” replied Harry stonily. In reality he'd revealed far too much at this point, spoken at too great a length, subconsciously emulating Voldemort's compulsion to be verbose. Neville just stared on confused, he couldn't understand where the shy, retiring, magically weak Harry Potter had disappeared to.

“Very clever, Harry Potter, I should have chosen you instead.”

“Woulda, shoulda, coulda.”

“I suppose we duel now, Harry Potter,” said Tom Riddle and without waiting for a reply leapt into action, throwing a curse at Harry even as he took a duelling stance. Harry casually batted it away, as he did the next four curses that Tom Riddle flung at him. The first time he'd done this, Harry had been all but outmatched and the duel had involved far more defensive posturing from him than his pure skill allowed this time. Voldemort at seventeen had all of his considerable magical talent at his disposal, as well as years on Harry in experience. This time however, Harry had all of his talent as well as years of training with Dumbledore. It had clearly paid off, the duel that had taken everything from Harry to survive, giving Neville long enough to piece the diary with a basilisk fang, was now a cakewalk.

Tom Riddle hissed in frustration as another curse failed to connect with Harry as he danced away. Harry let a smirk settle on his lips as the young Voldemort came at him again, a pair of curses hissing through the chamber. Harry's firewhip struck them both out of the air as if they were nothing more than balls of paper. Frustration showed on Riddle's face and he stepped forward, throwing a killing curse at Harry. For a moment Harry stood stock still, looking as though he was stunned by the spell, Riddle's lips curled in victory for a moment, before the curse hit a block of granite.

“Any time now, Neville!” cried Harry and Riddle turned to see Neville raising the fang high above the diary, he raised his wand to curse him but Harry intercepted, forcing his wand hand down. Riddle twisted in Harry's arm lock to look him in the face, his eyes glowed red for a moment.

“See you in hell Potter!” he spat, Harry laughed in his face.

“You first.”

Once again Harry returned abruptly to reality and paused for a moment, savouring the memory. That had been the beginning of Harry and Neville's friendship; together they had returned to McGonagall's office and the real world in a silence neither of them knew how to break. Once inside and pressed to their victory however, the whole truth had come out. No longer could Harry hide his ability and Dumbledore had regarded him with calculating eyes for a moment, before breaking into a wide smile and accepting him readily, surprising Harry beyond description. Indeed, he was honoured to the same standard as Neville himself. Harry could still almost hear the headmaster's end of term speech after over two years.

“There are some people who shatter all expectations,” he'd said, having raised his hands for silence. “They step beyond the world of normal people and become heroes, I am talking of course, about Neville Longbottom who this term acquitted himself against a foe that might have destroyed a lesser wizard. For his indisputable heroism, I award Gryffindor two hundred points.” Once again he had to motion for silence. “Then, there are those upon even the heroes must depend on, I speak of Harry Potter, who saved not one, but two lives, by duelling the darkest wizard in a century to a standstill. For this incredible feat of magical ability and heroism, I award Gryffindor a further two hundred points!”

It was that really that had begun it for Harry; Dumbledore had insisted on his apprenticeship, remarking that Harry had wandwork and ability far beyond any wizard of his age he'd ever seen. He'd become a hero to three quarters of the school, in the same way Neville Longbottom already was and he replaced the comatose Ronald Weasley in Neville's trio of friends. He'd gone from quiet squib quidditch star, to a hero over night.

Dumbledore must have read something from Harry's silence for he spoke softly. “Harry?”

“I'm fine,” said Harry, attempting to push the thoughts away. “These tasks get under your skin slightly.”

“I should imagine that was the purpose of such an enchantment,” replied Dumbledore and stepped down behind Harry. Harry heard, rather than saw the headmaster as he coughed slightly and readjusted his robes. Harry stepped forward again.

He adjusted to the new environment far faster this time and rose to his feet from the sand that was below him. He looked around, interested in what challenge faced him this time. He found himself in a cylindrically shaped room that stretched for miles above him. The only flaw in the one circular wall was a door about thirty feet above him. Harry looked at it for a moment and then reached into his pocket and withdrew his wand.

“Salirius!” he said, pointing to his boots and leapt toward the door. His jump was no where near high enough however and he completely failed to find any purchase on the smooth wall and slid straight back down. A metal disc appeared in the air above him, perhaps five foot or so above the top of the door. It spanned the room's entire footprint, sealing off the way above. Harry examined it again waiting for something else to happen, but nothing did.

Raising his wand again, Harry tried to transfigure the sand beneath him into a ladder; his form and wandwork was flawless but the material was far too fluid and changeable to be easily manipulated and all he achieved was a vaguely ladder shaped pattern in the dust before it collapsed back into sand.

Harry looked skyward again as the disc moved, lowering a foot, making an awful screeching noise as it did so. Harry frowned. He raised his wand again and cast a spell that fired a metal pin at high velocity, it was generally used by stone masons or rock climbers, but Harry hoped that he could form a ladder from them and climb that. The metal projectile, however, merely bounced off the rock at a crazy angle and Harry fell to the floor to avoid the spinning metal pin. The disc in the sky lowered another foot and Harry felt a flash of temper.

He had maybe four more attempts before there was no way he could fit through the door above and he assumed at that point the task was considered failed. So Harry sat and thought for a moment. If he couldn't jump or climb up, couldn't charm himself to do so, couldn't transfigure a ladder, couldn't conjure something to act as a ladder, perhaps he could conjure something to propel himself into the air. He was certainly under no illusion he could conjure a fully working jetpack, but perhaps a strong gust of wind?

The gust of wind he conjured threw him thirty feet into the air and he scrabbled for the bottom of the door but he was still at least ten feet too low. He bounced off the wall with a sickening crunch that he imagined may have rivalled one of his worse quidditch injuries, if this were not all in his head. As it was, he fell to his feet upon the sand as sprightly as a cat. He watched the roof lower another foot but didn't really mind, he'd been struck by a thought; surely if this was just his mind, he could will himself up to the door?

He stood for a long moment, willing himself to be propelled effortlessly through the air, after a few seconds he opened his eyes and found himself exactly where he'd been standing before. A soft laugh escaped his lips and he looked skyward, but even the magically lowering roof seemed to consider that a pitiful attempt and made no movement.

No, decided Harry, he'd been on the right track with the gust of wind, propulsion seemed his best bet, but he hadn't considered the puzzle laterally enough. There must be a reason for all this sand to be laying around, it could have just been a stone floor, perhaps there was something buried under it.

Deciding to forego spells in order to not attract the derision of the enchanted disc above, Harry dug into the sand with his hands, but it didn't seem to matter how deep he went, there just seemed to be more sand. When he reached three feet down, Harry gave up the struggle of preventing the sand from falling back in the hole and climbed out.

He couldn't help but notice, before it all evened out again, that the sand he'd dug out of the hole had piled up against the wall to a height of two feet. He looked up at the disc and snorted.

“You can't possibly be serious?” he asked the disc. It remained silent. “That would take forever. Even with-”

Once again, Harry realised he had overlooked the obvious. He instantly remembered the spell he'd used in the second task, the pillar of earth that had simply risen from the lake bed and plopped through the surface at Harry's command. He'd felt bad, Neville had chosen to use gillyweed at Harry's suggestion after trying for weeks to perfect a passable transfiguration and failing. But Harry had wanted to prove himself during the tournament and through winning, prove that he wasn't just Neville's lackey.

“Aguamenti!” incanted Harry, pouring water onto the sand below in order to cement it slightly better together. The disc above him lowered another foot. “Terraortus!” he said sharply and after a momentary shaking of the sand around him, the ground began to rise under food, carrying him to the level of the doorway. He made a neat jump from his column of sand through the door frame.

He shook his feet experimentally, ensuring that the sand he'd just felt between his toes had not followed him into the realm of reality. He turned to watch Dumbledore make the next step and allowed his mind to wander to the very nature of the tasks.

The first stair of every three is about challenging your identity, thought Harry. The second, challenged not your abilities, but your ability to perceive and accept your own strengths and weaknesses. Each time it was not until Harry admitted his own limitations and accepted his abilities that he could pass. The third? Harry had his suspicions and if they were correct, he had a pretty firm idea of what came next.

“You don't understand!” roared Sirius Black as Harry stood over him. His wand trembling as he levelled it at the throat of his parent's betrayer. “I'm your godfather Harry! I didn't betray your parents, it was Peter Pettigrew!”

Harry's decision wavered slightly as did his wand. “What?” he asked Sirius in a raspy voice.

“Peter Pettigrew betrayed your parents, he was their secret keeper!”

“YOU KILLED HIM!” roared Harry.

“Yes,” confessed Black. “But not because he'd cornered me as they said, but out of revenge for your parent's deaths! You have to understand Harry, we switched, Peter and I, we never thought he'd be the one they'd suspect, we never thought he'd be the spy!”

“Don't trust him Harry,” came a second voice, that made him turn. Remus Lupin stood in the door, covering the two of them with a wand. His eyes were frantic and panicked, but the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher stood strong. “Whatever you do, don't trust that man, don't make the same mistake your parents did.”

“Harry!” roared Black, his voice shrill. “He's not even a man Harry, he's a werewolf!”

Abruptly, Harry, who'd been screeching in his head for what felt like hours, fighting to regain control of what he was seeing snapped back into the driver's seat and found himself in control of his younger body once more. He levelled the wand at Black instantly, ready to incant the syllables he'd need to snuff out his life once and for all and shuddered to a stop.

This was all in his head, he reasoned, this wouldn't change anything that had already happened. What satisfaction would his death bring now? It would only betray himself, everything he and Dumbledore had fought for, all of the base human behaviour he'd stood against, the revenge, the bloodshed, the needlessness of it all.

So Harry, as he had in reality, took the only course of action available to him, knowing that he'd have to relive this night at least once more. This time outside his dreams. He lowered his wand slightly. He turned slightly to Lupin and gave him a sad smile. “I'm sorry,” he said silently and then flung a bind at Sirius Black.

Black rose fluidly and seized Harry by the wrist, forcing the spell away. He pulled Harry's arm back sharply and twisted his wand from his hand and cast him aside. Lupin's curse was parried by the Dark Lord's right hand and his killing curse struck the werewolf before he could even flinch. The last of his father's true friends stood in the doorway for a moment, silhouetted by the light behind and fell backwards.

Harry seized Hermione's wand from her lifeless hand and spun, taking a duelling position. Black laughed and fell into one similar.

“Going to fight me are you Harry?” asked Black, glee in his smile and relish in his eyes.

“No,” said Harry bluntly. “I'm going to wipe the floor with you.”

Black leapt forward, Harry's wand flashing down in his hand. Harry blocked the curse offhandedly and turned inside the older wizard's guard. His curse threw Black through a wall of the shrieking shack and crashing to the floor in the opposite room. Harry leapt through, a second curse on his lips, Black was waiting for him.

The crazed pureblood bashed Harry's curse away with a double handed block, that tipped him from his feet. Harry kicked him in the face as he fell, his toe striking the wizard just under the chin and Black collapsed to the floor unconscious.

Harry fell through his kick back onto the star stairs and stood there for a moment, shaking with anger before he took a steadying gasp of air. He could feel a twitch in his throat and coughed it away before it could develop. He'd lost two people that night, the last link to his father and a good friend.

Lupin had been a good man through and through, just as Harry had estimated him. He had given his life, cursed as it was to the defence of those weaker than himself and had died doing what he taught; defending against the dark arts. His death served as a constant reminder to Harry that no matter how quick you were, how prepared, you walked a perilously dangerous line when fighting the dark arts.

Hermione on the other hand was a tragedy. The girl who'd been praised by so many as the smartest of her generation, snuffed out like a match in her fourteenth year upon the earth. Harry, Neville, McGonagall, Dumbledore and strangely enough, Snape had attended her funeral, they'd been the only magical people there.

For someone who'd loved magic so much, she'd had a really appalling time of it at Hogwarts, what with Voldemort and the loss of Ron Weasley in first year, spending her entire second year as a statue and her death at the end of third year, Harry was surprised that her parents held no grudge when they'd introduced themselves.

Harry sighed and stepped forward again, not even bothering to contemplate what came next.

He almost fell in surprise as his foot merely touched the next stair, completely unopposed. He turned to Dumbledore, convinced that this was some sort of test in itself, Dumbledore just stepped down and looked blankly at him for a moment.

“Are you alright, Harry?” he asked after a moment.

“Tell me something I couldn't possibly know or have subconsciously deducted,” demanded Harry, warily.

“That would be rather pointless,” said Dumbledore, rationally. “You can hardly compare an answer of which you have no knowledge to itself. For instance I could say 'I have a fondness for yellow and pink polka dot underwear.' This would hardly do you much good considering you have no idea if this is true or something I've just invented to confuse you.”

“Or something I've invented to confuse me,” replied Harry.

“Ah,” said Dumbledore. “You are wondering, of course, if this is a challenge in itself, as you have just experienced a step with no challenge?” Harry nodded. “Whilst it is of course possible that this is merely a test, I do believe that the enchantment has opted not to challenge you on this matter any longer.” Harry looked at him strangely. “If it further reassures you, Harry, I think, therefore I am.” Dumbledore's eyes twinkled at him.

“Why wouldn't it challenge me?” asked Harry.

“Well, it might be because, like I, the enchantment is becoming old and senile and tends to forget things,” replied Dumbledore, his own joke pulling a smile onto his lips. “Or, it had decided that you have well acquitted yourself on previous tasks of this nature and has nothing more to challenge. I myself have not been tasked on my second second stair.”

Harry nodded, accepting the explanation and stepped forward. He landed on the next stair down, again without challenge.

“I could get used to this,” muttered Harry to himself, knowing he was wishing hell upon himself. He stepped forward once more.