Ginny was surprised that the werewolf that had attacked her was actually professor Lupin! He had put another student under the imperius curse and forced them to cast the killing curse at Fawkes. The curse had broken when Lupin had died, letting the hufflepuff boy go to the teachers and tell them what had happened.

Lupin had acted strangely ever since Christmas, but Ginny hadn’t made the connection between him and the werewolf. She felt a little sorry for him. It wasn’t his fault that Fate had been manipulating him, yet everyone kept talking like he was the worst person ever.

Oddly enough, after the Auror investigation was done, they somehow ended up blaming Pettigrew for everything again. Ginny couldn’t quite figure out how they had come to that conclusion. Somehow he had been working with Lupin to kidnap Ginny, and when they had a disagreement Pettigrew had decided to just kill Lupin?

It wasn’t exactly clear what Pettigrew’s actual goal was supposed to be since he supposedly left Ginny behind untouched after killing Lupin. Luckily Ginny hadn’t been named in the report, so only her roommates and her friends knew that she was the one involved. Her roommates had been nice enough to keep their mouths shut about it, much to Ginny’s surprise. She had thought that they’d blab about as soon as they could, but apparently not.

The theory with Pettigrew from the Aurors seemed far-fetched, but everyone seemed to accept that explanation, even Ginny’s friends. Alexa and Jack had been worried about her, but things had somewhat settled back to their normal routine after they determined that she hadn’t been hurt. Olivia hadn’t returned to school, still waiting for confirmation if she was a werewolf or not in a few weeks.

Once people discovered that Lupin was a werewolf, everyone started talking differently about him. Of course he was working with Pettigrew. Of course he was only at the school for some nefarious goal. Of course he was a violent maniac hiding behind his calm teacher facade all year. Even the people who had praised his teaching all year were bad mouthing him whenever he was brought up.

It left a bad taste in Ginny’s mouth. Was Olivia right? Would people treat her this way if she became a werewolf? No wonder why she was depressed. But Ginny would fix it. Olivia would only have to deal with it for two or three months until the summer, and then Balthazar would be able to see her and fix it.

If anyone could do it then Balthazar could.

— — —

Final exams came and went, with everyone furiously studying for exams there wasn’t any time for more gossip in the days leading up to it. Ginny was back home after saying goodbye to her friends. Fawkes had regenerated himself two weeks ago. When Ginny talked with him he was indignant after verifying quickly that Ginny was in good health still. He wasn’t annoyed because he was attacked. He was annoyed because he had lost multiple weeks where he could have been stuffing his beak with food. And all the energy he ‘wasted’ regenerating his body after his last body was killed.

When Ginny met with him to make sure he was okay, he kept complaining nonstop about how wasteful it all was. He had only stopped when her friends had started giggling a bit at his trilling, chirping, and hopping around so much as they watched on from the side.

Fawkes had calmed down a bit after that, but kept grumbling about the whole thing even as it was the last day and Ginny was about to leave for the Hogwarts express.

After getting to King’s cross station, Ginny promised her friends that she’d write lots of letters to them over the summer and that she’d keep exercising for Alexa. Then they parted ways and Ginny was back at the burrow. Fawkes was already there, sitting on his bird stand in her room when she went inside.

Ginny waited a week to relax with her family and settle back at the Burrow. Molly had been making an effort to be nice to Ginny, so things weren’t as tense as they usually were between the two of them.

But the week was over now. Ginny had sent out her first round of letters to her friends, and last night had given Balthazar permission to observe her position and create the portal around her when it was time. She’d do it tonight just before bed. Fawkes had already confirmed that he could get her in, although he was still a little grumpy that he couldn’t eat as much now that he was staying with her family for the summer.

Ginny had to praise him for over five minutes before he reluctantly agreed to take her to and from Azkaban after she told him the plan. She was nervous all day, barely speaking except when she had to.

She stared at Fawkes, the sun having just set and her standing in her room. “Alright, Fawkes,” She said, “This is it. It’s really happening.”

Chirp.

“Yes, I’m sure. It’s the only way to help Olivia. And if Teregatt gets more energy then I’m sure I can do all sorts of other things too that I don’t even know about yet.”

Chirp.

“That’s it. Just take me there, Balthazar will open the portal, then we leave. He’ll do everything else.”

Chirp.

“Okay. Let’s go then.”

She looked into the thin air above her. “Alright, Balthazar,” Ginny said, “We’re going now.”

She walked forward up to Fawkes' birdstand. Fawkes bobbed his head up and down for a moment before leaping into the air. He flapped his wings and hovered over Ginny for an instant before Ginny’s world was filled with bright orange flames. When the flames died down she immediately felt chilly and hopeless. All the happiness began quickly draining from the world as she looked around her.

She was standing on the center of a circular stone platform in the center of a raised courtyard. Giant waves crashed onto the black jagged rocks where the courtyard ended and plunged hundreds of feet down to the choppy ocean below. Sprays of freezing mist sprayed onto Ginny’s face even from this height as she looked around to the imposing black castle and menacing walls surrounding her. There were five Dementors floating around above the walls, and all of them turned to look at her on arrival.

Ginny felt the despair and hopelessness from the dementors' aura push into her and try to drain every ounce of her happiness from her. It had only been a few seconds, but Ginny was already feeling like she’d never be happy again.

Red sparks appeared from the air in front of her, almost like someone using a flint and steel to light a fire. The sparks continued and grew stronger as the seconds passed and the surrounding dementors started drifting towards her, their heads all pointed at her as they circled around threateningly.

Finally, the red sparks looked like they caught and with a *whumpf* of displaced air, a ten foot tall ovular red portal sprung into existence in front of her. It swirled and crackled like it was made of red lightning, growing and shrinking as if continually fighting against the world attempting to shut it. The dementors shied back as the portal appeared and the power of their aura diminished briefly.

Balthazar stepped out of the portal, the same as he had ever been in Teregatt. He was smiling widely as he looked around Azkaban. He was much more intimidating than he was when she met with him in Teregatt. Ginny held her breath as Balthazar’s gaze fell on her. He waited for a breath and then nodded to her.

“A pleasure to finally meet you in the flesh, my Queen,” He said, “Your loyal subjects will take it from here. I will not be in Teregatt for a time, but feel free to practice your magic as best as you can on your own.”

One of the insect soldiers in their armor and bone swords held in their grip stepped out of the portal.

“N-Nice to meet you too, Balthazar,” Ginny stammered, “Good luck.”

Another insect soldier emerged directly after the last one, looking almost identical to the last one. The Guard Balthazar had called long ago for Harry’s funeral in Teregatt.

The first member of the Guard’s armor began to glow with a white light as it stood stock still for a moment. With a loud crack, it was sent flying into the air as if launched from a cannon upwards towards the castle walls surrounding them on three sides, with the cliff down to the ocean waves on the other.

It flew through the air until it was just over the wall where its armor flashed white again and it stopped its momentum in place and fell down to the stone on top of the wall and out of sight. The next Guard in line did the same, launching itself towards the wall on the other side as another emerged from the portal.

“We have it handled,” Balthazar said, “Time for you to go. The fighting will begin soon.”

Ginny nodded and Fawkes flew over her and she saw another member of the Guard launch itself into the air as Fawkes flames surrounded her and brought her back to her bedroom. She laid down in bed and Fawkes settled back onto his birdstand. She got in bed and stared at the ceiling with wide eyes, unable to stop her mind racing from wondering what was happening at Azkaban right now.

Eventually after tossing and turning, she managed to finally fall asleep. For once she didn’t enter Teregatt as she slept. She just wanted the time to pass so she would know if Balthazar was successful or not. Practicing magic by herself in Teregatt just sounded like it would be even more stressful as she waited for Balthazar to do what he had to do…

— — —

“Got your paper, Rookwood,” the guard outside said. Rookwood walked to the edge of his cell and accepted the newspaper through the bars. Being rich had its advantages even in prison. He was arrested as a convicted Death Eater and follower of Lord Voldemort of course. But his family hadn’t been, and they were able to pay a few bribes here and there to make sure that things were a little more comfortable for Rookwood’s life sentence imprisonment in this place.

With the dementors and dingy cells they were kept in, even something as simple as being able to read the paper helped one maintain one’s sanity. Rookwood unfolded the paper and started reading every word leisurely while taking his time. The guard waited for a moment before starting to walk off. He would return in a few hours for Rookwood to return the paper. He wasn’t allowed to have anything in his cells, so he had to return the newspaper back to the bribed guard when he was finished with it.

He suddenly looked up as there was a loud crunch and the sound of splintering wood down the hallway. Murmurs and whispers echoed throughout the hallways and the prisoners rushed to the bars of their cells and pressed their faces against them, trying to see what had caused the commotion. Rookwood couldn’t see what was happening, but the prisoners nearer to the door were shouting incoherently.

“What the— Back, freak! Reducto!” The guard cast. There was the loud buzzing of an insect that reverberated through the hallways and then a heavy thunk of something hard on flesh and the sound of a spell hitting stone.

The guard let out a heavy grunt and fell to the floor, a wooden clatter sounding out as the man must have dropped his wand. The shouts died down as the prisoners who had watched the confrontation went largely silent and murmured softly in fear. Rookwood craned his face to the side to see what was happening through the bars. There were heavy footsteps that shook the floor approaching down the hallway. Several of the prisoners shouted and swore as the heavy footsteps approached down the hallway. But most went silent, too afraid to speak.

The hulking figure came into view and Rookwood flinched back and gasped as he saw it. It was wearing a massive suit of metal armor covering every inch of its form, except for the open lower jaw. The mandibles and insect parts sticking out of the plate clicked and shifted as the armored figure kept moving down the hallway while ignoring the cells to either side.

It hefted a large sword made of a bone material covered in reddish runes like none that Rookwood had ever seen before. The runes themselves seemed to squirm and shift even as he looked at them. Rookwood drew back and stood as still as he could as the figure walked by. Boom, boom, boom. The lizard part of his brain curling up in fear in the presence of a predator. Each heavy footstep shook the floor as the creature walked along with its sword held at the ready in its gauntleted hands.

Rookwood didn’t make a sound as the figure kept walking past without pause. When it had turned the corner and he was sure it was out of sight, he rushed to the wall of his cell and desperately scrabbled at a certain brick in the black and moldy wall. After a few heaves with his weak arms, Rookwood pulled the brick loose in a spray of dust and dirt and turned it over to reveal that it was hollow on one side. He reached inside and pulled out the wand that felt warm in his hand as his magic connected to it. He’d been preparing for his escape for years, his family had just barely managed to sneak the wand to him without getting caught by one of the honest guards.

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Even the bribed guards couldn’t know what they’d given him. They would only let themselves be bribed so far before they reported anything to the warden.

If Azkaban was being taken over by inhuman monsters, then it was best for Rookwood to escape in the chaos while he still could. At least the guards held back the Dementors from consuming all of their souls. Who knew what these new creatures would do? He shuddered as he remembered the squirming red runes and the inhuman insect mandibles on the armored creature.

Who knew what they wanted with the prisoners? This was his chance to escape!

He pointed his wand at the door to his cell and cast a quick charm. With a click, the cell unlocked. If he could just get to the apparition platform on the exterior courtyard, then he could apparate back to Britain and finally be free!

Apparition was blocked across the rest of this blasted island, otherwise Rookwood would have escaped with this wand months ago.

Rookwood ran forward towards the downed guard and quickly picked up the wand that had rolled a foot away from the man lying face down on the floor. As Rookwood leaned over, he noticed that the guard was still breathing softly, only unconscious. That only made Rookwood more nervous. What would these creatures want them alive for?

He straightened up with one wand in each hand and started running to the shattered frame of the wooden door, ignoring the cries of the other prisoners in the cells on each side of him.

“Wait!” One shrill woman's voice pierced through the rest, “I can help you! You need my skills to escape!”

Rookwood paused and the shouts only grew louder around him as the rest of the prisoners clamored around him and whispered fiercely, all too frightened by the inhuman figure to resort to outright shouting and risk it returning. Rookwood glanced behind him and there was no sign of the creature. It had rounded the corner and continued deeper into the building. But it could come back any moment, there was no time to hesitate. He didn’t need a second wand either way, and she was a skilled duelist. Better than him. It was worth the risk.

“Fine,” He said and quickly cast a charm to unlock the cell of Bellatrix Lestrange. The woman emerged from her cell eyes crazed and her black hair sticking every which way. Her prison robes clung to her thin frame even as she smiled as she stepped forward out of her cell.

Rookwood took the guard's wand and quickly handed it to her. She snatched it from him like a starving animal, holding it and stroking the wood lovingly for a moment as if it was a long lost friend.

“There’s no time for that!” Rookwood whispered urgently, “We have to get to the apparition platform now. Before that creature comes back!”

Bellatrix turned her crazed eyes to him, looking angered. But as she processed his words, her eyes flashed with fear and she quickly nodded without saying anything after a quick glance in the direction the creature had disappeared off to.

Rookwood and Bellatrix charged out the shattered door into a world of chaos.

The armor of more of the armored insect men outside flashed brightly as they dashed and stopped on a dime with bright white flashes of their armor. Hundreds of dementors were flying around the castle and circling and darting in to attack the creatures whenever they stopped moving for even a single instant.

In addition to using their aura to visibly weaken the creatures, the gathered Dementors had started forming balls of roiling shadow between their gray hands and launching them at the armored figures as they fought. Rookwood counted at least fifteen of the strange creatures fighting, but there could have been more. They were moving too fast around to properly count them. The armored figures leaped and twirled to dodge with flexibility that shouldn’t be possible in such bulky metal armor, but wherever the shadow balls landed on them their armor flashed with magic, the metal appearing to corrode and rust in moments before repairing the damage again in bright flashes of magic.

Bellatrix and Rookwood could only watch in disbelief as the armored figures launched themselves through several flying groups of Dementors over and over like sharks through a school of fish. The armored figure’s bone swords glowed a deep red as they lashed out with their blades even as they flew through the air. All of them were fighting dozens of dementors each, with none even significantly injured yet from what Rookwood could tell.

Suddenly a Dementor swooped down from above and loomed over the two of them and breathed in deeply.

It raised an arm shrouded in deep roiling shadow to point it towards them. The same attack that had partially rusted the enchanted armors of the insect creatures was about to be launched at their bare flesh.

Rookwood and Bellatrix cast their reflexive dark curses at the Dementor, but neither did anything, the spells unraveling as the Dementor shifted its arm so their charms were absorbed into the growing ball of shadow that it held at the end of its left hand.

The shadow ball stopped growing and the Dementor adjusted its arm so the shadow ball was facing towards Rookwood. He tensed and prepared to dodge, but before he could move there was a rush of wind and an explosive burst of air just in front of him that caused him to flinch and crouch down instinctively.

When Rookwood glanced up the armored figure that had appeared in front of him was already slashing with its red sword again. In a flurry of blows it sliced through the Dementor over six more times, the sword glowing blood red each time it touched the Dementor. The blade cut through the Dementor easily, but after it finished passing through a burst of shadow would expand from the wound and the Dementor would be healed from the attack in moments, the two severed segments of the dark creature sewing themselves back together and healing again.

At the seventh slash, the shadow healing only partially healed the wound. The eighth horizontal slash sliced the Dementor in two and the creature dissolved into dark mist that disappeared into nothing in moments.

The armored figure slightly turned its head to glance at the two frozen humans before looking back up into the sky. Its armor flashed bright white again and it launched into the air again to fly through another group of flying Dementors and rejoin its fellows in the main battle, slashing through over a dozen of Dementors with its sword as it blasted through another group of them at high speed.

“Move!” Bellatrix screamed at Rookwood before she started running towards the exit. Rookwood quickly went to follow, jolted out of his shock by her voice. They were on the upper courtyard right now. They had to get into the walls and find the staircase down and get to the bottom courtyard where the apparition platform and their exit was.

Rookwood stumbled to the side as a ball of shadow landed a few meters to his right, hitting the stone. In an instant the ground shriveled and withered, the stones crumbling to dust and everything being eaten away by the corrosive shadow. He kept running, glancing back and seeing that the Dementors were still busy fighting the armored figures. It seems it had just been a stray shot that had come their way. The place where the shadow ball had landed was a circular hole nearly a foot deep, carved directly into the cobblestones. Rookwood gulped and turned back around and kept moving.

Rookwood kept running, Bellatrix beginning to pull ahead. She lifted her wand, still running as they approached the barred wooden door. The heavy doors sat at the base of the towering walls looming over them from all sides and boxing in the upper courtyard.

“BOMBARDA!” She screamed and a spell launched from the tip of her wand and exploded, reducing the door to wooden splinters.

The woman dived through and revealed an empty guard room behind it. Rookwood’s chest heaved in exertion, but he pushed to catch up just before Bellatrix reached the stairwell. The stairs went up to the top of the walls and down far below to the lower courtyard. Rookwood turned to the right to go down.

Bellatrix turned left and started running up the stairs.

“Bellatrix!” Rookwood asked in a panic, “What are you doing?!”

“Up, you fool!” Bellatrix snapped, “There’s no time, we have to go down the fast way! And we do that by going up!”

She kept running and after a moment’s hesitation, Rookwood followed after her. Rookwood had a cramp and was having trouble breathing by the time the two of them reached the top of the wall.

“BOMBARDA!”

Bellatrix didn’t hesitate to blast the door at the top open rather than taking the time to open it. She rushed through with Rookwood close behind her.

“Remember your leviation chaaaaaaarrrrmmss!” Bellatrix screamed as she charged to the edge of the wall and dived over the edge of the crenelations into thin air. She dived over the edge head first without any hesitation as she shouted. Rookwood stopped and took a few deep breaths and mentally tried to force himself to just do it. To jump over the edge into a drop from who knows how high.

Rookwood suddenly snapped his head to the side and saw a Dementor descending from above, its gray arm lifted towards him with an orb shadow prepared to launch at him. His eyes widened as he remembered what the shadow ball had done to the ground before. What would those do to a person, to him, if it landed?

He ran forward and leapt over the edge of the wall and started falling with the sheer wall of stone flying by behind him. He was tumbling over and over in the air, spinning every which way with the sound of rushing wind pounding in his ears. Everything was dark and Rookwood was confused as he fumbled with his stolen wand and held it as far from him as he could.

“Wingardium Leviosa!” He chanted while pointing the wand at his robes. With a jolt, Rookwood started slowing down rapidly. But his speed was too much and after a single instant, the charm failed and he was falling again.

“Win-Wingardium Leviosssa!” Rookwood stammered in a panic as he cast the charm again, still flipping around and uncertain how far he was from the ground. He slowed again, almost to a stop before the charm failed again and he kept dropping.

“Wingardium Leviosa!” He quickly cast again and after he kept falling for another moment he halted in mid-air. Or his prison robes did. They were ripped and torn, nearly ripped open from taking the force of stopping the fall. Rookwood sweat nervously as he looked down. He was still another twenty meters from the ground even after that. He could only hope that his clothes could handle one more fall.

He canceled the charm and let himself fall again until he was less than five meters from the ground.

“Wingardium Leviosa!”

He stopped just two meters off the ground, floating in place. He took a shuddering breath and canceled the hover charm, allowing himself to fall to the coarse dirt below.

He stumbled onto all fours from the small fall and cut his knee slightly on the ground. He looked up and saw Bellatrix already halfway across the courtyard. In the exact center of the space was a bright red ovular rippling blob of magical energy.

Bellatrix diverted and was running around the edge of the courtyard, taking a wide berth of the guardian of the red portal. The creature had bright red skin, large horns, and batlike wings on its back. A devil. It was fighting over a hundred dementors at once with conjured spears of reddish flame and beams of bright light that could dissolve a dementor with a single strike when it struck. Purple barriers appeared from thin air all around the guardian and red mass of magical energy, blocking every single shadow ball that was being thrown at it with pinpoint precision before disappearing again.

Rookwood stood and started running forward, limping slightly on his knee that clicked as it moved now. Nothing that a healing spell wouldn’t fix, but he didn’t have time. He had to escape before the guardian moved or the Dementors or other invaders won their battle and turned their attention to the humans.

He circled the other side of the courtyard as Bellatrix had gone, the Dementors and the guardian too focused on combating each other to worry about attacking him or Bellatrix.

Bellatrix was nearly at the circular platform of whitish stone by the cliff’s edge now. She sprinted forward and with a cry of victory leapt forward and disappeared in a crack of displaced air that Rookwood could only barely hear over all the other sounds of battle around him.

Rookwood kept running around the edge of the courtyard at his top speed hobbling on his injured leg. Shadow balls landed in the dirt around him in an endless barrage. Even as the guardian slaughtered the Dementors in droves, more and more of them arrived to swirl and attack the guardian like a swarm of wasps attacking from all sides.

‘Ecraz, Ecraz, Ecraz,’

A chorus of hundreds of voices suddenly spoke as one, their tones filled with awe and worship as they spoke. The Dementors.

‘Ecraz, Ecraz, Ecraz,’

Rookwood felt his heart leap into his throat as he ran as fast as he could on his limping leg towards the ring of bright stone that represented his salvation. He could feel something tingling down his spine as a sense of foreboding built within him.

‘Ecraz, Ecraz, Ecraz!’

The voices grew to a fevered pitch, the telepathic voices of the Dementors growing more and more excited as they continued.

Rookwood was so close to the platform, only a few steps away from the edge.

The Dementors went silent and suddenly everything went unnaturally silent as if all sound had been drained from the world around Rookwood.

A massive gray featureless head suddenly appeared, rising from the edge of the cliff and flying upwards. Rookwood kept charging, so close to the edge of the platform that he could almost taste it…

He looked up to the massive Dementor looming over him and casting a massive shadow over him. It was titanic, over fifty feet tall as it floated just by the cliff’s edge, its head pointed straight at the guardian of the red portal.

‘ECRAAAAAZZZZZ!!!’

The surrounding Dementors cheered as one in Rookwood’s mind as the massive Dementor started breathing in deeply through its circular mouth and releasing its aura in billowing clouds to cover the whole area.

Rookwood leapt forward as his vision suddenly grew dim and he started to struggle to remember why he had even wanted to escape in the first place. Everything was just so hopeless, wasn’t it? Why even bother doing anything?

His body crossed the border, and it lit a spark of hope that lit a fire within him. Ecraz’s aura instantly pressed inwards to crush that spark ruthlessly, but it was enough for Rookwood to become aware enough to wave his wand and apparate away.

Instantly everything was brighter and there was real light coming from around him. He almost cried as he realized that he wasn’t in Azkaban any more. He sat up and realized the whole area was embroiled in chaos. Aurors and Ministry employees ran every which way in a panic, three dead bodies scattered around the place. Bellatrix likely making good on her escape. They were in the heart of the Ministry itself at the moment.

Rookwood took a shuddering breath and lifted his new wand again as he noticed the eyes of the nearby Aurors turn to him, noticing his arrival finally through all the commotion. Several of them shouted and raised their wands, but Rookwood managed to apparate again and in the next moment he was on the front stoop of his family estate.

One more time, he apparated away into a random muggle farmer’s field to escape. They would expect him to return to the estate, he couldn’t stay there.

He had much to do to hide himself and work on making sure he was never returned to Azkaban no matter what. Every moment was critical.

But Rookwood didn’t care. He laid back into the grass of the field and stared into the open night sky with not a single dark cloud to block his view or a dementor’s Aura pressing down on him for the first time in over ten years.

And then he started laughing. He was free. He was finally free.

Bellatrix could continue with her ideology and quest to find the Dark Lord Voldemort wherever he was ‘recovering’ from his wounds. Rookwood was going to savor his freedom instead. He had thought that he had chosen the winning side ten years ago.

He had been wrong. He wouldn’t be wrong again. He’d flee to America. His laughter slowed into coughs and hacks as his malnourished body punished him for his laughter.

Yes, America. He’d restart there. Leave this miserable country behind him.

Bellatrix could obsess over Voldemort. Rookwood had better things to worry about. Like America. East or west coast? He wanted to be by the beach. Ah, these were the types of decisions he wanted to be making…

Rookwood kept staring at the stars, fantasizing about his new life that was waiting for him.

It was the best that he’d felt in years.