Iniquitous

Chapter Two

Memories and thoughts were being quickly and roughly brought to the forefront of her mind. The destruction of each Horcrux was being re-lived, and in each memory, the intense hue of red, whether in the blood of basilisk, or in the glittering rubies surrounding a gold cup, or in the copper hair of the ghost of Lily Potter walking beside a living Horcrux in a forest, lent such vibrancy that all other colours were deadened by comparison.

As soon as Hera realised that he was in her mind, she fought him, and as soon as she began to fight him, she was overtaken by a freezing, all-encompassing pain. It felt as if her brain had been doused in icy water, or as if someone with an ice-cold hand was reaching for it through her skull.

She could see now nothing but what he wanted to see, could hear nothing but what he pulled out and played in short sequences like a librarian flicking through files.

Horcrux, horcrux, H is for Horcrux...

Striving to expel him through the overwhelming pain, she tripped on her own feet and felt herself falling onto damp mossy ground. Her vison was now a red haze where Dumbledore, in his office, surrounded by Hera-wrought destruction, was reciting the prophecy in its entirety.

The tactile sensations were the only part of her consciousness not currently conjured by him. Hera tried to focus on them. Something slim and rigid was jabbing painfully into her ribs. Her hands scrabbled, trapped in the fabric of her own robes. Dumbledore was speaking, and she was speaking, and her mouth was open and tasting dirt, and she was mouthing, or screaming, possibly:

"But he might have chosen wrong!"

She grasped unseeingly at the thing jammed between her chest and the ground, and her fingers closed around warm, friendly wood.

All her will and intent burst out of her heart.

The image of Dumbledore flickered, and now she was an eleven-year-old girl, standing in a dusty shop surrounded by boxes, holding for the first time, feeling the thrill for the first time...

"PROTEGO!" she roared. The spell came bursting out to hit her en pleine figure, the wand still tangled awkwardly in her robes and pointing directly at her own face.

She was thrown forcefully back by her spell, back and legs dragging harshly across the ground as she skidded several meters. Her brain was reverberating in her skull; she must have hit several tree roots along the way. The freezing grip of Voldemort's legilimency was replaced by the searing physical pain of physical pain.

Every nerve was firing off at once.

Every part of her body screamed at her that she was probably dying, definitely fucked up.

But her reckless casting had done the trick. She was free! She was torn up and bloody and her head pounded fiercely, but she was free.

And she was Hera Potter. This was her element.

Her own ragged breathing filled her ears. The star speckled night swayed alarmingly above her.

Hera leaped instantly to her feet, or tried to; still reeling, she stumbled and fell on to her knees. She flung the wand up in the general direction of her foe. Barely able to put words together, still seeing stars, she rasped out, "Bombarda Maxima!"

Funny just how much spellwork relies on complicated wand movements and precise intonations. Funny isn't it, how the right stress on the wrong syllable can be the difference between a flightless feather and a club rising to strike at a troll.

And yet in moments like these, where nothing, not even the rapid staccato of her heart operated with precision...

The blast of an explosion vibrated outwards, and she was once again thrown back. But this time, Hera was prepared.