There was a deafening roar of thunder directly overhead, and the sky darkened further.

“Damn,” Snape said aloud. Harry and Draco stared up at the sky as they began to ran, Snape right behind them.

“What’s happening?” Harry shouted as another deafening wave of thunder made his entire body shake.

“I don’t know,” Snape said. A moment later as it began to rain he said, “This is old magic. I believe he’s found a way to bypass the school’s protective barriers.”

“How’s he going to do that?” Harry asked. They were almost back to the castle now. Up in the lit windows of the Gryffindor Common room, Harry could see many curious faces peering out at the foul weather that had taken over the sun and warmth in a matter of minutes.

“He’s going to come in in the rain,” Draco shouted. Harry wondered how he knew that, but suddenly Draco had stopped in front of him and was pointing a hundred yards in the distance. A death eater was standing there, cloaked and hooded. A moment later another one dropped from the sky, standing steadily by his fellow’s side. It appeared that they had not noticed Harry, Snape and Draco yet, but Harry knew that would not last for long.

The sky seemed to be emptying an ocean full of water on them. It was cold, hard rain, and within moments they were soaked. They stood motionless, watching death eaters falling from the sky and gathering themselves for battle. It was so dark that it was hard to see them, making it hard for them to see them standing there also.

“It’s begun,” Snape said.

“We don’t have a chance,” Draco said, “there are hundreds of them coming.” As the last word had left Draco’s mouth twenty or so death eaters had appeared next to their comrades all at once, and twenty more after them. They were coming in waves now instead of one by one. There was more thunder, and Harry thought it must have sounded spectacular from inside the castle, booming around it’s many corridors and walls.

“Move,” Snape prodded the two boys, steering them in a direction he hoped would lead around the growing mass of death eaters in the near distance.

Just as Harry thought a death eater had spotted them, the castle doors boomed open and professors began streaming out, aiming and firing spells at the mass of evil men and women gathering there. Suddenly under attack they broke formation and some of them dove for cover, others deciding to take the offensive and fire nasty curses and hexes back.

Harry, wand already out, aimed at a death eater’s head, and was about to hit him with the nastiest curse he could think of when Snape pulled his arm down forcefully.

“No!” he commanded, rain still pounding down on their heads.

“We can get them from behind!” Harry shouted.

Snape shook his head. “One professor and two students against an army! We will do better with the others!”

Harry looked back at the Professors in the Entrance Hall. Several of them had already fallen. Draco cursed, and Harry nodded his head in agreement of the situation.

Up in the Gryffindor common room Hermione stood on a table and issued orders. “You!” she screamed at a fifth year Prefect. “Go to Ravenclaw common room and gather everybody above fourth year willing to fight and send them down to the entrance hall!” She pointed at another Prefect, a seventh year this time, and said, “Go to Hufflepuff and do the same!” Both Prefects obeyed her command and ran off, one tripping on his way out the common room door.

“Everybody else! Fifth year and above! We have to defend ourselves! There aren’t enough Professors to do it for you! If you don’t defend yourselves and each other, you’ll die!”

Every face in the house was turned towards hers. Many of the younger students, and some of the older ones were shaking. Fear was on every face, even Hermione’s.

“Who will fight!?” she cried.

Ron stepped up beside her immediately and so did Ginny. Ron wanted to say something to the effect that Ginny was not allowed, but he knew he would not be able to stop her if he tried.

Dean and Seamus stepped to the front of the group along with Neville, who although his face was pale, and he gripped his wand tightly, his face was also determined, and his mind running over curses he was going to use.

“This is it!” Ron shouted. “Are you Gryffindors or not! From the looks of you I’d say you were rotten Slytherins hiding under your bed!” Hermione had already sent one of the braver, and larger Prefects to gather Slytherins, but she wasn’t confident that he would find any.

Still, no more volunteers stepped up to fight. Suddenly the common room door burst open, startling everyone in the room. Many shaky wands were pulled as several people spilled inside, none of them Gryffindors.

“What do you want us to do?” Cho asked, wand out and face fearful.

“How many of you are there?” Ron asked.

Cho looked behind her, and said, “Around fifty Ravenclaws and fifty Hufflepuffs I think. There are a few Slytherins who swear their parents aren’t dark.”

Ron nodded and looked back to his fellow Gryffindors.

“How many from Gryffindor will fight?” he asked.

Nearly every hand in the room shot up now.

Ron jumped down from the table and began issuing orders to the other houses.

“Nobody go off alone! Everybody take a partner, two if you can! Cho, you’re in charge of Ravenclaw… take your people and guard every entrance to the castle you can find! Adams! Ron pointed to a sixth year Hufflepuff Prefect he knew and trusted, and said, “You’re in charge of Hufflepuff! Your people guard the Entrance hall! Chase down any death eaters that get in and kill them!”

While Ron was doing this, Hermione was issuing orders to the Gryffindors around them. “First through third years stay here! Defend the house of Godric Gryffindor! If there are injuries we’ll bring them back here! Fourth years guard the entrance to the house and don’t go any farther than the ends of the corridor outside! Protect the younger students! Fifth, sixth, and seventh years! You’re with us! We attack any and all death eaters as they would attack us! Be careful with mercy! They will show you none!

As the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws moved off, a new voice sounded, and said, “What about us? What do we do?” Ron looked over as ten Slytherins came through the portrait hole.

“How many?” Ron asked.

“Ten here, four in the corridor!” Ron looked to Hermione for help. He didn’t know that he wanted to trust them. They could turn their backs on them and run or curse them as soon as they stepped outside.

“Patrol the corridors, two in a team, from third floor down!” She pointed at a particularly smart Slytherin, a seventh year, the oldest one there, and said, “You’re in charge of your house now.” The boy nodded and moved off, waving his housemates to follow him.

Outside, Harry, Draco and Snape had almost made their way full circle around the death eaters and back to the entrance hall when they were spotted. Several curses and jets of powerful spells came careening at them through the darkness. Snape pushed Draco to the ground as a curse sailed past the boy’s left ear and missed him only by inches.

Draco, angry now sent three curses back that Harry had never even heard of before Snape could get any off. In the distance they heard a scream of pain, and then a few choice words from a voice Harry recognized as Lucius Malfoy’s.

Draco’s eyes hardened, and he wrestled himself free of Snape’s grip, running off into the darkness.

For a moment Snape believed Draco to be running to the other side to aid in their cause, but found himself mistaken next second as Draco was hurling hexes and curses at his father and any other death eater that caught his attention.

“This is for making my life hell!” they heard him shout.

Harry grinned, and began aiming more curses at the nearest death eaters. Suddenly from above him, there were jets of red, green, gold, and silver light coming down and hitting death eaters. Harry looked up and saw younger housemates aiming whatever spell they could think of at the enemy.

Fifty yards off, several death eaters began to sprout boils all over their faces and bodies, falling to the ground in agony.

While they had the original death eaters pinned down from two sides and from above, more were coming down from the sky in hordes.

Harry cursed just before a sparkling orange light sailed past him on his left and he heard an oomph, and a cry of pain beside him. Harry turned to see Snape on the ground, writhing in pain. “NO!” he shouted in horror and anger. “NO!” He tried to move to see if he could help him, but so many curses were aimed at him that he couldn’t move from where he lay on the ground.

He turned back to the death eaters and screamed, “You filthy bastards! You take away something I love every time don’t you! Friends, family, parents, you don’t care do you!”

In the distance he heard Draco scream in pain and then swear loudly. Harry swore under his breath again.

From the entrance hall streamed several students, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny among them, all aiming curses and whatever else they could think of at the foe. Some students dragged fallen comrades and professors back into the hall and away from further harm, while others dashed recklessly into the fray.

Ron, Hermione, Harry thought as he saw the Gryffindors coming to their aid. Just as he finished a silent prayer for his friends, a high, cold, and all too familiar laugh came from somewhere in the distance, and at the same time from right inside his head.

“See Harry Potter, I told you you would feel my wrath. And now you will die, and your friends with you.”

Harry shook his head. He didn’t think he could block the monster from his mind if his eyes were open, but at the same time he couldn’t afford to close them. He would die if he did, and he would probably die if he didn’t.

“Where oh where can little Harry be, oh where oh where can he be?” Voldemort’s voice taunted him in a sing song voice.

There was a hand on his left arm suddenly and Harry spun to see Snape gripping it weakly. “Force him from your mind… now!”

Harry turned again and aimed a curse at an approaching death eater, and tried to see blinding light without closing his eyes.

“In the castle, where he is safe?” Voldemort asked. “No… not our little hero. In the midst of the fray? Too cowardly for that… off the grounds completely? Not while his friends suffer and die…”

Anger coursed through Harry, and Voldemort said, “But he must be near daddy dearest, because he knows he’s hurt with a curse that will kill him…”

Harry turned to look at Snape again, and again Severus said, “This is a dream Harry. Force him from your mind as if it were a dream! See the light! Do it now!”

“Where, oh where can he be? Best tell me now little boy, and die quickly, or else you will see your friends die.”

Harry gathered up all his will power, and before he released his only defense against Voldemort’s mind, he said both aloud and with his mind, “Maybe he’s right beside you, and it is your time to die.” Harry could see Voldemort spinning around in his mind, sitting atop a tower of the castle like a hawk, watching his battle unfold. Before he could retort, Harry filled his mind with light, eyes open, and blocked the demon from all access.

He looked back at Snape, and in Harry’s eyes Severus could see that the boy had freed himself of the Dark Lord.

“That curse… it will kill you.” Harry said, just to make sure.

Snape nodded, his breathing labored. “This too is old magic. There is no cure that will save me. It will be a worse death than the Killing Curse would give me.”

Harry shook his head, understanding fully the implications of the other man’s words. “No,” he said. “You can’t die. I’m on your side.”

Snape looked deep into the boy’s eyes, and felt heartened by his words.