Sorry for the late chapter. I had meant to post on Saturday, but I was really struggling with the latest chapter (114).
(Word Count: 1,627)
Huge chunks of the black rock of the prison were thrown into the air, and came crashing down into the raging sea below. Harry could barely see anything due to the heavy storm and rain, but he could make out dementors and prisoners on brooms pouring out of the broken section of the prison.
As the spray and debris settled, he could see that the prison still stood, but one of the sides of the triangular prison was gone. Just like how it was shown in the movies.
The dementors swarmed around the prison, but they weren't doing anything to stop the prisoners.
Harry's mind reeled. How was this possible? When was this? This should only be possible with the backing of Voldemort himself. But he had planned on killing him before he could amass his power. This didn't make any sense. Would he fail somehow?
Harry could only watch as Bellatrix Lestrange, the Lestrange brothers, Peter Pettigrew, and many other death eaters escaped on brooms. The dementors were scattering in all directions.
Before he could see too much more, the vision slowly faded back to white, and both Harry and Trelawney gasped as they woke from their trance.
"Merlin help us!" Trelawney muttered in shock.
"What is it, what did you see?" Cassandra asked urgently.
"A mass break out from Azkaban prison," Harry answered, a deep frown on his face as he analyzed everything he had seen. "The prisoners had their wands. Somehow, someone must have infiltrated the prison, got their wands, and gave them back to the prisoners. The dementors seemed to be on their side, which was only known to happen when Voldemort was at his peak in power."
"I don't know exactly who this Voldemort is, but from what you've said before, it seems like this is the start of your enemy's return. Did you get a sense for when this would happen?" Cassandra asked.
"No," Harry said. He looked to Trelawney, who was still a bit dazed from what she had seen. "Professor. Did you get any sense of timing from the vision?"
Trelawney snapped out of it, and shook her head. "No, I didn't."
Harry thought about it. Fate seemed to want to nudge things towards canon where she could. Could this be her attempt at making his third year close to canon? Sirius was proven innocent and Pettigrew was captured, so instead of one innocent godfather breaking out, it was a whole prison of death eaters? That wasn't very proportional, Fate!
Harry sighed, combing a hand through his hair. "I think I may know when this will happen. Though, it seems like this is happening two years too early."
"You've seen this before?" Cassandra asked.
"Yes… Though this was meant to happen in my fifth year, but I have a feeling this is going to be much sooner. I'm not sure though. I'm guessing this because of my experience with Fate. Although I have permission to change things as I wish, she likes to push things back towards her favored path—something I call the canonical timeline—as much as she can. During this time, my godfather, Sirius Black, was meant to still be in Azkaban. Before my third year, he escapes in order to catch the real murderer and traitor, Peter Pettigrew. I believe that, because this can no longer happen, Fate is moving the breakout in my fifth year forward to occur in my third year so it can play out in a similar way," Harry explained.
Both Trelawney and Cassandra frowned thoughtfully.
"I don't have any experience in changing visions, Harry, so I will have to defer to your judgement on this. Though your logic is sound," Cassandra said.
"Perhaps we can divine more answers? We can verify if it will happen in your third year or if this was for your fifth year?" Trelawney suggested.
"It would be good to know for sure," Harry agreed.
There wasn't any need for some big ritual to confirm something, so they just used some tarot cards. For confirming a timeline for a specific event, they used the minor arcana. In this sense, the number of the suit drawn gave the time, where Swords represented Days, Cups represented Weeks, Wands represented Months, and Pentacles represented Years.
Both seers knew the process, so there was no discussion. Trelawney summoned her deck of the minor arcana with a flick of her wand, and a well-worn deck flew over to her. Wordlessly, though nervously, she shuffled her deck and shakily held it out for Harry to draw from.
He took a deep breath to center himself, thinking only of the vision he just saw, and drew an upside down 10 of Wands. The card showed a man in the field struggling to carry a bundle of ten wands. Though the term "wands" was a bit off. They were long staves, nearly as tall as the man himself, and they had small green sprouts coming out of one of the ends.
Ten months. That would be towards the month of August. Harry scoffed, that would be when he would be busy with next year's dueling competition, where it would be held in Bulgaria. 'What perfect timing, Fate.'
The 10 of Wands also represented burdens. Drawing it upright would have meant he was carrying a heavy load, faced burnout, or needed to push hard to finish a project. The fact that he had drawn it upside down meant he should let go of this unwanted burden and, possibly, to delegate this task to others. Considering the timing, that would likely be what he would have to do.
He set the card down in front of him, so the others could see.
"A reversed 10 of wands," Trelawney muttered. "10 months then. It would seem your intuition was correct, it will occur before your third year, just as you said. And reversed… Yes, that makes sense. A mass breakout should not be handled by one wizard alone, nevermind a student such as yourself, Harry. No matter how talented you are. You should not feel burdened by this. We should tell Dumbledore of what we have seen here, and he can work with the minister to stop this. Let the entire Auror force deal with this."
"I would have gone to Dumbledore with this anyway. A breakout is too big to try to keep it hidden," Harry said. 'But the minister… Fudge is too incompetent. Would he try to downplay it, or deny it will happen?' He may just hinder the entire thing. Still, he couldn't exactly get extra security for Azkaban without his help. "Let's just hope the minister takes this seriously."
Harry stood up and stretched. "We can tell Dumbledore about this tomorrow morning. For now, I'm exhausted. Today has been… Long."
"No wonder, it has gotten quite late. You should get some rest. Don't worry about helping clean this up, I can handle it myself before classes tomorrow," Trelawney said, looking at the clock. It was now nearly 2 AM.
Harry nodded, "Good night then, Professor."
"Good night, Harry. Thank you again for finding Cassandra's painting," Professor Trelawney said.
Harry made his way down the divination tower and back to his dorm room. Luckily, at this hour, not even the prefects were out. The castle was completely dark and empty. Unfortunately for the portraits trying to sleep, not even Harry's crow vision could see in the dark, so he had to light his way with a lumos orb.
"Put that light out!" One of the portraits grumbled.
Harry just ignored him and kept walking. He would be out of sight soon anyway.
A few minutes later, Harry entered the Gryffindor common room. Since he had a professor's permission to stay out so late, the Fat Lady had waited for him and he wasn't locked out.
In the common room, he saw a mess of curly hair peeking out above the armrest of a couch. Hermione was sleeping against the armrest, with a book that had tumbled to the ground.
Neville was there as well, sleeping on the other loveseat, hands folded over his stomach and sunk deep into the seat.
Harry smiled softly and picked up the book she had dropped, gently fixing the bent pages, and closed it. He gently brushed the hair away from her face and chuckled to himself. She was still in her school robes, her mouth was wide open, and she was snoring softly. Not very picturesque, but he still found it adorable.
"Mione, wake up," he said softly, shaking her shoulder.
She woke up slowly, blinking at him in confusion before her brain finally registered him. "Harry!" She hugged him.
"What are you and Neville doing sleeping in the common room?" Harry asked.
"After everything that happened, I couldn't fall asleep knowing you were still out there, so I wanted to wait for you to come back. I guess Neville had the same thought," Hermione explained.
Harry handed her book back. "I'm back now, Hermione, go get some proper rest in your bed. We can talk more in the morning."
"Okay," Hermione yawned. "Good night, Harry."
"Good night, Hermione."
Hermione went up to her room, leaving Harry and Neville in the common room.
Harry went over to Neville and lightly kicked his feet.
Neville startled awake, bringing upright. "Watda!" He said sleepily.
"Come on, Neville, I'm back, so let's go to sleep," Harry said.
"Oh, Harry! It's you," Neville said, still not fully awake.
Harry dragged Neville along behind him to their dorm room. Harry made sure Neville got into his bed, though he ended up just flopping down over the covers, before getting into his own. As soon as he closed his eyes, Harry was out like a light.