Harry's POV

After all these years of knowing Fred and George Weasley, I can conclude one thing: they're nothing without the other, like the majority of the twins and siblings in this world. Like me and Lilith.

And the fact that one of them is gone now, I can't imagine what George is going through. Unlike me, he has known his twin since birth, never been separated from each other for more than a couple hours. Lilith and I spent more than ten years apart, finding our ways to each other in fifth year.

They were never far from each other, they even slept in the same room at the Burrow.

And now his other half is gone, just like mine. This time, the pain is too hard to contain and I fall on my knees, my face buried in my hands. I shake my head but the years I sit on falling, my chest contracting in pure agony. The simple thought of living with Lilith is too much to bear and I silently cry as my best friends gather around Fred's body. It feels like I'm not in control of my body anymore, the sobs violently leaving my mouth, the tears burning my cheeks as the travel down my face.

Lilith is really gone. It didn't hit me until now. And Fred is too. They're not coming back. I'll never see Lilith's shiny eyes as she looks up from her book and finds me walking to her; I'll never hear her talking about her favorite songs, I'll never be able to confide in her again, tell her my every secret and every story. I'll never hear her laugh again.

I'll never hear her breathe again.

I snap out of my painful daze as Ron and Hermione grab hold of my arms and pull me away from the danger: curses being thrown around by both Death Eaters and Professors. I look around and find Percy clutching Fred's body tightly against his chest, not wanting to leave his brother behind. But he has too if he wants to survive, this is a war.

"Percy, come on, we've got to move!" I shout.

"Percy!" Ron yells at his brother, tears striking down his face, lifeless eyes staring at his siblings. Ron seizes his breathing brother's shoulder and pulls him up, but Percy doesn't move. "Percy, you can't do anything for him! We're going to-"

Hermione screams and I turn around, finding a monstrous spider trying  to climb though the hole in the wall. One of Aragog's descendants decided to join the fight. Against us. Ron and I shout together, out spells colliding and the monster is blown backwards, only to give space for his little friends to enter the castle.

"It brought friends!" I want the others, glancing over the edge of the hole, as more spiders climb the side of the building. I fire Stunning Spells down upon them, knocking the lead monster into its fellows, as more spells are fired behind me, every spider falling down the building.

"Let's move, NOW!"

Pushing my two friends ahead of him, I help Percy with feeds body, not wanting to leave it behind like a forgotten rag doll. Together, we walk around carefully, avoiding curses flying at us and pushing Fred out of the way.

Taking Fred's body to the other Weasleys and watching their reactions is one of the hardest moments of my life. Forget the Triwizard Tournament, the mission with Dumbledore to retrieve Voldemort's Horcrux, forget the years with the Dursleys. The pain and desolation in their faces when they see their boy, their Fred, lifelessly hanging from Percy's arms mirrors what I'm feeling inside, for losing both Lilith and Fred.

Hermione and I decide to leave them to mourn and have some time with Fred, and as we turn around to leave them alone and walk out of there, Ron surprises us by throwing his arms around us and hugging his body against ours.

"I don't want to stay here. I wanna help you." He says, sniffing and rubbing his red eyes. "I can mourn later, there's a war, and I have to help and you need every single help you can get an-"

"I get it Ron." I smile sadly and ruffle his hair. "Let's go."

I don't know what is going on in my mind but I want to find Snape, at least to let him know about Lilith. He deserves to know, he did everything he could to save her. And I want to find the snake, make her pay for what she did with her venom.

We find a tunnel ahead of us and follow the sound of voices coming from the end of the tunnel, with Hermione trying to pull something from her bag.

"The Cloak!" She whispers. "Put the Cloak on!"

She forces the Cloak into my free hand, the one that's not holding my wand, and I drag it over the three of us, careful not to let our feet be seen from under it. We extinguish our wand lights and continue walking, slightly crouched. As silently as possible, we cross the tunnel and find ourselves in front of two people.

Voldemort and Snape.

Hermione pulls me and Ron against her for better protection, and we press our bodies closer to the wall, but still close enough to the pair.

The room is dimly lit, but I can see Nagini swirling like a serpent underwater, circling Snape and Voldemort. I catch the end of one of Snape's sentence.

"... my Lord, their resistance is crumbling-"

"-and it is doing so without your help." Voldemort says in his high, clear voice. "Skilled wizard though you are, Severus, I do not think you will make much difference now. We are almost there... Almost..."

"Let me find the boy. Let me bring you Potter. I know I can find him, my Lord. Please." Snape walks past Voldemort, keeping his eyes fixed upon Nagini, that is now protected by a spell, making it float next to Voldemort in a tight bubble.

"I have a problem, Severus." Voldemort says softly.

"My Lord?" Asks Snape.

Voldemort raises the Elder Wand, holding it delicately and precisely. "Why doesn't it work for me, Severus?"

In the silence I can hear the snake hissing slightly as it turns beside Voldemort.

"M-my lord?" Snape asks blankly. "I do not understand. You-you have performed extraordinary magic with that wand."

"No." Voldemort interrupts. "I have performed my usual magic. I am extraordinary, but this wand, no. It has not revealed the wonders it has promised. I feel no difference between this wand and the one I procured from Ollivander all those years ago."

Voldemort's tone is musing, calm, but my scar begins to throb and pulse. Pain is building in my forehead, and I can feel that controlled sense of fury building inside Voldemort.

"No difference." Voldemort says again.

Snape does not speak. Just stares at his master in pure disbelief. I wonder if he's scared. I wonder if he's scared; I would be if I were him. Can he sense Voldemort's anger? He starts moving around the room with his beloved snake after him.

That snake that killed my sister.

"I have thought long and hard, Severus... Do you know what I have called you back from battle?" Voldemort speaks in the same measured voice, while pain and fury build up inside me.

And for a moment I see Snape's profile. His eyes are fixed upon the snake in its enchanted cage.

"No, my Lord, but I beg you will let me return. Let me find Potter."

"You sound like Lucius. Neither of you understands Potter as I do. He does not need finding. Potter will come to me. I knew his weakness you see, his one great flaw: Lilith. And I do believe she's dead. I felt it. And I'll do the same to all his friends. He will hate watching the others struck down around him, knowing that it is for him that it happens. He will want to stop it at any cost. He will come."

"But my Lord, he might be killed accidentally by someone other than yourself-"

"My instructions to the Death Eaters have been perfectly clear. Capture Potter. Kill his friends-the more, the better-but do not kill him. But it is of you that I wished to speak, Severus, not Harry Potter. You have been very valuable to me. Very valuable."

"My Lord knows I seek only to serve him. But, let me go and find the boy, my Lord. Let me bring him to you. I know I can-"

"I have told you, no!" Voldemort says, his cocos raising slightly. "My concern at the moment, Severus, is what will happen when I finally meet the boy!"

"My Lord, there can be no question, surely?"

"But there is a question, Severus. There is."
Voldemort stops pacing, and I can see him playing with the Elder Wand, staring at Snape.

"Why did both the wands I have used fail when directed at Harry Potter?"

"I-I cannot answer that, my Lord."

"Can't you?"

I feel a stab of rage right through my forehead. I force my own fist into my mouth to stop myself from crying out in pain. I close my eyes, and suddenly I am Voldemort, looking into Snape's pale face.

"My wand of yew did everything of which I asked it, Severus, except to kill Harry Potter. Twice it failed. Ollivander told me under torture of the twin cores, told me to take another's wand. I did so, but Lucius's wand shattered upon meeting Potter's."

"I-I have no explanation, my Lord."

Snape is not looking at Voldemort now, his dark eyes fixated on the coiling serpent in its protective bubble.

"I sought a third wand, Severus. the Elder Wand, the Wand of Destiny, the Deathstick. I took it from its previous master. I took it from the grave of Albus Dumbledore."

And now Snape looks at Voldemort, and Snape's face is like a death mask,  marble white and so still that when he decides to speak, no emotion runs though his blank eyes.

"My Lord, let me go to the boy-"

"All this long night when I am on the brink of victory, I have sat here..." Voldemort whispers. "Wondering, why the Elder Wand refuses to be what it ought to be, refuses to perform as legend says it must perform for its rightful owner... And I think I have the answer."

Snape says nothing.

"Perhaps you already know it? You are a clever man, after all, Severus. You have been a good and faithful servant, and I regret what must happen."

"My Lord..."

"The Elder Wand cannot serve me properly, Severus, because I am not its true master. The Elder Wand belongs to the wizard who killed its last owner. You killed Albus Dumbledore. While you live, Severus, the Elder Wand cannot truly be mine."

"My Lord!" Snape protests, raising his wand.

"It cannot be any other way." Voldemort says. "I must master the wand, Severus. Master the wand, and I master Potter at last."

And Voldemort swipes the air with the Elder Wand. It does nothing to Snape, who for a split second seems to think he his going to be free: but then Voldemort's intention become clear. The snake's cage is rolling through the air, and before Snape can do anything more than yell, it surrounds his head and shoulders, and Voldemort speaks in Parseltongue.

"Kill."

There is a terrible scream. I see Snape's face losing the little color it had left, his black eyes widen as the snake's fangs pierce his neck, and his knees fail him, resulting in him falling to the floor.

"I regret it." Voldemort says coldly.

He turns away from the scene as if extremely disgusted; there is no sadness in him, no remorse. A wand, a stupid wand, is more important to I'm than a life. But seeing his actions over the years, it is evident he cares about nothing but power.

Power.

He points the wand at the cage holding the snake, which drifts upward, off Snape, who falls sideways onto the floor, blood gushing from the wounds in his neck.

Voldemort leaves the room like hell is on his heels, without a backward glance, and the great serpent floats after him.

Back in the tunnel, the three of us stare at the sight in pure horror. The teacher we've known since the beginning of our journey...

"Harry!" Hermione breathes behind me, but my feet are already carrying me toward the fallen man.

Or should I say, the fallen hero. The fallen warrior.

As quietly as I can, I pull myself into the room, searching for enemies. When I find none, I walk to him. Snape's white face, his fingers trying to stop the flowing blood from leaving his already tired body. I take off the invisibility cloak and look down upon the man I've hated my whole life, whose widening black eyes find mine as he struggles to speak. I bend over him, and Snape seizes the front of my robes and pulls me close.

A terrible rasping, gurgling noise comes from Snape's throat. "Take... It.... Take... It.... "

Something more than blood is leaking from Snape. Silvery blue, neither gas nor liquid, coming from his eye. A tear. And I know exactly what to do with it. I look back at Hermione, that decided to join us, and she hands me a flask, conjured from thin air.

I lift the silvery substance into it and find Snape staring at me. He tells me something I'll never forget.

"Look... At... Me..." He whispers. "Tell... Lilith... She is... The best... Goddaughter... Ever..."

Something in the depths of his dark eyes seems to vanish, leaving them fixed, blank, and empty. The hand holding my clothes falls to the floor, and Snape stops moving.

Third dead body today...