The Intelligent Potter

*** June 1994, Hogwarts

The Dark Lord Voldemort stood at the gates of Hogwarts. Despite his long opposition to Dumbledore, he had not stepped into the castle since all those years ago when he had come for a job interview.

Despite all of the decades it had been, the Dark Lord still habitually expected the gates of the old castle to soundlessly swing open in front of him, as they had so many times while he had been a student.

Instead, his presence garnered the exact opposite reaction. Intricate bolts began to swing, reinforcing the gate. The gaps between bars were covered by sliding plates.

The gates were now flush with the wall, merely a slab of metal, sandwiched between the walls made out of stone.

Voldemort took a few last relaxed breaths. He knew that the full power of The Darkness would be required to penetrate the castle.

He spread his arms wide, and Darkness seeped out of his sleeves, out of his collar, out of the hem of his robes. It continued coming and coming and coming, until he, and the army of Death Eaters behind him, were covered in Darkness.

Voldemort moved his arms like he was the conductor of an orc.h.e.s.tra, and The Darkness shaped itself into tendrils which shot at the school, meeting a blue dome, which came into visibility as it was attacked.

The tendrils moved to try and grasp the bubble, as if they were the fingers of god, a very evil and shit-your-pants scary god.

Upon getting a grip of the bubble, Voldemort squeezed his fist, and The Darkness, and its tendrils, followed suit. They squeezed the blue bubble tightly, and thin cracks began to appear all over the bubble, even as the stress began to take its toll on the Dark Lord, who fell to one knee. The Darkness which supported and animated his body leaving it to try and put further pressure onto the bubble.

With a roar, Voldemort renewed his effort.

The entire castle shook on its foundations.

Even as Harry Potter reaffirmed his June-theory to Hermione Granger, Albus Dumbledore was formulating his plan of action up in his own office.

He was feeding the blue dome with his own magic now, which was the only thing preventing the imminent shattering of the protections upon the castle. Suddenly, he felt the pressure of feeding the wards on his magical core reduce a little bit, and he knew that Iliad was taking his role as the Head of Security of the school of witchcraft and wizardry seriously.

Nicolas Flamel had supplied Iliad with several objects to store magical energy, some of them already filled from Flamel's own resources, while others were empty, and Iliad spent his own magic everyday to fill more and more of the magic stores.

Now, he was putting them to good use, as he connected them to the wards of Hogwarts, which was draining them at an extremely high rate.

There were still seventeen peacekeepers who had yet to be reassigned from Britain, as Babajide had slowed down the bureaucracy in the process of reassigning some of the troops, leaving them to work with the resistance in Britain.

All of them got the alert from Iliad's security system, and apparated right behind the forces of Voldemort, taking on the far larger numbers of the Death Eaters which the Dark Lord had brought along with him.

The element of surprise was very useful, as over a dozen Death Eaters were taken out before they were even able to respond to the assault upon their faction, and managed to retaliate.

Unfortunately, once they did retaliate, their superior numbers got the clear advantage over the peacekeepers.

The good news for the peacekeepers was that the Dark Lord was still far too occupied in his efforts with the wards of Hogwarts to be able to help his forces at all, otherwise, it would already have been a massacre.

The bad news was that there was a high chance it would turn out to be somewhat of a massacre anyway, as their numbers were reduced to just seven within ten minutes of combat. The Death Eaters were not afraid to cut them down ruthlessly.

The dome cracked further, but like shatter-proof windows on muggle cars, it did not shatter. At this point, it was practically just fragments of ward-energy pressed so tightly together that it held up shape.

With another roar, Voldemort squeezed tighter, if that was even possible. The wards of Hogwarts began to wail as if they were alive.

The blue dome disappeared.

Voldemort smiled triumphantly, before he finally noticed the scuffle taking place between his men and the peacekeepers. Seeing the Dark Lord was finally free to participate in the battle, the seven remaining peacekeepers cut their losses and apparated out of the location, back to Black Manor in order to regroup along with the rest of The Resistance.

The blue dome finally out of the way, Voldemort simply walked up to the front gate of Hogwarts, still in the form of a slab of metal, and thereby still refusing Voldemort entry to the castle.

Voldemort touched a finger to the cold metal, only to be blown back several metres, coming to a stop as he was caught by several tendrils of Darkness, which came out of his own sleeve to protect him.

He grunted. It seemed like there were still defences on the old castle, something that he had not anticipated, especially after the strength of the initial wards, which he had just about managed to take down.

The gate-turned-slab morphed once again. Only, it didn't change form, remaining a slab, the only difference was that there were now words, written in massive font, upon the gate.

Voldemort peered to read the words written upon the gate

Draco Dormiens Nunquam Titillandus

The Hogwarts motto which he knew only all too well.

Never Tickle a Sleeping Dragon.

With a cold dread building in his stomach, Voldemort looked up to see one of the most terrifying sights he had ever laid his eyes upon.

A massive dragon, the likes, or size, of which he had never seen before hovered over the castle protectively, made entirely out of the translucent blue energy which the dome had been made out of.

With an ear-shattering roar, the Dragon of Hogwarts made itself known.

*** End of Chapter