"Stop him!" Scrimgeour shouted, raising his wand toward the dragon. His face was hard with urgency, and his voice carried over the shattered street. "That Dark wizard is casting something else. We have to stop him now."
The Aurors of the Ministry reacted at once. Wands rose across the ruined stretch of Diagon Alley, all aimed at the dragon hovering above Gringotts and the black-robed figure suspended near its bleeding back.
"Attack!" Scrimgeour roared.
He fired the first spell. Dozens of Aurors followed him a heartbeat later, sending a storm of curses, jinxes, and attack spells streaking toward the dragon in midair. No single spell might have threatened a wizard like Dumbledore or Voldemort, but dozens of trained Aurors casting together carried a force no powerful wizard could ignore lightly.
Yet what happened next made every watching wizard freeze.
The spells struck the strange energy binding the dragon, and instead of tearing through it, they sank in. Light twisted, warped, and disappeared as if the barrier were feeding on the magic.
"What?" one Auror gasped. His wand trembled in his hand as the last of the spell light vanished. "How is that possible?"
Even Dumbledore frowned slightly. There were too many mysteries in magic for any one wizard to understand them all, even after more than a century of study. Whatever Tyler had prepared, it was not a common curse or ritual.
"Thank you for your help," Tyler said from above.
His body floated in the air, robes whipping around him in the wind. The massive dragon beneath him had completely transformed into a crimson, dying creature, its pale scales soaked through and its breath weakening by the second.
"Now," Tyler said, his voice hoarse and cold, "enjoy the gift I prepared for you."
Boom!
The dragon erupted in a burst of red mist and violent magical energy. The force scattered outward, but before it could dissipate, Tyler drew it all in with the ritual he had been chanting.
Then fire ignited.
It was not ordinary flame. Fiendfyre burst into existence with a terrible roar, black and orange and gold, burning so fiercely that every wizard nearby instinctively stumbled back. The heat rolled down the street in waves, and the air itself seemed to twist beneath it.
"Oh, Merlin's beard," an Auror whispered, his face pale. "That's Fiendfyre."
Every trained wizard understood the horror of that name. Fiendfyre was cursed fire, living fire, a monstrous Dark magic that could devour nearly anything if allowed to grow unchecked. It did not merely burn; it hunted, multiplied, and consumed.
The first Dark Lord, Gellert Grindelwald, had once nearly destroyed Paris with flames like this. Even now, decades later, older wizards still spoke of that night in lowered voices.
The enormous Fiendfyre seemed to burn half the sky above Diagon Alley. It writhed in the air, changing shape again and again, until at last it formed a monstrous Hydra.
The creature had nine serpent heads and a body like a great hound made of flame. Each head snapped and twisted, jaws dripping sparks, while its burning eyes looked down on the wizards below as if deciding which of them to devour first.
Cornelius Fudge looked as though his bones had turned to jelly. His face had lost all color, his knees trembled, and if Dumbledore had not stood nearby, he might have fallen to the cobblestones outright.
He was not the only one terrified. Several younger Aurors stared at the Fiendfyre Hydra with open fear, their training suddenly looking very thin against a monster of living Dark fire.
They had not fought in the war. They were flowers raised in a greenhouse, trained for danger but never truly baptized in it. Faced with a nightmare powerful enough to destroy the entire alley, more than one of them forgot how to breathe.
Somewhere among the shadows of Diagon Alley, Professor Quirrell remained hidden, watching everything unfold from a safe distance. His own courage would never have kept him there, but the thing clinging to the back of his head had given an order, and he did not dare disobey.
Voldemort was curious. He wanted to know who this Dark wizard was, who possessed such power, such ruthlessness, and such willingness to challenge both Gringotts and Dumbledore in broad daylight.
Even Voldemort himself had never robbed Gringotts like this. He had never unleashed Fiendfyre over Diagon Alley simply to burn the entire place down.
"Quirrell," Voldemort hissed inside his servant's mind. "Find the Philosopher's Stone quickly. I must recover as soon as possible."
His voice was filled with impatience and dark excitement. "Once I have regained my strength, I will meet this Dark wizard myself."
Perhaps they could form an alliance. Perhaps this stranger could be used against Dumbledore, or perhaps he would need to be crushed before becoming a rival. Either way, Voldemort wanted answers.
"But Master," Quirrell trembled inwardly, "the Philosopher's Stone is in Dumbledore's hands. I don't know where he hid it. It may be in Gringotts, or it may already be at Hogwarts."
He swallowed hard, though the action did nothing to ease the terror inside him. "Gringotts cannot be searched now, and Hogwarts will have to wait until term begins."
"What a useless servant," Voldemort snapped. "How did I find someone as incompetent as you?"
"S-sorry, Master," Quirrell whispered inside his own mind. He felt close to tears. More than once, he had regretted seeking Voldemort out in the hope of becoming stronger.
"Forget it," Voldemort said coldly after a moment. "I have waited for years. I can wait a little longer."
The red eyes in his hidden face seemed to gleam with cruel calculation. "Now that this Dark wizard has drawn most of Dumbledore's attention, it will only make it easier for us to search for the Stone."
"But Quirrell," Voldemort warned, his voice dropping into a hiss, "it must be soon. My strength cannot sustain me for much longer. If we do not find the Philosopher's Stone quickly, I will be reduced to a wandering remnant once again."
"Yes, Master," Quirrell said fearfully. "I will do my best."
High above Gringotts, Tyler laughed sharply as the Fiendfyre Hydra spread its nine burning heads over the street.
"Wait here and be burned to ashes," he called down. "There is no reason for this rotten magical world to continue existing."
Dumbledore's gaze hardened, and he stepped forward, but he could not pursue Tyler. The Fiendfyre Hydra was already turning toward Diagon Alley, and if he chased the fleeing Dark wizard now, the cursed fire would devour everything behind him.
Tyler gave one final cold laugh. Then his figure twisted and vanished, leaving the fire, the ruins, and the terror behind.
"Ah… Albus," Fudge stammered, his voice thin and desperate. "What do we do now?"
He looked as if he might cry. Cornelius Fudge had only recently become Minister for Magic, and already the world had collapsed into disaster around him. He had thought that after Voldemort's fall, the wizarding world would enjoy peace, and his time in office would be comfortable.
Instead, a terrifying Dark wizard had appeared from nowhere. First the Leaky Cauldron was attacked, then Gringotts was robbed, then an Obscurus had ravaged Diagon Alley, and now Fiendfyre in the shape of a Hydra threatened to burn the whole place to the ground.
Attacking the Leaky Cauldron had been awful, but Fudge could have survived it politically. Robbing Gringotts was worse, but as long as his own vault was untouched, he might still have found a way to shift the blame.
But this was different. The Dark wizard had released two catastrophic forces in a single day and seemed perfectly willing to destroy all of Diagon Alley without hesitation. That was not merely criminal; it was madness.
Fudge's thoughts spun wildly. If being Minister for Magic meant facing monsters like this, perhaps someone else could have the title, the office, and the headaches that came with it.
"Oh, Cornelius," Dumbledore said, his eyes fixed on the burning Hydra before them. "It is not that bad yet. There is still a way."
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