I know, Harry told the music, I know I mustn’t . . . but no sooner had he thought it, than the thing became much harder to do. His wand began to vibrate more powerfully than ever . . . and now the beam between him and Voldemort changed too . . . it was as though large beads of light were sliding up and down the thread connecting the wands—Harry felt his wand give a shudder under his hand as the light beads began to slide slowly and steadily his way . . . The direction of the beam’s movement was now toward him, from Voldemort, and he felt his wand shudder angrily . . .

As the closest bead of light moved nearer to Harry’s wand tip, the wood beneath his fingers grew so hot he feared it would burst into flame. The closer that bead moved, the harder Harry’s wand vibrated; he was sure his wand would not survive contact with it; it felt as though it was about to shatter under his fingers—

He concentrated every last particle of his mind upon forcing the bead back toward Voldemort, his ears full of phoenix song, his eyes furious, fixed . . . and slowly, very slowly, the beads quivered to a halt, and then, just as slowly, they began to move the other way . . . and it was Voldemort’s wand that was vibrating extra-hard now . . . Voldemort who looked astonished, and almost fearful . . .

One of the beads of light was quivering, inches from the tip of Voldemort’s wand. Harry didn’t understand why he was doing it, didn’t know what it might achieve . . . but he now concentrated as he had never done in his life on forcing that bead of light right back into Voldemort’s wand . . . and slowly . . . very slowly . . . it moved along the golden thread . . . it trembled for a moment . . . and then it connected . . .

At once, Voldemort’s wand began to emit echoing screams of pain . . . then—Voldemort’s red eyes widened with shock—a dense, smoky hand flew out of the tip of it and vanished . . . the ghost of the hand he had made Wormtail . . . more shouts of pain . . . and then something much larger began to blossom from Voldemort’s wand tip, a great, grayish something, that looked as though it were made of the solidest, densest smoke . . . It was a head . . . now a chest and arms . . . the torso of Cedric Diggory.

If ever Harry might have released his wand from shock, it would have been then, but instinct kept him clutching his wand tightly, so that the thread of golden light remained unbroken, even though the thick gray ghost of Cedric Diggory (was it a ghost? it looked so solid) emerged in its entirety from the end of Voldemort’s wand, as though it were squeezing itself out of a very narrow tunnel . . . and this shade of Cedric stood up, and looked up and down the golden thread of light, and spoke.

“Hold on, Harry,” it said.