Title: Grasping the Nettle
Category: Books - Harry Potter
Challenge(s): Shower challenge!
Prompt(s): Write 500+ words!
Length: WIP Chapter One – 1,249 Words!
Rating: M
Pairing or Characters: Harry Potter, Lykour Velvenoff, mentions of Remus Lupin.
Thanks: To my amazing betas who always remind me to paint a picture with my words, not just tell a story. Thank you girls! Thank you to LJ as well for reading the first version of this story before it was changes and beta read again.
Disclaimer: Though it pains me to say so, I do not own the rights to anything that belongs to the Harry Potter universe, nor do I make any money from writing about them. The only thing(s) that I can claim as mine own are the ideas and/or characters that may be woven into the wonderful world of all that is Harry Potter. Everything else is used in the spirit of good natured fun or naughty shenanigans. What can I say? I just like to play!
Author's Notes: Hey guys, I just wanted to write and let you know that this story is based mostly off of head-canon. In my mind Tonks and Remus survived but they aren't together anymore and they share custody of their son. Sirius never died and he is still very much a part of Harry's life.
Written For: My good friend Jess! Because she is such an amazing person I wanted to do something special. Well...a oneshot turned into a WIP!
Chapter One
Long teeth gnashed at the arm Harry brought up to fend off the attack. A terror-filled scream wrenched from his throat when he felt the fangs tear through his skin pulling his arm around like a ragdoll with ease. The sound of his skin being ripped was sickening him even more than the pain itself. Long tufts of fur were pressed against him from where the beast stood above him, pinning Harry to the dirt-covered floor of the rickety old shack. His wand. He needed his wand! Biting back another scream, Harry forced his disorientated mind to try and remember where his wand was. Didn't he have it out when he came through the door of the shack? Yes, but he couldn't feel it in his wand hand now. Had he dropped it? Harry couldn't remember. In a desperate attempt to find his wand, Harry flung his free arm out and began frantically feeling around for it.
The intense pain from his battered arm pulled his attention back to the large wolf that was mangling his arm. A deep rumbling growl vibrated from its mouth, making Harry scream again. If he didn't get away soon, the damned wolf was going to rip his arm off! His desperation intensified as he searched for his wand but found nothing, making his heart pound in a frantic rhythm within his chest. He had no magic to help him. The only thing left to do was fight against the beast physically and hope that he could get the thing off of him enough to get any kind of help.
Blood poured from the wound, mixed with slick strings of saliva. The sticky rivulets looked black in the pitch-black room. The only light was that of the moon peeking through a shattered window beside the door, with the pale glow eerily lighting up the horror of it all. All of the blood made Harry's arm so slippery that with a mighty tug Harry managed to dislodge his gnawed arm from the grasp of the wolf's fearsome set of teeth. For one brief moment, Harry thought that he was finally free, but the wolf had other ideas as it opened its powerful jaws again at his hand, unwilling to let his prey escape so easily. Another scream burst from Harry's mouth in reaction to the pressure of the bite breaking something in his hand.
The only thing Harry could think to do was punch desperately at the beast's huge face. He hit it with a clenched fist over and over again for what felt like forever, yet it didn't seem to affect it at all. Finally Harry placed his hand along the creature's face and felt for one of its eyes. Using his thumb, Harry pressed with all of his strength into the eye, trying to gouge its eyeball out of the socket. The wolf released Harry's hand abruptly and gave a great yelp of pain. It pawed at the damaged eye as if trying to rub away the agonizing ache Harry had caused.
Harry didn't hesitate. Pulling himself backward with his good arm, he searched for his missing wand and found it beside the door, where he had dropped it following his entrance. The wolf had tackled him, and his wand had gone flying out of his hand as he crashed to the floor. Harry grabbed the wand and was pointing it toward the wolf, but he knew he wasn't quick enough as the wolf had launched itself toward Harry already. Before he could say "Stupefy", the wolf threw itself into Harry and barrelled out the door using the momentum. The raven-haired Auror rocketed backward, slamming his head onto the solid ground just outside the doorway.
Harry's vision swam. No matter how hard he tried, he just couldn't focus on anything. Blackness ate at the edge of his vision until he found himself falling through the darkness of unconsciousness. He didn't know how long he had been unconscious, but when Harry came to, it was still dark out. The moon was cloaked in a blanket of silver-lined onyx clouds, and fat drops of rain had begun to spatter against his face where he lay, halfway outside of the rundown shanty. For a moment Harry couldn't remember where he was, nor could he remember how he ended up on the ground, unconscious in the middle of the night. Trying to get a grasp of where he was, Harry made as if to sit up, but pain lanced through the entire left side of his upper body.
Looking over to his left side and seeing his ravaged arm in horror, memories started flooding back. He had been looking for Lykour Velvenoff, a powerful dark wizard who just so happened to turn furry once a month. Harry had received an anonymous owl just before leaving work for the evening, claiming that Velvenoff had holed up in an abandoned hut in Yorkshire. Velvenoff had evaded all of the Aurors who had come after him. Even Harry had been outsmarted by the mongrel on two other occasions. If someone thought Lykour was in Yorkshire, Harry needed to look into it. It was necessary for the werewolf to be stopped before he hurt or murdered another person, and though he was exhausted from all of the overtime he'd been forcing himself into, Harry decided to look into it. However, with Velvenoff waiting in ambush for his arrival, Harry had not way to prepare for the impending violence.
A hiss of discomfort escaped from between Harry's clenched teeth as he searched yet again for his dropped wand. It lay just beside him in a cluster of damp, trampled grass. He held the wand awkwardly in his mangled hand as he pushed himself to his feet with the other. There was a crazed werewolf running around somewhere, but Harry couldn't muster the strength to go after it. Not now. His feet felt heavier than they should have, and he could barely keep himself upright. On top of it all, he had an arm that was completely useless. He needed help. Quickly.
Harry was about to apparate to Number 12 Grimmauld Place when a stray thought made him pause and he thought better of it. He had been attacked by a werewolf and had survived. That could only mean one thing- Harry was going to be a werewolf come the next full moon, which was only a few days away. A werewolf could shift any time around the full moon, though he wasn't sure if that applied to freshly made werewolves, but he knew that he was too dangerous to be around. There was only one person who could truly help him now. Remus Lupin.
Harry staggered a few steps as he twisted on the spot to apparate. A strange feeling washed over him, one he wasn't used to feeling when he travelled by apparation. There was the feeling of nausea which he always felt . . . but deep down there was something else as well. He was lightheaded. Harry didn't know that blood was still seeping from his arm, nor did he know that the poison of lycanthropy was pumping through his veins, making his body use what little strength it had left to try and fend off the disease. Spots danced through his vision, causing his stomach to give a threatening lurch. And then, just before he thudded onto the ground outside of Remus' house, Harry lost consciousness once more.
A/N: I really appreciate all of the people who take the time to read and review. I respect positive comments and constructive criticism. Both help to make me a better author which in turn makes my writing style improve for the better. On top of that I truly enjoy responding to all of your reviews. Also, thanks to those of you who have favorited and/or followed this story. That means so much!:) So, thank you all so much!. You're all wee gems!