Harry Potter and the Path of Ruin

Disclaimer: None of the characters are mine. If I do toss an OC in here, I'll let you know. But until further notice, all characters are property of JK Rowling. I'm not making any money at this – non profit. Just posting this for my own amusement – and because Anne Rice won't let me write stories about Louie and Lestat.

Author's Note: I keep starting fics and not finishing them. I always know what feel I'm going for, but I never seem to be able to take them right to the end. Hopefully this one will be different. I have a plan for it. I'm rather proud of myself for that. I also have some aspects from my other fic, "The Path of Slytherin" that I'm going to be incorporating here. So, if you used to be a fan of that one, that was me. I'm the author. I'm not stealing from anyone except myself.

I'm going to stop talking now, hope you all enjoy.

Introduction

Blood. It was always about blood. Pure blood, half blood, mud blood. Blood of the enemy, forcefully taken. His life revolved around blood. He'd always guarded his blood – terrified for what someone could accomplish with just a few drops of it. He'd watched as people transformed their entire bodies with just a single hair. A drop of blood?

He had witnessed as blood destroyed the most malicious and powerful wards. He'd watched as his own blood resurrected an abomination from beyond the grave. He knew his blood was powerful. Of that there was no doubt. But it was his, and he'd be damned if anyone would take it from him.

He was laying in a pool of it right now. The warm red liquid chilling him as the stiff evening breeze brushed past him, undiscriminating between the weakening man and the stone pavement below. It was cold, but he couldn't shiver. Not anymore. If he started, that was all he would be doing. A trail of warm, cold, and pain flowed from the gaping hole in his neck, blood flowing steadily from it to pool around his limp form.

It was also flowing from the mouth of the man laying in front of him. His blood, was spewing from that other man. He was rolling on his back, claw like nails tearing at his own throat. More blood poured from the mouth like some morbid fountain, pieces of Harry's flesh running from the orifice to the growing pool on the ground. This man flailed, clawing and ripping at his own flesh as if trying to speed up this agonizing process.

"Bastard." Harry coughed weakly, using his undamaged arm to slump himself closer to the dying man. "Filthy son of a bitch." Cussing at this man gave him strength somehow. Hearing his own rage vocalized fueled the adrenaline coursing through his system and into the puddle that surrounded him.

There was nothing more that Harry wanted in this instance than to watch the other man die. That, and to pour his frigid, flowing blood back into his own body where it belonged. Damn him, this blood was his.

The world was spinning around him now, blood spiraling and flowing everywhere. It enveloped him, washed around him and flooded his senses. He was growing weak, so tired – he gave up trying to make sense of the situation he found himself in. He couldn't piece together what was happening within his mind. The pain was gone now, only an aching numbness that consumed him, his fingers, his toes, he couldn't feel them. He couldn't feel anything, he just knew somehow that they were still there.

In this spinning haze, Harry slumped himself forward. The other man was no longer clawing at his neck, one hand still managing some pitiful scratching, the other hand forgotten in the pool of death that surrounded them. He didn't protest when Harry shoved his hand aside, too weak to fight back even if that had been his intention. Harry pressed his lips against this man's flesh, the self inflicted gashes gaping like dumb mouths with ruby lips*, begging him to ease their pain.

Harry complied with this silent request, not noticing as this other man's eyes rolled back in his head or as his chest no longer rose and fell with strangled cries of pain. He didn't notice as life escaped this man for the second time, nor did he give a damn. No, Harry didn't care that his failure of a sire was dead on the ground beneath him. "Just drink, drink. Just drink..." was the mantra thrumming through Harry's mind. "Just drink, drink as much as you can before it goes black..."

*Inspired by Shakespeare's Julius Caesar – Act III, i