Upsweep
Even as he was struck by the curse that killed him, he felt triumph in his defeat.
Oh, he had feared death, almost as much as his master, the Dark Lord. But he had found the Dark Lord's secret of immortality. And where his master failed, he knew he would not.
It had been difficult, crafting a horcrux, just a single one. He learned that from his master's actions. Only one to keep him as handsome as he had ever been instead of the freak he could become.
But he was smart. He placed several Notice-Me-Not charms on his horcrux, the strongest he could make. Then he hid it, not in a significant place in his life, but in a place that no one, muggle or wizard, would ever be able to reach it, much less find it.
After his death, his spirit drifted at his command. But yet... he noticed something...
One direction was much easier to drift towards. Oh, the other directions would work, but they were much harder to travel towards. No matter, any direction was as good as another, and by going in the easy direction, it would leave him with much more power when his body was recreated. Simply drift for a while.
Soon he noticed where he was going - towards the ocean. Wait. He didn't want to go there. If he got lost on the water, he would have no way to have his soul put into another body. He tried drifting back towards land. The resistance to go towards land was much, much harder than before. After he exhausted himself, he stopped.
Or tried to.
He found himself pulled towards the water and not only towards the water, but into it. Deeper and deeper, going faster and faster. After a while, his attempts to get further away from where he was headed were overridden by the power and speed of his descent.
He heard a noise. It started as a whisper, but turned into a scratching sound. The further down he went, the louder it got until he heard it for what it was.
Screaming. Screaming from the depths.
He saw he was moving towards a large glowing area, the screaming becoming unbearably loud. Unhindered by physical eyes, he saw his destination - a silver snake head, jaws opened, poised to strike.
He screamed.
What he never noticed even in the centuries after he arrived there, was that it lay directly on top of a metal sign, untouched by the ages, the words "Wool's Orphanage" embossed on it. Even the screams of the sign or the other screams from the other object around him gave no indication that they were there.
Author's notes:
I had an idea about this story a while back. I wanted to find an unexplained sound and explain it. I found an article on LiveScience that had the one for Upsweep and thought it would work nicely.