WARNING!: Violence ahead. Extreme Violence.


Flying over the building his tracking spells led him to, Harry frowned down at the rooftop and glided around the skyscraper, trying to find an angle that would tell him which floor Regulus was supposedly on. His wand had a single strand of the wizard's hair taped to it, and while usually this would be more than enough to track anyone down, he was having trouble keeping his wand from twisting off into several different directions.

The spells on the maps Kreacher and Dobby had provided for him placed his target in seven separate locations. Even now his wand was bucking between four of them, all seemingly within the same country. Had Regulus somehow cloned himself or was Harry about to walk into a very carefully laid trap meant to catch anyone who tried to track him down?

The wizard had made a name for himself amongst his fellow Death Eaters as someone who was brilliant and vicious with it. His creative spell work had earned him a place amongst Voldemort's inner circle and his strength, ingenuity, and cunning had kept him there. As far as the Dark Lord was concerned the man had disappeared out of nowhere without a trace of him to be found and there had been no doubts as to his loyalty.

He didn't need to take the map out of his pocket to check; from the way his wand was angling, two of Regulus's cloned signals were in the building before him. That alone made it worth checking out.

A part of him was telling him to be cautious in his approach, to land at street level and take the stairs up to the level his wand was pointing at. To at least find a window to slip through or land on the roof and break in through the door leading from the helipad. It was telling him to keep his invisibility cloak up over his head and make sure no part of him was visible because he didn't need Auror attention right now, especially not in a foreign country.

It was a very distant part of him though and it was immediately drowned out when his wand levelled out on his next circuit of the building and stayed that way.

He rocketed forward and when he'd gained enough momentum, swung under his broom by his arms, tucked it and the invisibility cloak into his pockets and kicked through the windows of the skyscraper like he had punched through the marble of Myrtle's bathroom. Every moment of training under Felis in learning how to tread lightly and how to move about undetected went flying out of the proverbial window the second he realized his target might be within reach and he went cannonballing feet first in through the reinforced glass instead. He couldn't even find it in himself to be all that fussed by the thought as chaos erupted all around him.

Screams. Blaring alarms. Shouts and the sound of rubble and glass bouncing off the floor. Harry skidded forwards on his heels along the slick linoleum, bent his knees to absorb the impact and crouched, smoothly lunging into a run that had him going in the direction the tracking spell was leading him.

Peeling the tape off of his wand and deliberately wrapping it around one of his gloved fingers, Harry tucked his wand away and allowed the strand of hair stuck to it guide him through the building. It was the only consideration he was about to make to the Statute of Secrecy, his magic had gotten him this far and he needed magic to guide him the rest of the way. He only needed his wand out earlier because he'd also been flying at the same time, now he could focus all of his attentions on the feedback the spell was giving him.

He ducked and wove around shocked businessmen and women, then did the same to people who started pulling out weapons. He'd been expecting some kind of trap so he wasn't overly surprised when people with flames started popping up. The flames were all in different colours from his own but it didn't matter. He was too fast for them. Getting them out of his way was as easy as swatting flies from his path. It wasn't long before he kicked his way through a set of double doors that wouldn't have been out of place at Hogwarts and found himself in the middle of a large, opulent office.

Thick rugs in a rich array of color and emblazoned with a corporate logo he didn't care enough about to pay more attention to. The rest of the floor was shiny black marble accented with white and gold, the walls were a deep amber, a crystal chandelier hung from the ceiling and a polished desk spanned the three quarters of the room. How had a Pureblood of Regulus's status, a former Death Eater at that, managed to ingratiate himself so deep into Muggle side of the world's Flame Users to the point where this was where Harry's tracing spell had lead him?

Felis had trained his last heir well.

Harry ignored the man sitting behind the desk, and swept his eyes around the room for other occupants.

"C— can I help you?" the man asked, brown eyes visibly turning amber as he slowly and with very deliberate caution, put the phone he'd been speaking into down.

Harry couldn't help but notice he kept his hands in full view.

The Muggle was a bear of a man without a drop of magic in him whatsoever and was very much the opposite of who he was looking for. Blond where Regulus was dark haired, amber eyed where Regulus's grey eyes would have turned purple were he calling on his Soul Shade. Stubble instead of a clean-shaven visage. Kreacher had told him his master had used a potion to eliminate facial hair upon puberty. No hint of a disguise either, no contact lenses, makeup or latex and while Regulus could have gone as far as plastic surgery, he'd still have needed to change his Attribute and hide his eye color. The man's hair looked naturally blond to boot.

The spell tugging at his finger urged him to look down.

Two small toddlers stared up at him. One of them had wide open bright blue eyes, a shock of blond hair and his mouth hung open in a gape. The other had a curious red mark on one of its cheeks, sweetly curling dark hair and eyes that were hidden behind a red visor. The spell was tugging at both children but only one of them looked anything close to who he was looking for.

He wouldn't put it past a wizard trained by Felis Black to disguise himself as a child, all he'd have needed was a de-aging potion.

He slipped the packet of photographs Kreacher had given him out of his pocket and flipped through them to the one picture the house elf had provided him of Regulus at the same age. He compared the picture to the child in front of him and clicked his tongue. Neither child felt magical enough to be a wizard and upon closer inspection the dark haired one looked nothing like his target.

Tucking the photographs back into his pocket, he turned on his heel and left the building, stalking back through the destruction he'd left behind in his wake to jump back out through the hole in the wall. He swung his invisibility cloak up around him as he fell and pulled the Firebolt out of his pocket, then winged away towards his next destination.

What a waste of time and effort.

OoO

For as much time as he took getting there, Harry didn't have to get as close to realize the next direction his tracking spell had led him in was another dead end, and this one was far more dangerous a dead end than the last.

He'd ended up facing another Lord.

Goosebumps tickled up his spine and something akin to revulsion clawed up his throat. It wasn't revulsion though, he was all too familiar with that sensation and it was reserved for far more deserving individuals than the woman smiling gently at him from behind her desk.

Even if this one made every single hair on his body stand on end.

He hadn't had to kick down any doors or swat through people to get here. Well-dressed men and women opened doors as he approached, bowed him in and guided him through the airy estate with polite English that had him realizing that he'd been expected and that she had seemingly been waiting for him.

This wasn't Regulus. He wasn't so stupid that he needed to check. Just being in her presence was enough to know. Magic rolled off the woman in waves, and none of it was giving off the tell-tale taste of potions or spell use. It felt deeper than that, stronger and weightier, but not Dark. Her aura would've had to have been pitch black if she'd been Regulus, because if it were at all possible, Dark Magic of the blackest kind would have been the only feasible way to change one's Aspect into that of a Lord's.

Tainted as it was her Aura was still reasonably clear, and that was more than enough for him. He didn't need to spend any more time in this Lord's presence. He couldn't even bring himself to step into the same room as her. Her Knights stood at either side of him and made no move to either wave him in or chase him out, even though he was hovering in the doorway.

One of them motioned as if to take his cloak, but he shrugged off the offer and— "Okay, fine. Rude." The Knight muttered gruffly out of the corner of his mouth, blond hair slicked back with copious amounts of gel.

"I warned you not to offer." The Lord laughed lightly from her desk, casually capping her pen. "You're lucky all he did was glare." Her kind gaze turned to him and it was heavy with the kind of gravitas Trelawney affected in Divination. His own magic and flames flared in agitation in response and the urge to step back and run hit him as he realized why. Coupled with the way she'd been expecting him, the language they were speaking, the warning she'd given her Knight and the apparent instructions she'd given her staff before he'd even arrived, and it all lined up.

It was clear what he was dealing with. A Lord with the Seer's gift? Voldemort would have sacrificed his everything for a fraction of the power the woman wore around her like a cloak.

"So that's how you knew I was coming." Harry remarked almost to himself, watching her sharply as she set her pen down on top of the stack of papers she'd been working through.

"Will you keep my secret?" she asked cheekily, her deep blue eyes brimming with banked charisma. Threading her fingers together, she smiled wryly at her own question as if already expecting the answer.

"Only if you'll keep mine," he returned sarcastically, though he was pretty sure he'd take the secret to his grave. No one in the world needed to know there was a seer this powerful still living. Even if Voldemort weren't a very real threat he would have done it, an existence like hers was too dangerous to leak.

"You're not very trusting, are you?" the same blond Knight who'd earlier tried to divest him of his cloak muttered and this time Harry couldn't stop himself from retorting. "I can't afford to be, a woman with her gift helped ruin—" he cut himself off.

"… gift?"

Harry regretted answering him. Of course she'd kept it a secret from her own people, otherwise the whole world would have known about her and she'd be under siege by now. The only reason he'd connected the dots as fast as he had was because Felis and Demeter had given him a rundown of the various groups of Flame Users he might run into once he left the Sky Manor.

He'd only listened with half an ear, but now that he was this close all the details fell into place. The Giglio Nero of times past had always been led by a female Seer with dark hair, sapphire blue eyes, and a very unique orange and blue mark under their left eye. Felis Black had talked at length about the one time he'd met his match in a Lord of similar description and The Ghost had never been able to steal anything from what would have been this woman's ancestor.

Another waste of time and energy.

"Wait, Saint; take this with you!" The woman called cheerfully as he turned on his heel to leave. He caught the packet she tossed at him automatically and gave her a quizzical look over his shoulder. "… Saint?"

"That… isn't your name?" She asked, caught off guard, and the same part of him that had earlier been screaming at him to tread lightly around her abruptly laughed. A Seer caught unaware by their own gift? She must have Seen him referred to by the name and made assumptions. Her gift must not be as all-encompassing as the weight of her magic was making it feel.

Malfoy considered himself clever for the fact that he'd conditioned him to respond to the name since second year. It was useful now, he supposed. He hadn't had any trouble answering to it and he couldn't exactly go around using his own so—

"I guess… it is now."

OoO

The next Lord he came face to face with wasn't nearly so gracious a host, but to be fair Harry wasn't exactly on his best behaviour. He hadn't even noticed him until the man burst into flames almost directly under his nose. The only thing that came to mind when looking down at the man was the image of a child having a temper tantrum. A loud and messy hissy-fit that was setting fire to everything around him. Amber-red flames crackled and exploded all around him, but hit the man's Knights rather than him.

There had been no one to bow his way into the building this time, and no one expecting him. Dropping into the courtyard from above had been child's play and he'd even managed to hide his wand and cloak before he hit the ground. It was more luck than caution that no one had witnessed him land and the tug of his tracking spell helpfully drew his eyes to an open window.

A single step and a jump had him on the balcony and in what appeared to be a lounging room. The Lord had been draped along the length of a red and gold couch with a Knight in attendance, though he hadn't realized that then. The Knight, as he now recognized the long haired one as, was caught mid-sentence reading aloud from a sheaf of papers in hand and the dark haired man's eyes widened.

He had looked at the pair, the dark haired man on the couch and a man standing at attention with long silver hair, and had dismissed them as unimportant.

No resemblance to who he was looking for and neither of them had magic in them and had no hint of it on them at all. In their hair, clothes or otherwise. Neither of them were Regulus and the spell around his finger was tugging at him to go deeper into the building. A huff of annoyance escaped him as he crossed the carpet and let himself out the door, letting it close behind him as he left the room.

He would examine everyone he crossed paths with if he had to.

It wasn't until he was halfway down the corridor that he realized that one of the men he'd so casually dismissed must be a Lord as he leaped lightly out of the way of an amber-ruby inferno headed in his direction. A Lord who had taken great exception to being dismissed and was now waving his flames around like he had something to prove.

After Voldemort, this screaming teenager pretending to be an adult didn't even register as a threat. He was reduced to turning his own residence to rubble and burning his own Knights trying to kill him. It made him wonder if this is what Voldemort would have been like, had he caved into accepting Knights like this one had.

At the very least one of the man's Knights turned out to be the focus of his tracking spell, as he discovered when the toddler was drawn to the sounds of screaming chaos. Walking along the exposed top of a wall, Harry dropped down onto his heels and tilted his head at the cloaked baby, trying to see its face. So far, out of the other directions he'd been pulled in, this child looked like it might actually be who he was looking for.

Regulus had been a Slytherin and the baby he was looking at had a snake familiar. The baby wore a cloak, a holdover from his time in the wizarding world? There were also odd markings on the baby's face that were magical in nature and there was a dark taste to the child's aura. The other babies had felt somewhat magical too, but not nearly as strongly as this one did. This one felt like it could actually be a wizard. How would the toddler react to Harry casting a compulsion spell on the packet of Regulus's baby-hair within arm's reach?

"Don't ignore me, trash!"

"Then don't act like a child. Enough, I have no business with you." He countered without looking, dismissing the overgrown Lord once more. Straightening from his crouch he slipped off the wall and frowned as he approached the cloaked child.

"What business would you have with me then?" the baby with the snake asked, cautiously floating around him so he was directly in between Lord Temper Tantrum and Harry, faithfully taking guard against the threat he posed. Harry eyed the floating toddler, stepped closer until he was not even a foot away and heard, (and ignored), the Lord's other Knights rally to the man's defence.

He kept his focus singled on the one in front of him.

Would Regulus have really accepted another Lord after leaving the wizarding world? The obvious answer was no. In the man's shoes he wouldn't have, not in a million years, but the former Slytherin hadn't ever bonded with Voldemort. He'd only ever stood within the man's orbit. Had he fallen to Brat-Lord's charm?

Not that he could see the attraction, personally.

Right on cue, as the thought was crossing his mind, another blast of amber-ruby flames streamed towards him. A step away and he avoided the lion's share of it, but the hood and back of his flapping cloak caught the edge of the blast and disintegrated. He was forced into pulling the cloak off of himself as it burned. Distantly, he was glad he'd tucked his invisibility cloak away when he'd landed in the courtyard. The one that had just been burned through had been the only normal cloak he'd packed. Dobby had brought it to him, and Kreacher had cleaned and repaired it.

The baby who might or might not be Regulus also dodged the flames admirably and when Harry turned to the Lordling who'd interrupted them, he glared.

The man's eyes were red.

The Lord's flames lingered on his person, staining his hair amber and ruby along the strands the man's flames had touched. Removing the taint was as simple as running a hand burning with his own flames through them and combing his hair out of his face, but the fact he'd even had to do that…

It pissed him off.

It was strange. He wasn't tired, or at least he was in no danger of stepping down in Dying Will Mode, but… he was undeniably annoyed and that annoyance was growing by the minute. He should be numb to emotions, but he wasn't.

This Lord's complete disregard to his Knights and surroundings. Overly inflated pride with no sense of decorum. What kind of behaviour was this to display in front of a stranger? His red eyes, dark hair and pale skin, (where it wasn't scarred), the temper tantrum and the way he was throwing around what power he could. It was like he was looking into a warped funhouse mirror version of Tom Riddle minus the magic, and he didn't even have the excuse of being as broken.

Beyond the similarities this man shared with his parent's murderer, there was a look in the man's eyes he didn't like. A flavour of expectation that was pulling at him to respond and—

It set his teeth on edge.

The man's flames were crackling and burning all around them, the feel of it was feeding his ire and it made him want to teach this brat a lesson he'd never forget.

Harry thought about it for a moment, and then let his flames roar to the surface.

Far be it from him to pass up the opportunity to stomp a young Tom Riddle into the proverbial curb.

OoO

Since the Lord had worked so hard to catch his attention, Harry made sure he kept it.

He had to occasionally bat aside an interruption or five, but on the whole he made sure to thoroughly kick the lesson on manners into the man and absolutely enjoyed every minute of it. The wizard he had been before Fawkes had lit his flames would have been utterly and completely horrified, but now? He was surprised to find himself enjoying the complete beat-down he was delivering.

If given the opportunity to repeat this performance? He would. He would do it in a heartbeat and love every second of it. He was a fighter, always had been. This was no different from his usual fair, but this was easier. The playing field was levelled, or rather tilted so far in his favour that it was laughable. He didn't even need his wand for this. With no one-hit killing techniques like the Avada Kedavra curse, no one to worry about but himself, and actual training under his belt? Fighting was damn near a dream.

Gryffindors loved a good dust up, and he could no more deny that part of himself than he could his own magic, but this was something else for Harry. This wasn't just play fighting or something so simple as a lesson. Not only was he having fun deflating this Lord's ego down to size, this was also the first real fight he'd been in since the graveyard.

Being praised over completing an obstacle course while being pit up against dummies was one thing; actually putting his new skills to the test was another.

The Lord's weapons were the first to go; Harry caught them with hands burning with flames and his opponent was forced to let them go or lose his fingers. He locked eyes with the man as he crushed the barrels of the guns like they were made of cheap tinfoil and let the cracked and melting remains drop to the ground at his feet.

Seeing fear in the man's red eyes was immensely gratifying, the fleeting mental image of Voldemort's face superimposed over the Lord's made it all the more satisfying. Fear wasn't the only thing he saw in the man's eyes, he saw panic there too, and with it dragged stupidity to the fore. When the brat tried to attack next, it was with a violent palmful of fire aimed at his face. Harry leaned back out of the way and backhanded the Lord's wrist, redirecting the attack into the oncoming face of his shrieking silver haired Knight.

Silver screamed and dropped backwards in order to avoid the attack that would have otherwise incinerated his head. Harry grabbed the redirected wrist and planted his other hand against the Brat's hip to physically haul him up into the air and threw him across the room.

The Lord flipped like a cat in mid-air and attempted to land on his feet, but Harry got there first.

A burst of flame-fuelled strength launched him across the room before he could land, and he skidded on the hardwood flooring behind the Lord and punted him right back towards his scrambling Knights. The scarred man ploughed into the lot of them, sending three to the ground beneath him, though two managed to scuttle out of the way even as the young Gryffindor prowled closer.

Panic had really lit a fuse in the lot of them; to give them credit though, they hid it fairly well as they scrambled to get back up to their feet.

They were bloodied, bruised, and baring their teeth as if it were supposed to be intimidating, which might have been funny for how weak they were, if it weren't also so very insulting. Harry narrowed his eyes and shifted backwards a little, lifting his fists into the opening stance Felis had demonstrated and watched as the group in front of him stiffened nervously.

Then Harry unsheathed his claws. A burst of amethyst flames to his knuckles and six inch bladed claws scythed out, gleaming dully in the light from the broken window. It made one of them twitch visibly.

"Shi shi shi~, this peasant thinks he can intimidate the Prince?" the one teenager of the group hissed, teeth bared practically ear to ear in the most forced grin the Gryffindor had ever seen.

Harry didn't give the blond a reply. Contrary to what Voldemort, and every single goddamned one of his ilk seemed to think, monologuing was very stupid. Monologues had given him the time to think and recover in the past and holding a conversation with the enemy had always been his last-ditch effort to buy time. He would not be granting the Brat's Knights the luxury of a chit chat.

He would rather continue with his 'lesson'.

The Brat-Lord shoved himself through the group to get out in front, mouth opening with a furious expression on his face, but Harry lunged. He would not be allowing him to talk either.

Red eyes widened exquisitely as he ducked under one of the weird metal umbrellas the man's Emerald Knight furiously threw like a javelin and Harry snapped his heel down hard. The floor beneath them cratered and shattered. The entire building shook as the walls around them strained and then buckled. What was left of the ceiling above them crumbled without the support.

Harry kicked off the debris and shot between the fallen men, grabbed the Brat by his face and used him to cushion his fall, landing on him feet first. He parted his fingers to let the Lordling see him rear his other fist back, claws extended, allowed him see how easy it would have been to simply kill him. He gave it a moment for the vision to really sink in then launched himself away using the feet he still had planted firmly on the man's chest. Backwards and neatly up over the sword swing that would have taken his head off if he had been a fraction too slow.

Live opponents really were so much more satisfying to kick around and it was clear now how much progress he had made training under Felis. He was no longer leaking flame everywhere he went, his flames were responding beautifully and obeying his every thought.

He kicked off a corner of ceiling, cut lumps of plaster and lengths of wooden beams down on the approaching Knights with his claws as he passed them and landed with a skid across the now dusty floor. He only just managed to halt the slide when he buried a claw in the wall to stop him dead.

Slamming his foot down to shake the room again when green lightning raced towards him, Harry hauled up a chunk of the newly broken bit of floor he speared his other claw in to shield himself and minimized his profile. His claws wouldn't transfer the charge, as they were technically made from his flame.

Someone moved behind him and he was forced to reverse his position to disengage his claws from the wall and slice upwards.

The flamboyant, green haired Topaz Knight was practically bisected, his stomach split open from groin to throat in his attempt to slam a metal plated knee where Harry's skull would have been. Blood sprayed hotly across Harry's face and the man squealed a soft and surprised "Oh" as his body crumpled. The man's gloved hands clamped over the gaping wound reflexively to try and keep his insides where they were supposed to be as exclamations of shock, surprise and alarm went up around the room.

The Gryffindor kicked the large chunk of floor he had been shielding himself with off of his other claw at the closest spectator and 'Prince' cartwheeled out of the way… and directly into the path of grappling hook Harry shot at him.

Gutting the flamboyant one and catching this one by the literal throat had been a bit of a happy accident, but he was hardly going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Besides, showmanship was better left to situations one wasn't outclassed in, wasn't it? Best they learned that from him then someone else, because he didn't care in the least bit whether they lived or died.

Their Lord should have minded his own business.

Brutally yanking the blond Knight right into the path of his Liege, Harry withdrew the flames he'd put into the grappling hook and flicked his wrist as it shrank back down into size, returning it back into the button it had been. The Brat hadn't even tried catching his Knight, he'd dodged and left the teenager to helplessly crumple unconscious against to the floor.

"Boss!" the others screamed, ignoring the plight of their Brother In Arms. The Turquoise Knight kept screaming, most probably obscenities in what Harry figured was Italian. Whatever, it wasn't like he knew or even cared to know what he was saying.

One step, two, and then he bounded across the length of the room, and returned his attentions to the Lord, knee aimed towards the man's face. The scarred man dodged by a hair's breadth, but left himself wide open to further attacks as Harry landed on his hands behind the man, re-positioned, and then spun in a neat circle, sweeping his legs out from underneath him.

He could have jumped on the Lord again like last time, but the brat's Knights had wizened up a little, and he was forced to roll backwards and push himself back up to his feet to avoid a flash of bright blue that left aqua streaks along the hair on his arms.

Not that he would ever let it show, but he could feel it dull his reflexes a little. This was the shade of the aspect could tranquillise things and slow them down, wasn't it? The Turquoise Knight would not be doing that for long.

Harry fanned his flames hotter, momentarily turned his attention away from the Lord, and grabbed the silver haired man's blade, melting and snapping the sword in half much like he would have done to a bar of Honeydukes' finest chocolate. With great relish and pleasure. Spearing the Emerald Knight through his shoulder with the broken end and pinning him to the wall with it to keep him out of the way, Harry pivoted on the ball of his foot and mule-kicked Silver in the stomach hard enough to launch him across the room and bounce him off a wall from the sheer force of it.

The Lord was retreating, reaching for one of the umbrella weapons embedded in the cratered floor, but Harry didn't let him get far. He blitzed forward and grabbed the boy King by the hair and yanked him backwards, but with their height differences, and his inhuman strength, he nearly tore the man's head off.

The brat fell back with a yell, and Harry twisted to the side to let him drop and rammed his knee into the Lord's gut. He kicked the Lord onto his back, pressed his heel into the man's stomach and leaned his whole weight against the foot, grinding him under the sole of his boot as if he were an insect.

"Do you see what happens when you stick your nose somewhere it doesn't belong?" he asked, blank faced and even-voiced.

Ruby Knight was unconscious where he'd left him, bleeding from a head-wound. Both Turquoise and Topaz Knights were down for the count. The former was vomiting behind a bit of rubble and struggling for breath and the latter was reduced to a sobbing and whimpering ball, wrapped around his own mid-section. Emerald was screaming incoherent obscenities, busy trying to figure out a way to free himself without touching the flames Harry had left burning on the broken piece of sword he'd used to pin him to the wall and keep him there, lastly the Lord was trapped underfoot and would not be going anywhere.

Harry gave absolutely no tell to the thrill of exhilaration reverberating along his insides, even though his Flames were purring in pure satisfaction. He wanted to luxuriate in it, but a thought came to him as he stared down his nose into the Lordling's wine-red eyes.

A Lord who was so self-assured that he'd completely forgotten his manners, or did not possess them in the first place. Quick to insult and even quicker to violence. This man had called him trash without knowing a single thing about him, treated his own Knights like they were disposable and had attacked with little to no concern for them. How was he different from Voldemort? Was the only difference time and age?

Harry was separated from Voldemort by a sheer gulf of experience and skill, he would not be ready to kill him until all the Horcruxes save the one inside him were destroyed. No such age gap, or condition, existed between him and this overinflated would-be king.

Wasn't he training to kill Voldemort anyway?

Without thinking much further into it Harry fed another burst of Flame into the claws extending from his fists and they doubled in size. Violet streaked silently off the blades in flamelets and set the shadows to dancing around them in haunting flickers. He would be doing the Muggle World a favour if he killed the arrogant baby king here and now.

Rearing back a fist Harry locked eyes with the red-eyed Lord and—

"What business do you have with me!?" a voice screamed, piercing through the veil of focus that had momentarily tinted his vision purple.

Cutting a glance towards the direction the voice had come from, Harry paused.

The child he'd originally been here to examine was glowing, and he belatedly realized the air all around them was saturated and heavy with Dark Sapphire Flames, and had been the entire time he'd been fighting.

Regulus would have known illusions sourced by Dark Sapphire Flames wouldn't work on a wizard who also had usable flames. Was he was putting on a show for his Lord's sake? But… Felis had mentioned Regulus not having a secondary Aspect and as far as any of Harry's ancestors knew, his target's soul shade was purely Amethyst.

This... was not Regulus.

He narrowed his eyes at the child before scoffing in disgust, allowing his Amethyst constructed blades to fade.

"Pathetic," he spat as he kicked the fallen Lord away from himself.

How pathetic was he? To forget that Regulus was a Slytherin, and nothing about tracking him down would ever be so simple. He'd been wrong, this was not Regulus and he had wasted both time and energy, and potentially even tipped the former Death Eater off to his being hunted.

Three times he'd walked into dead ends and each path his spells had led him in had ended up with him face-to-face with a Lord. Two of the three Lords hadn't been magical but the second one had been, if she hadn't been as amicable as she had been… who knew what would have become of him. She'd was a Seer and there was nothing more dangerous than threatened Seer. They Saw everything and depending on their strength, could do whatever it took to make sure trouble was never seen again.

Once was happenstance, twice was coincidence and thrice was enemy action.

Furiously jerking his maps out of his pocket he scanned the area, found a flat surface and spread them out in front of him, no longer interested in continuing the fight in the slightest. Where had he gone wrong? Had he cast the wrong spell? How was Regulus rerouting it? It was being anchored on his end by a strand of untainted baby hair! His spells should have worked!

"Damn it! How am I supposed to find him now?!"

"Y— you wanted me to track someone down for you?"

Harry whirled around.

The child he'd mistaken for Regulus had just offered that like it was actually a plausible explanation for Harry's visit.

"Can you?" He demanded, stalking forward, maps forgotten.

"I— I'm the World's Strongest Esper, Viper! There isn't a thing or person in the world that could hide from me!" the cloaked toddler claimed, confidence threading back into the projected voice at the attention. Or rather from the attention the toddler's struggling Lord was not getting, who he could see was being tended to by Silver out of the corner of his eye.

Was this another trap?

"How do I know you aren't just pulling that title out of your ass?" Harry sneered, because this was too easy. He'd walked into a trap and the lure was offering him a solution to his problem?

"He is, I can vouch for his work." Silver wheezed, positioning himself in front of his brat of a charge as if intending to be a living shield, visibly struggling for each breath he took.

"I'm supposed to take the word of one of his Brothers In Arms?"

"Ask anyone in the Mafia World." Silver replied slowly, seemingly choosing his words carefully as 'Viper' spluttered in offence at Harry's show of doubt. "He's famous for it. There isn't a Mafioso worth the name that doesn't know Viper of the Arcobaleno, and for those who don't know that name will know him as Mammon of the Varia."

Harry looked to the floating baby for confirmation, and Silver used this apparent distraction to further cover his Liege from sight. The Lord swore and slapped away his Knight's attempt to hide him and Harry frowned, eyes once again drawn to him and the Brat froze under the look.

"I TAKE PAYMENT IN THE FORM OF—" the Dark Sapphire Knight started loudly in a very unsubtle attempt at regaining his attention.

"— representation!" Silver interjected.

"Representation?" Mammon repeated, turning to look his brother questioningly and then his mouth dropped open in an 'o' of realization. "Representation as the Varia's Cloud Guardian in the upcoming Vongola Ring Battles!" the child finished speedily.

"I don't have the time to waste—"

"It's in a week's time and won't last for longer than a fortnight!"

Harry weighed the offer Silver had offered for Viper.

Potentially, he could be walking into another trap, but was that so different to what he was already doing? Silver could be offering the ticket to the success of his ultimate mission. Regulus had spent years running from his past and had evidently had all the time in the world to set traps to catch his magical pursuers unawares.

World's Strongest Esper was it? Shouldn't take much effort to confirm the statement.

Giving no warning as to his intentions Harry jumped forward, shoved Silver out of the way and grabbed Brat by his hair again. "You had best be telling the truth." He warned Silver, locking eyes with him as he slipped hands through the messed up mane of dark hair. "For I will take payment for the lie with your Lord's life." He finished, snatching a few strands and shoving the Lord's face into the ground for emphasis, knocking him out cold.

Tucking the stolen strands of hair away in his pocket, he took his leave.

Detouring to pick up his almost forgotten maps, he found himself appalled by the sheer number of unconscious men and women littering his path out. They'd evidently been caught unaware by their Dark Sapphire Knight's illusions. The Brat's Knights had just about as much respect for their Sworn Hands as their Lord did his Knights, didn't they?

"Someone call in a medic team!" Silver screamed onto deaf ears as soon as he deemed it safe, probably feeling secure in the assurance that Harry wasn't about to turn around and revisit them sooner than expected.

He heard though, the words carried reasonably well on the wind as he'd pulled out his Firebolt and invisibility cloak once out of direct sight and set himself aloft. Shaking his head, Harry angled his broom up and away from the smoking ruins of what had once been a rather beautiful mansion.

The question now was, where was he going to find someone to answer his questions?

OoO

Forgetting he was covered in the Brat's Topaz Knight's blood turned out to be something he couldn't decide was good or bad luck.

The downside was in the fact he'd frightened several small children and their mothers into screaming and running away in abject terror.

There were definite benefits to looking like he'd just rolled out of a war-zone though and he could hardly argue with the results. He found the Mafia World rather quickly because of it and as a bonus he hadn't had to hunt down information; it came to him. There couldn't have been more than five minutes past him stumbling out of the bushes, unintentionally scaring the liver out of innocent park goers, before people in black came rushing at him.

Just to be sure though, he grabbed the first one he saw and shook him down for answers while other suited individuals hollered from a 'safe' distance for him to let his 'hostage' go. They also tried asking him who he'd killed and clamoured at him to answer.

Idiots, the lot of them.

The group identified themselves loudly as the Vongola, which was a name Viper had dropped earlier, and demanded to know why he'd broken into the headquarters of their intelligence gathering organization. He could see why they needed someone else to do the thinking for them. They clearly didn't have enough brain cells collectively to scrape together to process what was actually happening in front of their own eyes.

He wasn't covered in nearly enough blood to have killed someone. A casual glance at a nearby shop window revealed that his reflection hadn't changed overly much from the last time he'd seen it. He might have understood the reaction if he'd been wearing his hooded cloak as the unknown was intimidating to just about anyone, but he wasn't exactly visually impressive.

He was slight and small for his age, dusty and covered in dirt and debris. Yes, he had blood streaked liberally across his person, but there wasn't that much of it and what was there could have easily have been explained away as stage makeup. Yet people were legitimately finding him terrifying, enough so that he'd sent women and children screaming away from him and these so-called Mafioso were acting like he was holding a weapon, like a gun, or was about to set off an invisible bomb.

He didn't even have his claws out. What exactly was so frightening about an unarmed fourteen-year-old with purple hair and eyes? He could have been a goth with a particularly unique sense of fashion for all they knew, he was wearing all black.

The man he was shaking down for answers wasn't even injured, simply trembling, pale and docile within his grasp. He was conscious and coherent enough to answer his questions promptly and precisely and without adding any unnecessary information. Harry quite liked that. Easing him from his grip, he lowered the Mafioso down so that he was no longer dragging his legs behind him and made sure the man's knees were in contact with the footpath before letting go.

It would be poor repayment for such clear and concise answers to just drop him.

The man heaved a great gasp of relief that he struggled to stifle, as if the sound alone would startle Harry into unspeakable violence, and the tension in the air was palpable for a long moment.

Until a jaunty ringtone broke the atmosphere.

"S—scusami!" a man towards the back of the ring of Mafioso said, sweat breaking out across his brow as he pointed to the breast of his coat and flipped the lapel so he could show off the pocket. Loudly telegraphing each movement he reached in with two fingers to gingerly pull out the singing device. "May I take this?" the man asked delicately in accented English, as if seeking permission.

Harry shrugged and raised an eyebrow at him.

All of a sudden there was a circle of clear footpath around the man.

Very deliberately glaring at the group that had so readily abandoned the man on the phone, he snorted at their show of solidarity and loyalty. Had about as much spine as a sack full of Flobberworms, didn't they? He ran into this all the time and it didn't matter where he was, in the Wizarding, Muggle or Mafia World, people were the same.

"I Varia lo stanno corteggiando?" the nervous man on the phone squawked, surprised into speaking a full sentence for the first time since picking up his phone.

No idea what was being said, but it seemed like word travelled just as fast in the Mafia world as it did in the Wizarding World. It couldn't have been more than two or three hours since he'd hopped on his Firebolt to confirm Viper of the Varia's statement and already people were talking about it. He was lucky the new tracking spell he'd set to find a 'Mafioso' willing to answer some questions had lead him to a city so heavily populated with them. It almost made up for the time he'd wasted at the Brat Lordling's mansion.

Darting to the man with the phone he pulled the device out of the man's hand, grabbed him by the collar and pulled him down to stare him in the eye. Grey eyes widened, pupils blown wide with fear, but the man didn't try to escape.

"I have a few questions for you." He told his new focus, walking the man backwards until the back of his knees hit a bench and forced the man to sit. Much better, at least this way he wasn't straining his neck looking up or wasting strength holding the man. "Will you answer them?"

"Yes, of course, anything you want to know." The man near-babbled and he was forced to tighten his grip to halt it.

"Good." Tucking the phone back into the man's pocket he made sure not to break eye contact. He wanted honest answers, and he would get them. First, there was a question that had popped up since landing that was nagging at him. He pulled the man forward again by his tie and glared at the lack of resistance. "I haven't even been here that long and you only heard about me from your phone just now. Why are you all so afraid of me?" he demanded, pulling the man up so hard he was almost rising up off the bench.

He'd more than satisfied his sudden and inexplicable itching thirst for violence with the Brat, who had caused it in the first place, so he wasn't about to fly off the handle again now! This lack of spine from so many people was unbelievable!

"Y— your flames! You're still F-Flaring! They're strong a—and the taint—"

Harry let the man go as if he were burned and backpedalled, the hair rising along his arms and realized that he hadn't pulled his flames back in from the lesson he'd dealt to the Brat and his Knights. Also the taint…That had to mean his bond with Voldemort.

The knowledge that others would be able to sense the blackened bond he had with 'his' Lord had been in the back of his mind since he'd awakened his flames. He hadn't thought much about it as neither Felis, Demeter or any of their children had mentioned it, but… they probably couldn't sense it. As lifelike as the portraits were, in the end they were spelled and animated paint.

Yanking his flames back under his skin confirmed it, as to the very last of them the watching Mafia relaxed.

"Okay, now that we're all calm now…" a woman started from somewhere behind him and Harry slammed one of the smoke bombs pilfered from the Sky Estate to the ground at his feet, pulled on his invisibility cloak and ran. He had a week to decide if he wanted to take Mammon up on his offer and he'd need the time to get his head back on straight, now that the clarity of thought had returned to him.

Maybe he should have listened to Felis when he'd said to wait until he wanted to be around people again.

OoO

Chapter end~!

I am dead. Please excuse any typos because this update was written in the span of two to three days and my beta hasn't seen it yet. It was written that fast. I am so goddamned tired.

Spent the whole chapter going "Harry, no!", "Harry, why!", and "Whut are you DOING?"

Credits go to Araceil for writing that fight scene for me, I was so. stuck. There, I'd written only two paragraphs of it and offered to let her have a go as a joke. She took me seriously and felt like writing a fight scene so I let her. XD (all I did was adapt the scene she wrote after that to suit my writing style). Credits also go to 13th-to-Fall for being my amazing and long-suffering beta, (This chapter has now been replaced by the final version~!). Love you guys so much, this chapter wouldn't have been nearly as awesome without you.

I'd apologize for the sheer amount of violence that happened in this chapter… but i know you guys love it all really and, well… if you didn't see it coming, I did try to warn you. XP

P.s. For those that need a translation? I apologize in advance if i got it wrong. Correct me and i'll fix it.

"I Varia lo stanno corteggiando?"

"He is being courted by the Varia?