The Dark Legacy

Chapter Seven: The Why of Things

Harry went down to the Library where he didn't know anyone, and stayed there until nightfall. Then he returned to the barracks, changed, and climbed into bed. Violet was in the next bunk, but she pretended to be asleep. He could tell she was pretending because he could hear her thoughts still whirring.

Curious, Harry listened carefully, and got the general idea of her thoughts. She was second-guessing the intelligence of giving all her secrets to a complete stranger, and one with such a strange aura. She had hoped that by telling Harry about herself, he would explain the mysterious things happening to him that were driving her crazy with curiosity. But he hadn't, and now she was somewhat anxious that he might tell someone about her spying for the Ministry.

Harry quickly whispered, "No, I promise I won't." He didn't agree with it, but he could see why she was doing it.

Violet whipped her head around to look at him in distress, and Harry realized he had answered her thoughts.

He blushed, and said quickly, "Sorry!" and pulled the blanket over his head. Her alarmed thoughts buzzed next to him until he fell asleep.

"Haven't you had an interesting day?" Araeva commented. He was busy taking bottles, boxes, and all manner of strange objects off the wall of shelving on one side of his hut, and moving them into a large chest. He glanced over his shoulder and nodded to Harry in greeting, then returned to his activity.

"Yes!" Harry agreed, "What do I do?" He was momentarily distracted. "Why are you packing things? Are you moving?"

"No," Araeva explained, "I mean to make a door here."

"Oh… okay. What do I do about Violet?"

"I don't know Harry; it's your life."

"Should I tell her the truth?"

Araeva turned around to look at him seriously for a moment. "Do you trust her?"

"Yeah, I guess?"

"Well when you're sure, then tell her."

"I thought you said my life would be in danger if I didn't keep it a secret."

"From the general public," Araeva clarified. "I didn't expect you to do everything alone. If you find allies, keep them close."

"Then Violet could be my ally," Harry decided. "I think if I alienate her now, she'll eventually go to the Ministry, despite what she said. It's worth the risk telling her the truth."

"Very well. One more thing: I thought I'd give you a break, and I haven't released any of your memories in these last two days, but I'll continue doing so soon. Since we haven't gotten that far yet, I wanted to tell you that I used to do animagus exercises with you when you were a child. I would never have attempted a transformation with you at that age, of course. But if you were to pick up the study, I'm sure you would find the results very interesting."

When Harry woke up the next morning, Violet's mind was still in turmoil. He could hear it as he got up. She was already dressed and waiting by the door, her eyes following him almost doubtfully. He sensed she was still quite alarmed about what he had accidentally done the night before.

Still, she was at his side when they went out for their morning workout. This morning, they had a rather unusual obstacle course, which was set up around the back of the fort. There were several steps to the obstacle course; it didn't seem to be as much about being in shape as it did about being careful and precise. The first step comprised of picking up a large bowl of some kind of foul smelling potion, and carrying it as quickly from the beginning of the course to the next step without spilling it. There they had to weave through many low posts without knocking them over. Following that were several large tiles that would crack if you didn't step on them carefully, and lastly you had to leap directly over a sleeping hippogriff, which made Harry nervous.

"That's not good," Ron murmured, clearly remembering Buckbeak's more aggressive side.

Harry and Violet did not have their minds on the exercise, and as a result they performed horribly. After all six trainees did the obstacle course twice each their times were calculated along with how much damage they did to the course along the way. Waking up the hippogriff would immediately disqualify you, but nobody did. Harry suspected it might have been coerced into a deep sleep, because large tiles cracking and wooden posts hitting each other nearby didn't disturb it. Since both Harry and Violet were extremely distracted, their team did the worst. Harry sloshed half the liquid from the bowl onto him, only to belatedly discover that it burned when it touched his skin. He knocked over lots of the posts, which were delicately balanced. The tiles seemed to crack with just a little of his weight, but at least he didn't step on the hippogriff. Violet did even worse than he did, and in the end them both smelled horribly of the burning potion and looked defeated.

Ron couldn't help himself, as he passed Violet he murmured, "Smooth."

Her eyes narrowed dangerously, and she returned a string of epithets that made Ron blush bright red.

"What's wrong with you two?" Friedenwald asked. "You've been top in the challenges the last two days; I thought you were going to be my best team! Disappointing!" He shook his head. "Trainees, this exercise brings us to today's topic: Stealth and Tracking."

They were given more of the tiles to practice with. You had to step on them extremely lightly, and keep your weight on each foot as even as possible, or they would practically shatter. This was supposed to teach them to walk quietly. Harry and Violet finally did get better, with some practice.

Harry had noticed by now that Violet seemed to have three distinct moods. The first and most common one was when she was silent, apathetic, and almost cold. When she was like this she ignored everyone to the point of rudeness and punctuated this with an occasional sarcastic comment.

Her second mood was the one she was in today, and Harry termed it 'irritable'. Violet seemed to know exactly the right way to lash out at people and make them feel bad about themselves. She even made a cutting remark about Jack that made Jack's eyes fill with tears. Jack quickly hid them and Neville glared at Violet threateningly.

The third mood was the way she was around Harry: normal, almost nice. But she didn't seem to show this side around other people.

They had their lecture (on the importance of stealth, citing specific cases) outside, sitting against the wall near where the hippogriff continued to slumber. It seemed to take forever before they were released for lunch; Harry's mind was on other things. Harry was sure he would not remember anything come Monday, because he had been unable to pay attention to many of the lectures all week.

"Do you want to take our lunch somewhere where we can talk?" Harry asked Violet.

She nodded, suggesting "The workroom?"

They grabbed their plates and left the cafeteria, retreating to their small, triangle shaped workroom at the end of the hall. Harry had a certain fondness for it, despite its irregularity. They promptly locked the door and sat on their pillows, plates on their laps. For a few minutes they ate in silence, almost nervously.

"You can read minds!" burst out of Violet eventually.

Harry bit his tongue, dreading the coming conversation. "Yes."

"How? Since when?"

"Since the middle of the night a couple days ago; the time I woke up and you were writing in your journal."

Violet's eyes widened. "That's when your aura first expanded! I'll bet you are picking up on the thoughts of the people inside that mist that I see."

Harry nodded. "I think I can reach a little bit outside my range when I try, which would explain the tentacle shapes you observed."

Violet nodded. "But why did this happen to you?"

Harry hesitated.

"Whatever is going on, it's big, isn't it?" Violet asked, and regarded him calmly with her ice-blue eyes.

Harry nodded, and put down his plate, pushing it away. Violet did the same. Harry reached out and took her hands, thinking it might help him read her better. "If I tell you, would you ever betray me?"

Her thoughts returned with such surprise and refusal that Harry was a little taken aback, and Harry dropped her hands. "No," she said resolutely.

Harry nodded in acknowledgment. "As you know, I killed Voldemort. That is, his death could directly be blamed on me. What I didn't know was that killing the true dark lord makes you his successor."

Violet frowned, almost disbelievingly. "That doesn't make any sense. You're not a dark wizard."

"If you define a dark wizard as somebody who knows the dark arts, then you're wrong," Harry told her. "Not that I use them."

"Where did you learn dark magic?" Violet asked, sounding surprised.

"There was a wizard in the town that I grew up, and he made me his apprentice when I was seven years old. After a couple years he took my memories away and stored them so that I wouldn't remember him or any dark magic while I went to Hogwarts. He only started giving them back to me recently, and he explained the succession idea to me. He says I don't have to be anything like Voldemort, he says I can be a Dark King. The Dark Kings were here before the Dark Lords and weren't destructive. I figure it's better for me to keep this, whatever it is, then somebody else get it and become another Voldemort. Besides, my old teacher says I can't get rid of it without dying and passing it on to someone myself. That's why it's such a secret, if a real dark wizard found out they would want to kill me."

Violet quietly considered this. "Wow."

"I wouldn't hurt anyone," Harry promised. "I can't even use my mind-reading ability to spy on people's fantasies, it bothers me."

"Do you listen to my thoughts all the time?" she asked.

Harry shook his head. "No, your thoughts are very quiet. I would have to actually focus."

"What else can you do?"

"I don't know," Harry said wonderingly. "There's something I'm supposed to do eventually I think, but I don't know what it is yet. I can do something with my shadow I haven't tried yet: it doesn't seem to be attached to me."

Their food lay cold, forgotten.

Violet finally nodded. "That all makes sense. It would explain everything I've been seeing. But didn't you kill Voldemort last year? Why hasn't this happened to you until now?"

Harry shrugged. "I don't know. I'll have to ask Araeva."

Violet frowned. "Araeva? That's his name?"

Harry could tell it bothered her somehow. He nodded. "What?"

Violet bit her lip. "It sounds familiar, like I've heard it somewhere before…"

"If you remember where, tell me," Harry said and she nodded.

Harry picked at his cold food.

"Can I ask you a personal question?" He asked.

Violet looked at him sharply. "Alright."

"Why are you so cold to people all the time?"

Violet's eyes went wide, and she considered his question. "I have to."

"What do you mean?" Harry asked. "If you were as nice to other people as you are to me they probably wouldn't dislike you so much."

"No," Violet shook her head. "It's how I defend myself. If they're not my friends, and they don't like me, then I don't care about them. I can't care about them."

"Does this have to do with true sight?"

Violet nodded. "See if everyone was my friend, every time something sad happens to them, and they are a little low or someone is cruel to them, it upsets me. I can see all of their emotions, and I get tied up in their emotions instead of mine, and I spend all my time trying to make everyone around me happy all the time. And nobody is happy all the time."

Harry considered this. That sounds really hard.

"I consider you to be a friend," Violet told him, "And you can already see this beginning to happen. Yesterday I said something that made you uncomfortable and upset, and I immediately tried to appease you even though it wasn't what I really wanted. I was dying to find out what makes you look to me like you do in true sight, but I told you it was okay even though it wasn't."

"You don't have to worry about upsetting me," Harry assured her. "I can handle it."

Violet shrugged. "It doesn't work like that. I can't help it."

Then Harry and Violet noticed that the other trainees were already meeting in front of the fort, and they hurried to catch up.

The evening challenge was a game of relay tag, where you had to sneak up on the other teams in the forest without them seeing or hearing you. Bastian and Ron would have won, but it ended in a tie because Violet could use her true sight to see where everyone was. Harry was beginning to see how true sight could be used to advantage in many of their challenges; it didn't really seem fair to the other teams. Harry asked Violet if she was able to turn it off, but she just shook her head regretfully.

Harry had to admit he was cheating a little bit as well: he could hear where the others were by their thoughts. He could tune out their words, but he could still hear the hum of somebody's mind as they neared him. Their team could have won easily if they had been on task.

The next day was Advanced Defense against the Dark Arts, which was immediately Harry's favorite subject. The day after that they needed to study, and Harry decided since it was the only day off he would spend some time with Ron. Violet immediately withdrew, but she seemed understanding. She studied by herself in the small workroom while Harry was with Ron and Bastian. The three of them had a lot of fun, but come Monday Harry wished he had studied with Violet. They were tested for several hours on the material of the previous week, and Harry had seriously underestimated his own need to study. Some of the tests Harry could have passed by reading minds, but he made sure he didn't.

Since he tested so badly, Harry spent the next week completely focused on their material. He took all the notes he could, did well on the challenges, and studied hard. He tested better, but didn't have any time to test out his new abilities.

Every night, Harry's mind was filled with dreams. They started where they had left off, when he had been seven years old and just met Araeva. Araeva had given him lessons almost every day, and Harry found himself suddenly full of facts, stories and spells that he didn't know before. His seven year old self was completely devoted to Araeva, convinced he was the best thing that had ever happened to him. Harry still wasn't so sure. After all, Araeva had freely admitted that Dumbledore would have tried to put an end to it if he had known.

Best of all was Violet. She calmly accepted his secret, and he had someone to talk to. She studied just as hard as he did, and proved to be intelligent and have a quick mind. She continued to treat others with contempt, but when it was just the two of them she was always nice. Ron was usually agitated when she was around, and sent her dark glares. Harry usually managed to keep them apart.

And so two more weeks passed before anything eventful happened. The trainees fell into a familiar, if challenging routine and Harry began to like Deeperbourg.