Hey fellow readers,

As you can tell I'm a slow updater, but when I start something I aim to finish it. So here you go!

-Leals


Days passed by uneventfully. Only counted by my missed presence at breakfast and lunch- including my consistently tardy appearances at supper. I became a ghost, or as close as I could get to one without flouncing around with my transparent head hanging by a few pieces of straggling skin.

The few days I speak of, mundane and seemingly endless, were just filled with my silence and inevitable boredom. I showed up to classes mere seconds before the clock struck tardy, and rushed to the exit before the teachers had even finished uttering our dismissals.

Not even one small parcel reprehending my recent mishaps was sent from Gellert. He was uncharacteristically silent for a micromanaging German volcano.

I received odd looks from some of the more nosy and involved Slytherins, when they did catch sight of me that is. Only Leander and his cronies ever spared a moment more for a snicker in my direction. And Gatsby had taken to clenching his jaw profusely during potions whilst zapping me every couple seconds with his constant contact. Ironically only putting himself in more danger as I struggled to remain focused on all parts of the potion brewing process.

The distraction at least helped me get the most mediocre of E's.

Still, it was a slow torture I had brought upon myself.

Filled with quiet, yet foreboding, solitude.

I found myself glancing over my shoulder every couple steps, ducking around corners and taking the less traveled and cleaned hallways to move around the castle.

I would've never verbally confirmed it, but I was afraid.

His, Gatsby's, magic was no trick, no joke to be brushed off like the dirt from the dodgy public school yard sand box.

If Gellert knew this kid existed. If he knew what attention I had drawn, I would probably be taking tea with my old professors; in the graveyard; six feet under; blue as a summer sky. "Unconfirmed" as their deaths currently were, I was sure I would have joined them.

Kore had taken to trailing after me whenever she spotted me. Her insane mutterings offered me solace, and mutely I appreciated it by allowing her to stay. It was getting to be too late to stop attention being drawn to me anyways, even if I was behaving like a ghost now.

Gellert spoke as if people's words and concentration were tools to be manipulated and easily predicted. I, having lived in this environment of sodden teenage hormones and oily acned declarations of individuality, knew for a fact that a teenage mind, nay a teenage wizard's mind, was a complex and troublesome concept. Not some formaldehyde drenched dead frog to easily be dissected by a discerning eye.

And my silence was only breeding grounds for festering rumors and suppositions to take hold.

I was ruining myself with Gellert's advice.

But I dared not defy the man, he obviously was the greater wizard between us two and probably knew best.

And so, holding onto my introverted persona and falsified patience, I continued onward.

My missed lunches and breakfasts made me weaker as mere days turned into a mere few weeks. I became tired more easily by the simplest of tasks, and had trouble climbing the copious amount of moving stairs without becoming intensely winded. Even my voice grew rasp with it's frequent disuse.

The teacher's barely even acknowledged my small figure haunting their classrooms; to them, I guess, I was just another mediocre E student.

Therefore, of course, no one noticed my sudden change in pallor, or baggy clothes. In fact, with my sudden sallow visage, I seemed to have gained enough ghost-like qualities to deter even the formidable Leander and his harlots.

And so I glided down the hallways and through my classes with the occasional painful jolt of magic from the cold marbled fingers of Gatsby, my kind reminder that there would be a price to pay.

And pay I would.

It happened on a Thursday. The day started much like Wednesday, with my creaking bones unfolding from the crumpled heap of damp sheets at the end of the bed at an early hour. My sad body was awoken by the lonely howling of my own hoarse voice; the dreamless nightmares were a constant companion now.

By now the lumpy mess of exploded orange corrosive acid in Potions was but the last fall leaf on a tree of half conceived rumors. They had moved on to more important matters, like The Hallows eve dance. Or the distant winter formal, both indefinitely more interesting than my clumsy blundering.

Encouraged by the lack of attention I was receiving, even from my own dorm-mates, I braved one or two lunches a week, always making sure to disappear as soon as I had wrapped my food securely in a napkin.

On these two days of my wandering from routine, I would hide out in one of the many curtained alcoves in the lower halls near the dungeons. Bathed in an ethereal eternal light of lake green, I would brave a chapter or two of one of my many old tomes bestowed by Gellert onto me.

Today, I had chosen a smaller, even more secluded alcove that branched off from one of the hallways of abandoned classrooms, said to have at one point housed lords and ladies of the mighty fine lands of Scotland. All rumors I suppose.

This windowed ledge, of course, still looked out only upon the under-waters of the mossy lake; once in a while a shadowed figurine of a fish or unsuspecting creature would pass by, disturbing the solidarity. I had taken my outer Hogwarts crested robe and transfigured it into a plush embroidered pillow; intricate threads intertwined, creating a rather somber field of half bloomed poppies. It reminded me of a French painting I once had seen in a dingy public school history book.

For a while, I simply stared at the small drooping petals of the slumbering flaxen pods as they swayed in a gentle breeze framed by turbulent gray skies. No longer interested in the pretty charm, I placed the magicked pillow behind my back, uttered a minuscule cushioning charm for my bum, and pulled out my latest tome of interest- Hexes and Charms: The Theory of Relative Context.

It was not easy reading. I chose it specifically to distract me from the situation and my past failures. I was letting down my teacher, his cause, and these poor delusional students.

I mean, perhaps the present could be considered as a victory. I was finally becoming an unknown, practically invisible, and I could move around the hallways without an eye constantly following me. But I was weak. And being watched by probably the most dangerous person at this institution.

Cracking open the dusty thick pages of my book, I set about passing the rest of lunch.

Slam!

The sound of my extremely heavy and ancient tome dropping to the floor awoke me from my dozing. Instinctively, I peered outside the window looking for some sunlight, some way to spot the time.

The heavy anchor of a steamer dropped in the little stomach acid contained in my stomach, the butterflies kicking up at their uninvited visitor. The middle part of my body started to get an uncomfortable twinge, the one a person usually get's when they realize they left the oven on at home.

Scenarios ran through my head: the possibility of missing the rest of lunch, sleeping so long I was declared missing and or dead, people trying to find me, Gellert finding out about my abduction via newspaper, and -you know- missing potions. All extremely valid and possible scenarios.

If only I could tell the time, and be let out of the mystery. How long had I slept?

Of course, we always forget we have a watch when we are in a panic.

Luckily, after five minutes of frozen panic, I bent down and picked up the book I had been blaming for all my problems and caught sight of my fancy wizarding wristwatch.

Some of my musings had been somewhat accurate: I had slept through lunch, and almost all of potions. There also was exactly five minutes until Slughorn dismissed his class.

The least I could do was scamper off to my bed and behind the soundproof curtains before the others were let loose. With extra determination, I quickly shrunk the book and deposited it into my beaded purse; smoothing down the crumpled pleats of my loose pinafore dress with hurried hands, I left the comfort of the heavy velvet curtains, briskly pacing down the hallway towards the more populated parts, and the snake's common room.

I did not banally run into some important person, nor was I attacked from behind, but rather addressed loudly by a booming and imposing voice. The smooth sultry undertones instantly forgotten in the authoritative musical lines the voice produced when shouting "Alexandria!"

Yes, with the "ia." How irritating.

It could have been several people. And if I was daft like most of the people at the school I may have spent a couple seconds uselessly pondering whom it could be, my ego loving that I could name off all the people whom knew me-without seeming uncultured of course.

Alas, I never could seem to find stroking my ego to be particularly useful.

And so, instantaneously, I turned. Catching the icy gaze of our Grecian god himself, Gatsby.

Do not think my sarcasm equates hate, no indeed it does not. It is merely a last ditch effort by my defense mechanisms to put up a fight.

"You are not in Potions." A statement. A quite obvious statement. One point Gatsby.

"I'm not." I took one long stare at his nearing figure. He was but a couple feet away from me now. "You aren't, either."

"I'm not." He was parroting me. I could see it in the way he smiled, he was patronizing me. He stopped walking. Only a foot away from me, in poking distance really. He lightly combed a hand through his perfectly parted hair. "Ditching is not acceptable, Alex-andr-ia." Seemingly reading my mind he continued before I could butt in. "I had permission to leave the classroom, I'm a prefect." He tapped at the shiny gold pin on his robe slowly.

"Oh." I meant to walk away, nay, sprint and flee the scene and scary Gatsby. But his hand reached out and clamped down on my shoulder before I could even turn a foot in the opposite direction.

"You should come with me Alexandria, Dippet would probably be thrilled to hear about this." He seemed excited. I bet he was, from the way his fingers dug into my shoulder, this was most definitely a form of payback for him.

I was almost certain Gellert would hear about this; I'd rather face Gellert's wrath by owl than face Gatsby's suffocating power alone and so I willingly went with him to keep our time alone brief.

Sadly, when playing with my life the fates never seemed to consider my opinions on things. And so I was dragged down the hallway, soon I was lost.

"I'm pretty sure Dippet's office is not in the deepest darkest part of the dungeon." We had been walking for several minutes now and the bleary sunlight of midday was no where close to appearing anytime soon. Gatsby was taking me deeper into the damp musty cells of Hogwarts' underbelly.

"A short cut I assure you, Alexandria." There he went with the "ia" again; if it weren't for the fact that I was a seasoned Occulemency user, I would think he was picking my mind apart for my pet peeves to use ruthlessly against me. Of course, that was impossible. Simply suppositions on my part.

And so I made my reply a timid and unsure "Okay."

As the torches along the walls kept counted flickers of the time passing while we edge lower and lower into the castle, the weary clunk of my regret-anchor sounded in the pool that was my stomach.

With only his measured footsteps and my scuffing as company, I began to count the torches. When I got to twelve, he stopped in front of an old dusty painting. Fresh smudges where the dirt had been displaced allowed the gilded frame to shine through. It was probably a door way.

I looked over sideways at the passive facade of Mister Gastby. He seemed to be deep in thought, his angular handsomeness shrouded in even more shadow than usual, an ominous glint took to his oceanic eyes.

Perhaps he was telling the truth, perhaps this was but merely a magical short cut to Dippet's lair of dullness and stupidity. I attempted to calm myself, it was the just the light- or lack of it- making him seem so cold. No, he was just another study-crazed student doing his solemn duty to keep order, hence the recently polished prefect pin.

His eyes caught mine as a hunter does catch a jittery hare. I gave him, what felt like a pretty genuine and brave, encouraging smile. He just as quickly turned towards an old faded painting of a slumbering snake and shoved it open. The snake startled with a grumpy hiss.

Behind the painting their was a stairway illuminated by torches, casting a uncharacteristic warm glow over the stone steps. The descending stone steps. This almost assuredly wasn't leading to Dippet's classroom, less he have a secret bat cave bellow ground, serving as some sort of bomb shelter or the likes.

"After you." His sultry and sweet charismatic tones would have soothed me, had I been a duller less educated version of myself, actually born in the forties. Alas I was not. I was a modern gal and could think for myself.

"No." I began to step back in retaliation, but his hand firmly made contact with my back and pulses of large shocking energy sent me forward again and stumbling down the illuminated stairwell.

"What are you doing?"

"You already know Alexandria." Begrudgingly, I walked in front of the boy, trying to keep a couple inches between me and his outstretched hand.

"Nope. I really don't think I do." I began to subtly draw my wand from my robe sleeve as we descended.

"Patience Alexandria." I stopped at a crossing we came to at the bottom of the stairs, the hallways were beginning to get considerably smaller than that of the doorway and stairwell.

I'm not saying I'm naturally claustrophobic, or that if stuck in an elevator I would panic, but I do have a perfectly normal rational fear of being crushed by walls.

"Turn to the left, if you will." That was most definitely not a suggestion.

"Let me go." I attempted to turn around and hex the bollocks off of him, but his magic stilled me. Soon, I was placed under a silent body binding hex- my wand comfortably resting in his robe pocket- and levitated a few paces in front of an impatient and slightly peeved Gatsby, at least that's how I imagined he was now reacting. I couldn't exactly see anything but the dull rough blackness that was the hall's narrow ceiling.

I really must've been getting rusty from all this sitting duck business.

So logically I denounced, while being levitated for Merlin knows how long that I would blame Gatsby besting me on Gellert, because Gellert made me act like a dormant little sycophant. And here we are now, captured and awaiting execution by a devilishly handsome maniac boy-man.

I was still quite verbal though, even if I was supposed to be a timid submissive girl, and I only began to protest more. Gellert would not be pleased to know what peril I was in- that I allowed myself to get in. Even if it was indirectly his fault.

Thinking about it logically, my constant inaudible screaming of "AHHHHHH" did not provide any aide. In fact, I'm pretty sure it only enraged the zapping maniac controlling my bound body's movements more. It also plausibly explained why he accidentally dropped me on the stone floor after a minute of my constant screeching.

And when Gatsby started levitating me again, a solid invisible mass had stuffed its way down my voice pipes, muting me and making my breathing difficult.

After a minute of silence and his second hand shoes clacking, he levitated me into what seemed to be a chamber, the ceilings arched up almost half of another story, carved in the same dark stone as the passageway except smoothed out and decorated in slithering snakes and delicate stone Grecian vines.

Candle light flickered against the vaulted ceilings, relaying the other occupants in the room to me through their shadowed figures. Approximately six people, not including Gatsby, currently shuffled around the room mumbling "M'lord" and such to my captor.

It was definitely a cult.

Oh dear fuckin' Merlin.

Albeit I've never seen a cult in person, but if I had this would be it.

I was carelessly tossed onto a stone slab in the middle of the room, where each domed section of the ceiling met in a single high point.

"You should be ecstatic Alexandria, you're the first sacrifice in a century to be made in this chamber, on that slab." If I hadn't been muted I would have found a way to saying something biting with sarcasm between screams of terror. But I also wouldn't have began to focus on loosening the invisible bonds, that suffocated me, with my limited, yet powerful, wand-less magic.

Knowing I had the ability to fight these men if I could free myself, I paused.

Gellert wants assimilation and a helpless exterior to keep suspicion away.

Yet if I did not defend myself these children would start an experiment on me that could be fatal or, even worse, permanent. And looking at the cold dark glass of Gatsby's eyes, the permanence was very evident.

But I must remain true to Gellert's cause, he can not be found out.

And so I stopped the mental wand-less struggle with my binds.

I left that ring on my finger, and I let Tom Riddle begin his stupid bloody idiotic sacrificial experiment thing and prayed that if there was a god, he would be just.

There was no god.

Unless it was a god of silence and inaction. Then there was a very able god indeed.

From what I could see within the peripheral of my view of the wall, the other people in the room had formed a loose circle around me and Gatsby.

Gatsby was currently stalking around me adding binding spells that literally weighed me down. With each mutter from Gatsby's smooth pink lips, my chest compressed more; my rib-cage screamed in pain and begged the rest of me for relief. The rest of me just shrugged in response.

The whole ship was going down, not just a mast.

Satisfied-I would imagine- that he had completely cocooned me in his forceful magic, Gatsby leaned over and gazed directly into my eyes. Our two glares clashed and battled; he simply brushed off my silent anger with a nonchalant smirk.

Stepping towards my arm, he ripped away at my clothing until my left arm laid bare to the stone ceiling above. A cool damp air kissed the pale underside of my left arm. Fingers brushed lightly over my blue veins, leaving an electric shock in their wake.

"Bring me the potion." One pair of shaky steps moved closer towards us.

"M'lord." The voice was muffled and submissive.

"First time getting a tattoo dearie?" My stomach rolled, a tattoo, what the fuck did he want to mark me for? Dark arts was the only thing that came to mind and yeah, I almost peed myself. So what?

He leaned over me so I caught a good heap of the sarcastic smile he created just for me. Oh the mocking was worse than the waiting. Just get it over with Gatsby, stop with the semantics.

Obviously his question was rhetorical, me being silenced and all kind of put a damper on real conversation. I tried again to convey my displeasure through my eyeballs.

His minion finally returned after a good five minutes of his taunting words and smiles.

"M'lord." A low voice offered to Gatsby. His chiseled jawline and cold eyes disappeared from my vision for a second, he reappeared again and pried my lips apart with deft fingers. Laying a glass vial against my paralyzed bottom lip, he grinned manically.

"If this works gentleman, we can proceed as planned. We will be a brotherhood, my knights!" I just looked at the charismatic glow he rapidly adopted when giving a pep talk to his cult. It almost made me feel better, you know, if I hadn't been targeted as their guinea pig.

The steam from the warm liquid in the vial heated my nose while he talked, and then my throat as her poured the entire contents into me. Gosh I wish he'd sat me down and explained the side affects, like a doctor or something. It couldn't be worse than the Cruciatus curse, even though it did taste like pig shit.

My eyes teared up as Gatsby massaged the liquid down my throat with his cold fingers. As the hot liquid descended, the pain escalated until I was faced with spotted vision.

It was not the usual pain one feels if they stub their toe or cut their finger. It did not sting or throb incredibly so in one particular spot.

The pain was a searing void of eternal flames that started at my throat and consumed my entire body. Under the duress, my magic broke through Gatsby's bonds and I began violently thrashing around on the stone altar.

I did not wonder if this was what death felt like, because I imagined death to be softer than this was. I think I cried. I know I finally pissed myself. And I'm pretty sure I emptied my stomach on my wrinkled pinafore dress.

At some point I blacked out. I think Gatsby, who must've been shocked, rebound my limbs to contain the out lash. I came too after being slapped awake by his pretty hands.

The first thing that registered was my bruising headache and the stench.

It was as if I had taken fermented sewage and dabbed it on my wrists, neck, and bosom. You know, like the lady I am.

My left arm throbbed; when I looked down to the pale skin, it was tainted by black ink of a moving snake surrounding a knight with his sword drawn.

With what voice I had left, I attempted to talk.

"Is this it?" I tried to move, but only ended up trying not to hurl. Was the world always tilting like that? What the hell had he done to me?

Gatsby laughed a boisterous laugh.

"Of course not, I am not done with you." Okay that's my que to run away. I tried to get up. He just watched with his eyebrows raised.

And I barfed on myself, again.

It wasn't that he was forcing me to stay, or that I had no desire to leave, but instead my inability to move without hurling that kept me sitting in the midst of Gatsby's cult on that terrible platform. Gatsby was holding court of sorts on the steps of what seemed to be a tribute statue of a man with a very large snake. The statue seemingly swayed, taking judgment over all the tiny humans from his place amongst the ceilings. I imagine he would say something like 'Such stupid simple creatures, cannot even create a magical elevator for a poor cripple Alexandra.' if statues could talk.

Gatsby spoke up, quieting the statue's silent dialogue I had dreamt up.

"You have seen success today on the altar of your ancestors. The purest blood shall be united as one under the hallways of the ancient Hogwarts." I looked around the room, trying to identify the cult members, it was a fruitless attempt. They each wore hoods that covered their hair and faces, although from the arrogant ramrod posture and stature of the one figure on the end, I was almost sure it was Leander Malfoy: the little snake that could.

With crusted and fresh bile splattered on my rags that had once been a pinafore dress, I assume I smelt better than I looked. And from the matted parts of hair stuck to my neck, I could only assume the rest was ten times worse.

The robed figures had formed a long line, and at the front of it sat good ol' Gatsby, high and mighty, getting his robe's hem-lined cleaned with people's dry lips. The cult just kept getting worse and worse.

Honestly, I wondered what Gatsby was going to do with me. I was a witness, I would probably snitch on him and his following. I was a risk. And considering how secret this seemed to be, I could only assume my presence was a problem, experiment or not.

And the flickering candle light shadowing Gatsby's face did nothing to calm my nerves. He looked terrifying. With his sinister smile, dark ceremonial robes and benevolent followers at his beck and call, Tom Riddle really resembled a nightmare in waking form.

I was 99.9% sure I would not be leaving here with recollection of this or, better yet, even alive.

That didn't work for me. See, I had important errands to run, people to spy on, information to cipher, and Gellert to sneak into Hogwarts. I didn't have time to even contemplate death, let alone actually perish.

This sickness, this woozy feeling of the world constantly spinning on three axes at once, it wasn't worse than being under Christophe's Cruciatus. It wasn't worse than Gellert's History of Magic punishments. I could work through it.

Better yet, I could run away, even if I barfed once or twice more as I ran-stumbled. It was all mental, really.

So I attempted to sit up. And this time, though my gut thoroughly protested, I managed to stay sitting. My vision still tried to tilt, but my mind and eyes gave up a nasty fight, leaving my world at a weird, yet manageable forty five degree angle.

Though I was physically drained, my magic thrummed from my finger tips, begging to get out. Gellert's duels had taught my body how to make it through extreme situations of duress.

Casting a disillusionment char, I waited patiently as the spell took hold, hoping all the while that I hadn't been spotted by the grovelers or the groveled.

As soon as the cold light blanket of invisibility rested securely over me, I stepped down from the alter, praying frantically that the sound of my footsteps would be covered by the "M'lords," I only had but a few seconds, at most a minute, before someone took notice.

Therefore I did not tip toe, or even make an attempt at quietness, but instead loudly stumbled around the line of worshipers and down the only hallways that seemed to lead away from the antechamber. If I had thought abut it I probably would have just cast a silencing spell, but this made it a lot more exciting, I guess.

People started yelling in the chamber behind me, "She's gone m'lord!" and "Go find her!" were the last words I heard before my hearing started siphoning off and disappearing on me. I had lost the ability to distinguish sound in my body in its attempt to stay upright and moving.

I leaned my should against the stone wall for a second before moving forward. The torches were still on, so at least I could still see, even if everything was tilted. My stomach jolted and rolled, I had to stop and put more weight against my right shoulder on the wall, whose jagged natural edges embedded themselves into my side.

Robes began to run past my motionless, recuperating, body.

"Do you see her?" a robe yelled, streaming past me, his hood fell away and I watched the long white blond locks flutter behind him in ribbons. Leander Malfoy, you little bastard, I knew it!

My smugness was short lived, I really needed to get out of the underbelly of Hogwarts.

After Gatsby had followed his minions out and had ran past me, I followed them. Hopefully they would lead me to the entrance.

Albeit a bit slower than a healthy Gatsby, I still managed to make good time, using their distant footsteps to keep from getting completely lost.

I pulled up short at the bottom of the same stairs Gatsby had carried me down, waiting for the sound of a door opening before I followed the group up.

"You take the left, the rest of you with me on the right. Spread out and find her now." Gatsby authoritatively yelled, I could hear his displeasure from a story bellow, and it was funny.

I was tickled pink beating him at his own game, running away with secrets he needs kept.

Oh yes, I was having fun. I actually had to stifle a laugh at his anger.

Fumbling my way up the darkened stairwell, I hit the dead end with just enough time to watch the exit disappear again.

I hit the wall with an Alhomara, but nothing happened. I wanted to cry. My body did not posses the strength to have time to deal with Gatsby's stupid security. I felt undoubtedly compelled to blast a hole straight through the stone, but that would draw his attention.

And so I sat down and began to work out the wards he placed on the door. After a wasted ten minutes, the wall popped open, dragging its way sluggishly across the floor. I was left with just enough room to safely squeeze out, and didn't question the doorway when it disappeared again promptly.

My body finally lost it's fight against my organs, and I promptly fell into a heap on the floor in a random section of Hogwarts' dungeon and relieved my stomach of all its contents for the third time. It was actually quite relieving, and reinvigorated me with strength to keep moving in my forty five degree world.

I just needed a shower and a long nap. And maybe a timeturner.

Somehow, I dragged myself back to my dorm unnoticed. And if someone had noticed the footsteps without shoes that made them, they forgot to mention it.

Eventually I made it to my bed. I promise you I was going to take a shower, but then I passed out. So that was that.