Harry helps the cursed and Mikhail and Aska return home.
A/N: I own nothing, it's all Rowling's
Chapter Eight - Of Sand and Stone
Harry leaned against the sandstone wall of the tiny windowless and door-less cell that he found himself in. He had been there for hours and he was beginning to think that he was going to be trapped forever. He'd tried everything to get himself out but even with Merlin's magic he couldn't break out of the tiny prison that he was trapped in. It was sweltering in the tiny prison and he had long ago discarded his shirt and light cloak, which were soaked in sweat. He'd tried meditating for a while to keep himself calm, but every time he thought that he had found himself in a state of relaxation and calmness, something in the back of his mind would start to make him panic again and broke his meditation.
Harry called out again for the hundredth time. Again, no one answered his cries. How had he let himself be duped by the ring that he couldn't even remove, no matter how much he tried? Why did he always get himself in these situations? How did he always get himself in these situations? Harry slammed his fist into the wall in anger and tried again to blast at the stonewall with his magic, with no effect. The only thing it served was to make him even more tired. He had no idea where he was. His father had no idea where he was. He could die here and no one would know.
Harry took a deep breath in. "Look," Harry tried a knew approach, rather then screaming his head off to be released. "I don't know who you think I am, but this blooding ring had some kind of mind control over me. I don't even know how I got here. The last thing I remember was putting on the ring," Harry said tiredly, not expecting any answer, so he was startled when there was one.
"Come now, Nicodemus, you put this curse on me and then expect me to believe that you are under some kind of control from a ring?" A female voice laughed. "It's too much, really. Stop making me laugh. You are getting exactly what you deserve!" the woman, who Harry couldn't see, spat.
"What? No. I'm not Nicodemus, my name is…" Harry stopped. What did he have to loose, he was already in a prison. "My name is Harry Potter. Please let me go. You have got the wrong person."
"Oh please, you expect me to believe that story! Ha!" the women laughed cruelly. "Harry Potter is dead, even I who have no contact with the outside world have heard that."
"Look, surely you know what Nicodemus looks like. If you look at me you will…" Harry began to reason, but was cut off.
"Look at you! I can not look upon anyone because of your curse!" The woman screamed. "Enough of this, Nicodemus, you shall meet your fate now!"
Harry stepped away from the wall as a small block slid out from the wall and a large black and red snake slithered through the opening. Harry's eyes widened as he looked at the huge python sized snake.
"Attack, kill him!" the women shouted in unmistakable Parseltongue.
The snake reared up until it was eye level with Harry. Harry had backed himself into the far wall, which wasn't that far to back away. "No!" Harry hissed in panicked Parseltongue as the snake lunged at him and he raised his right hand ready to cast a wandless spell.
The snake stopped abruptly and looked at him through golden eyes. "You speak? Yet you are not a creature of serpents, but you are branded one."
Harry let out a shaky breath, he wasn't quite sure what the snake meant by being branded a serpent perhaps his dark mark, but he was just about to agree to anything to keep his life. "Yes. Please let me go. I have nothing against your mistress. I am not who she seeks."
The snake looked contemplative for a moment as he looked Harry straight in the eyes and then he turned and left through the small hole in the wall. Harry waited for several long silent minutes before the woman spoke again.
"My serpent tells me you speak his language. He also tells me that you are not the man I seek and everything you have said is true." The woman was silent for another minute. "I will release you, but do not look upon me or you will turn to stone."
"Turn to stone?" Harry asked quietly, what kind of curse was put upon this women? "Alright, I will keep my eyes closed." Harry shut his eyes as he said this.
Harry immediately felt the stone around him had disappeared and a cool breeze brushed his bare torso. He wanted to open his eyes and see where he was, but he kept them shut. Though, he almost opened them when he felt a gentle hand on his shoulder.
"I must apologize to you. I cursed the ring you wear to bring me Josef Nicodemus, I had no idea it would take control of you. You must be as powerful as he or the ring would not recognize you."
Harry nodded in understanding. He was a powerful Wizard whether he liked it or not. "May I ask your name?"
"Ashea, my name is Ashea," she whispered by his right ear. "I have never met someone with the ability to converse with serpents that was not part serpent themselves. How did you come upon such an ability?" The women asked lightly. Harry could feel the warmth from her breath and it sent a tingling sensation up his spine.
"I was born with it. I inherited it from my ancestor Salazar Slytherin," Harry answered after he swallowed hard as he felt her hand run lightly across his chest and trace some of the spider vanes that we still quite visible.
"Slytherin; Nicodemus used to spit upon that name. He hated serpents. Said they were evil. Do you agree? You use Slytherin's name as if it's a curse to you."
Harry took a deep breath in as he felt her hand on his cheek and his heartbeat sped up. "No, serpents aren't evil," he managed to whisper as he felt her breath near his lips. What was she doing?
"Good," she whispered before he felt her soft lips on his.
Harry was so startled that he open his eyes to look into the most beautiful eyes he had ever seen. They were the color of liquid twilight. The woman immediate pushed away from him and hid her face with her hands.
"I told you not to look upon me, and now another is stone," she whispered, keeping her face covered by her hands as she started to cry.
Harry looked at the young woman as she hid away from him. She wore a white robes, which brought out the rest of her with stark clarity and almost seemed to make her glow. He took a hesitant step back. He could see the curse upon her, but he could also see who she was underneath and he found her to be the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. He took a step closer to her. "You were cursed to be a gorgon?" Harry asked in a whisper, his voice did not hold revulsion, but curiosity. It took a lot of magic to give someone that curse. It was one of the curses in Slytherin's Diary; it was a very old curse.
Ashea looked up from her hands with startled eyes. "How?" she whispered. "That's impossible, no one escapes my sight."
Harry again stepped closer to her. "I don't know, but you're beautiful," he whispered. He almost felt mesmerized by her. Harry could see that the curse was breaking, and he wondered if it had something to do with the ring that was stuck on his right ring finger. Maybe it allowed him to see through the curse and that was what was breaking it. Her hair that he had clearly seen as hundreds of snakes moments ago was now soft brown ringlets that cascaded down her back and shoulders.
Ashea first looked at her hands that had once been gray, but were now normal skin color and soft like the rest of her skin. She ran her hand through here hair and lifted it to her eye level. A wide smile came to her face as tears came to her eyes. "You've broken the curse," she cried as she looked up to Harry. "Thank you," she whispered and then threw her arms around him and kissed him quite deeply.
"I have no idea how I did it, but you're welcome," Harry said quietly after the kiss was broken. Ashea looked into his eyes and then backed away from him with a smile on her face. Harry smiled back.
"You have given my mistress a gift. You have freed her without asking anything in return. So I shall give you a gift," the large snake hissed as he circled around Harry and wrapped himself around him before Harry had a chance to move. Harry didn't even have a second to scream out before the snakes large fangs sunk into his shoulder and Harry felt the venom coursing through his body as his eyes lost focus. "Relax and let my magic heal you. I am an ancient and powerful serpent, older then your ancestor. My mistress saved my life, now I shall save yours."
Harry could feel himself loosing consciousness as the snake released him, but he didn't feel himself hit the cold ground as someone laid him gently down. He felt warmth spread through his body, before his mind caught up to him and he realized what the snake had done for him. Harry's eyes snapped open and his brow furrowed in confusion.
"You had a curse upon you as well it seems and my serpent has released you from it," Ashea said gently as she looked down at him. Harry felt tears come to his eyes and slide down his temple from the corner of his eyes. Ashea wiped them away with her soft fingers.
"I'm free…" Harry whispered before he gave into the blackness that was creeping into his vision and lost consciousness.
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"I have a bad feeling about this, James," Aska said for the fifth time as they followed the wolf deeper into the desert.
"Yes, you've said that," James said as he walked.
"I've been exiled, when they find out who I am…"
"I'll stand up for you. You helped me get home. I will help prove your innocents," Mikhail said with out stopping as she walked quickly beside James. "You have every right to return to your family as I have."
"That's another thing, how exactly are you going to prove my innocents. They think I've murdered someone from the royal family. That's a rather huge offense," Aska ranted.
"Do not worry," Mikhail said with a sly smile on her face, which only proved to irritate Aska. Ever since they had met, Mikhail had proved very adept at getting under Aska's skin. It was a source of amusement for both Nemaek and James.
"You know, you didn't have to come with us, Aska. In fact, you could have gone back to the nice solidarity of the Grove after dropping off my son," James said as he walked passed Aska who had stopped momentarily during his rant.
Aska moved to catch up with them. "Right, and let you lot have all the fun? I think not!"
Nemaek laughed from the air above them. "Something tells me that the two of you will never change."
"And why should we? It keeps us on our toes," Aska replied to the bird.
"Or, rather it keeps you at each other's throats," Mikhail laughed.
"Oi, I see something up ahead. I think we may have finally arrived," Nemaek said as he flew lower to the group.
"Didn't you say that before, and last time it was a mirage?" Aska remarked and Nemaek swatted him on the head with his long tail feathers.
"Go on and look for yourself if you don't believe me."
Aska and the others squinted and Mikhail squealed like a little girl. "Jay, it's the city. It's home. I'm home!"
James looked at her a little funny and Bill was still squinting into the distance. "I don't see anything," Bill commented.
Aska rolled his eyes. "You will, just wait till we get closer. We're still outside the wards."
After a minute the wolf they had been following stopped and looked back at the group. He shifted form, back into a man. "Wait here. I have to announce you," there was a smirk on the dark haired Aker's face as he turned to leave and Aska growled angrily before Mikhail put a hand on his shoulder.
"Relax, he's only part Aker, his opinion shouldn't matter to you," Mikhail whispered and looked at their guide's back with superiority.
The group watched as he disappeared and that was when James and Bill let out low whistles. "Wow, I didn't know we were so close," James said as the large gates to the city suddenly appeared to all of them.
Mikhail looked fondly at the city before them and then tears came to her eyes and James wrapped an arm around the girl. "It's alright, I'm sure they'll accept you back." James laid to rest one of Mikhail's fears and she smiled up at him.
It seemed like forever as they waited and Nemaek and Aska had started up another argument, but this time were joined by Bill, who had been laughing at the two. James looked back over the see of sand; already their tracks had vanished, swept away by the desert wind.
"James, are you alright?" Mikhail asked as she noticed the worry in his eyes.
"I just had a feeling, like something has happened to my son," James shook his head and looked back at the closed gates to the Aker city. "I just wish I knew where he was."
"I'm sure Harry's fine. That ring he had on. It was made by the Aker and the Aker are protectors. It will protect him, I'm certain of it," Mikhail said with conviction.
James looked down at her and nodded. "You're probably right," James said with a small smile on his lips and then looked up when the gates were opened. Aska, Bill, and Nemaek had stopped arguing to gape at who had come to greet them. They had sent a little girl.
The child looked upon them with crystal blue eyes, much like Mikhail's and she wore a long white dress that just touched the sand at her bare feet. Her long black hair was gathered in a loose bun on top of her head and curls spilled out of it and encompassed her young face. "Welcome travelers, I am Princess Corpora. I will lead you to the High Council. I would not suggest wandering off," the girl said with a sternness that none of them expected out of the child. As she said this two men appeared at her side, each held a staff made out of blue gold and radiated power.
"I really have a bad feeling about this," Aska whispered as he eyed the two guards that he knew well.
Mikhail was the first to step forward. She didn't appear fazed by the greeting or the guards and smiled to the others encouragingly. The others followed her, all eyeing the guards as four more took up posts around them.
The young princess led them through the city a fair ways. They entered into a square that held many people, all of them eyeing the new arrivals with some trepidation as they passed. They were stopped in front of a raised dais where four individuals sat, two men and two women.
One of the women stood up and pointed at Aska. "Seize him!" she ordered and James moved to block the guards before Aska shook his head and he stepped aside reluctantly. "You were ordered never to come back, under penalty of death, Aska de Aker," the woman said sternly and James looked to Aska with some confusion in his eyes.
"Is it just me or do you all have the same last name?" James muttered to Mikhail and she smirked slightly before she stepped forward in front of the council members.
"My name is Mikhail de Aker and as a royal I demand that this man be pardoned of any crime he may be charged with." There were several gasps from the crowd and all of the council members stood up in shock. A woman broke away from the crowd and ran towards Mikhail. James had his wand drawn, incase the woman wanted to harm her.
"Mikhail, by baby, you are alive," the woman collapsed to her knees and Mikhail was at her side with a smile of her face.
"Mother!" Mikhail exclaimed and threw her arms around the nearly distraught woman.
James watched the interaction with a sad smile on his face as he put his wand away just to have a wand pointed into his face seconds later. James stared at the wand and then the man that held it and his knees nearly gave out.
"Remus, stop!" Bill shouted before the man had a chance to get a curse out.
"Who are you?" Remus demanded with a growl to his voice. The guards had started to move closer to the group and Mikhail had stood and raised her wand at Remus' back.
James looked back to his old friend. "James Potter." James hadn't used that name in over fifteen years and it felt almost foreign coming out of his mouth.
"Impossible, James Potter is dead!"
"Remus, it is James, I was as shocked at you are, but believe it, he's James," Bill tried to reason with the angry werewolf, but the fire wasn't dying from the man's eyes.
"Drop your wand and get away from him now, or so help me Merlin, I don't care who you are, I will kill you," Mikhail growled and her eyes flashed dangerously.
The wind suddenly picked up in the square and a whirlwind of sand formed in the center. When it dispersed a woman with long brown hair was standing where the small cyclone had been and a large red and black snake was wrapped around her. Several screamed at seeing her and the guards moved away from James and the others to confront the new arrival. Before they had a chance a large black wolf appeared in front of her and snarled showing his sharp teeth with his emerald eyes blazing.
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A/N: Finally, a new chapter, and another soon to come. :)
