Chapter 8 Nightshade Forests

A/N: Fare warning. Be prepared for my most unrealistic plot twist yet coming up here in this chapter.

Review Response: For anyone wondering about my mentioning of memes, one of Harry's contacts from the last chapter, Azurial Crystallux is a time traveler, so has knowledge of times he shouldn't. He'll also be the only contact who actively remembers meeting Harry the first time.

Harry Potter was either very skilled, or very lucky. Igor Karkaroff couldn't exactly decide which. Maybe he was both? That begged a different point, he could sense the Dark Lord somewhere near the kid. It was the only way he could tell that this Mr. Grant wasn't who he said he was. Viktor Krum was a dour, rather heavy set for a Seeker, man, who looked like he could cool off a Caligula style orgy just by walking through the door. Harry wasn't intimidated at all by the threatening looks he was receiving from the Durmstrang Staff, which was undoubtedly pissed that he had walked in on them getting ready for what the students were calling the Tri-Wizard Tournament. Finally, when the glares were burning hotter than a blacksmith's fire, Harry just shouted, " Karkaroff! Tell your teachers to cool the fuck off, or they will find out exactly how easy it was for me to break through your wards!"

Unfortunately, before Karkaroff could answer, a letter appeared on the desk between them. Karkaroff read off, " It is for you, Mr. Grant."

Harry slit the letter open, and only barely managed to keep himself composed.

"To the Lord of the Ice,

This is Padfoot, I come to tell you that everything is in order. I'm afraid, old friend, that my time is coming quick. My arms aren't moving like they used to, and it takes everything I've got to get up for my morning constitution. As you know, Necrosis runs in my family, so I beg you please be careful about marrying someone too closely related to me. Even if it isn't an active gene, I urge you to avoid families such as the Malfoy's (luckily, they have not daughters). They may still carry it, and to my knowledge, the gene only shows itself in males.

Secondly, I would like to inform you that I have given the order to kill on sight should it become necessary. White Cloak is really stepping up patrols, and he has the Big Fudge in his pockets. Slimy Git is more Batty than usual. Cup is Crucio. Marauder Out!

Padfoot"

Harry quickly deciphered the code. So Snape and Dumbledore were behind the whole thing, and Fudge bought into it without a second thought. Typical. Oh, and Sirius was dying of a familial condition known as Necrosis. It was a hereditary disease that had afflicted the Lords of Black ever since the family came into existence. Considering that the Blacks could trace their history all the way back to Dennis, son of Roland, Prince of an Unknown Land and brother of Peter, it was shocking that not a single Lord Black had ever lived past age forty.

Sirius had discovered the disease, which his pureblood parents thought was a curse. Sirius had gotten concerned one day when Isis Miyashi ( his time's version of Cho Chang) naked couldn't get his dick to harden for ten full minutes. Sirius was furious, because by then, she was not interested in the sins of the flesh, more of trying to avoid trouble. So he went looking around to see what the hell was wrong. Finally, he decided to go to a Muggle Doctor, and they ran some tests on him. They revealed the fatal disease, and that he was likely to pass it on to whatever child he had. It was the number one reason that Sirius never wanted children of his own.

Harry shook it off for now, avoiding Viktor's question of his feelings with the typical answer. They couldn't know who it was they were really dealing with. Suddenly, Karkaroff attacked. Harry flittered out of existence, and reappeared directly behind Karkaroff, slamming the Blood Diamond of his staff into Karkaroff's neck. Blood spurted everywhere as the former Death Eater tried to stop the bleeding, but wounds inflicted by a Blood Gemstone, much less a diamond, couldn't be healed by magic. Within seconds, Igor was dead.

At first, the hall was silent. Then, it erupted in kind of a magical fiesta. Helloween was playing on the loudspeakers, Krum was shooting fireworks out of his wand, and some of the professors were taking indecent civil liberties with each other, some students doing it with them. Harry muttered, " What just happened?"

Krum shouted, " You just killed the Headmaster! This is the best day of my life here at Durmstrang!"

Harry's jaw dropped as Tom entered his two cents in, " Traitor deserved it. You should have made him suffer."

Krum suddenly sobered, " Hey, we do kind of need a headmaster of the Tri-Wizard cup. Want to help, Mr. Grant?"

Harry was struck off guard, " Eh, sure. Why not? But I need a favor. How long until the students are needed for the Cup?"

" Five Months. Durmstrang semester start early compared to the English."

Harry nodded, " Good. Are you familiar with the Valley of the Damned?"

Krum immediately paled, but answered, " Of course, in this valley lays the residence of Baba Yaga, Mistress of the Druidic Shadows."

" Also known as Domnu, or the Creeping Darkness, I know. I need to get there."

Krum hesitated, " I will take you to the Forests of the Nightshade, from there, you are on your own."

( Nightshade Forests)

"Keep your wits about you, Potter. You have absolutely no idea what the fuck is in this forest."

" Thanks Tom."

Harry kept his overpowered Lumos spell going to light his path. TIme to be King, he thought as he trudged through the woods. He could see creatures in the darkness, always just outside of his vision, but he remembered the advice that Viktor had given him. NEVER STRAY FROM THE PATH!

Harry had no intent to stray from the path, but he had a feeling that he would need to in order to accomplish his objective. His instincts told him that one of the Four Pillars, Baba Yaga's generals, was in the forest, and he had to be defeated. Yaga had four generals, each named after a color of the Arthurian Knights. The weakest was the Blue Knight, and the most powerful was the Black Knight.

Harry saw a flash of Green in the darkness, and heard a hiss, /You are not welcome, human/

/ It is not your place to decide who is, and who isn't welcome./

/The Mistress will have your head./

A giant snake easily triple the size of the Basilisk he had slain in Second Year came slithering out of the woods. It wasn't a Basilisk, it was one of the Great Wyrms. They were known for their viciousness, and cunning. Harry slammed his staff into the ground, erecting a shield between the two. The Wyrm lurched out, and struck the barrier, electrocuting itself, but shortly after, it reared its ugly head again.

Harry cursed as he leapt aside from the attack. The giant creature continued to follow him as he launched lances of lightning at his enemy whilst on the run. The Creature seemed to be affected by the element of lightning more so than others, so Harry kept raining storms of energy down upon it, while keeping his distance. Suddenly, he noticed that the Creature had forced him into the shadow of some castle that was well off the path.

Harry lashed out with a more ferocious attack than before, a hailstorm complete with lightning and ice. The Wyrm hissed at him, /I've done my job. Good luck with the Green Knight/

Harry watched in disbelief as the giant snake slithered off into the darkness. Harry turned back towards the castle. It was forbidding certainly, and it apparently had one of the Knights within. Harry pushed the gates open, looking, searching, trying to keep all the corners in his eyes at once. In the not so far distance, a wolf howled.

Harry turned instantly in the direction of the wolf. It came slinking out of the shadows. Not only was it huge, for a wolf, it was also green. The same green as his eyes. The wolf turned into a human. Harry almost dropped his staff. Tom put it quite nicely, "WHAT THE FUCK?"

" Hello Harry. I bet you never thought to see your mother again did you?"

Harry almost passed out. His own mother was facing him! He sputtered out, " Impossible, you're dead. Voldemort killed you."

" But he didn't kill my soul, and the Great Lady has given me a new body to play with."

Harry readied his staff, almost wishing he had his wand before remembering that the Goblins were forging it into a sword, " I don't care what illusion this is, but you can tell Baba Yaga that this will not go unpunished!"

" Dear Harry, my only son, do you honestly believe that you can defeat the Great Lady? It will only get you killed."

Harry stared down the red haired woman he had only ever seen in his dreams and pictures, " I don't think so."

" Many others have thought so as well. Would you throw your life away so hastily? One that I gave mine for?"

Harry snorted, " If anything, you are nothing more than an illusion."

"No she isn't."

" What?"

" Yaga is a powerful sorceress who's powers surpass even yours, Harry. She has access to spells so evil and foul that even I wouldn't consider. Does that tell you something? She knew you were coming. But I think I know the spell that brings a soul from the Firmaments, and forces it back into being. Fight! Fight your own mother! Fight her like she was me! Fight her until I can find a counter in my own knowledge!"

Harry took Tom's words to heart. He fired back, firing a lancing storm of electricity at his own mother, who mocked him like Bellatrix Lestrange, " Oh, so my son wants to play now?"

Harry roared in anger, unleashing a flare at her. He conjured barriers to stop the utterly strange magic she was firing at him. He rolled around trying to avoid the black fire. Harry could feel Tom ripping through his mind looking for a spell. Harry rolled aside from another gout of black fire, and launched an orb of mystical energy.

The attack took his enemy off guard, and blasted her back towards the wall. Harry pressed his advantage, shouting, " Fist of Ice!"

A giant fist made of ice manifested at his command, and flew at his mother. Supernatural reflexes allowed her to move away from a crushing blow that would have killed any normal man. Harry began to summon auras to aid him. It had been a while since he had faced an opponent that necessitated the building of his Draining and Chaos Elemental auras. Immediately, his magic was beginning to be taxed in a way he hadn't thought possible. He pulled a blue potion out, and swallowed it in one gulp.

His auras began to suck the magic from the wolves that were being conjured and attacking him. He felt vitality returning to his tired limbs, and he rose to do battle once more.

Suddenly, Fiendfyre began to pound against his barriers. Tom hissed, " Fiendfyre? Did killing her twist her this much?"

Harry grunted as his auras were temporarily overloaded, and he had to set them to cooldown. He pushed his barriers out, smothering and extinguishing the Daemon Fire. Killing Curses came next, but for one as powerful as Harry, extinguishing a Killing Curse was simple and easy. His auras came back online, and began to retrieve magical energy from the environment, as well as the waves of wolves that kept attacking him.

He whipped around, three whips of fire lashing out. The whips tore through the layer of wolves between him and his target, and he fired a sword of flame at her. She leapt aside, and shouted a spell he had never heard before. The earth began to shake. Tom hissed, "Jump fool! Earth Shaker!"

Harry jumped into the air on Tom's command, and the shockwave blew past him without damage. Harry slammed his staff into the earthen ground, unleashing his own earth shaker. His wave was much larger, and rocks began to fall from the ceiling. His opponent blasted him back with an attack he wasn't ready for, but he immediately rebounded shouting, " Secare!"

A wide, ruby red slicing wave of energy flew through the air, slicing all the conjured wolves in half, and beheading his mother. But to his shock, and Tom's, her body simply reformed and began the fight anew. Harry mused in his mind, " Hurry up Tom! I can't keep this up forever!"

" I'm trying Potter! I know there is an Exorcism spell that sends spirits back to the Firmaments! Stop Holding Back damn you! I don't care if she is your mother, your grandmother, or your fucking sister! Fight to kill!"

Harry still couldn't summon the true reserves of power he needed to keep up the stalling fight. He was running out of time, and more wolves joined every new wave he destroyed. Even his Auras weren't granting him the power he needed. A constant barrage of hexes, curses, and similar charms were berating his defenses and draining his power swiftly. Finally, he just snapped.

The last barrier on the reserves of power he had stored in his core in the event of a catastrophe broke free. A blaze of emerald light filled the castle, detonating. In the far distance, at Durmstrang, Viktor Krum gazed out of the tallest tower to see the blooming mushroom cloud in the distance. He muttered, " There is still hope for you then, Headmaster Grant."

Harry somehow reeled himself back in, and saw the entire forest had been completely destroyed, and fire was blazing all around him. He grunted from the heat, but expelled it with a burst of water. Harry began to disfigure the battlefield. Somehow, his mother's spirit had survived his Detonation, and was still hurling all sorts of unpleasant attacks at him. He continued to dodge, realizing that his attacks were not doing any damage, not even the ones that were designed to harm spirits. Finally, Tom shouted, " Dimensional Spirit Rift!"

Harry hesitated for a moment, leapt aside, rolling in mid-air, shouting, " Dimensional Spirit Rift!"

A giant hole opened in the earth under his mother. She screamed, " You bastard! The Great Lady will make you pay for this!"

" See you in Hell!"

Harry ran up and crushed her fingers, allowing her to fall all the way through. Harry fell backwards as the rift closed, and he was tired. Tom commented, " Nice job Potter. Not surprised you are tired. Hey look! This entire plain is fading away…."

" The Nightshade Forests are really just a giant illusion filled with the fears of the opponent, though I have no doubt that I really did just face my mother in combat and sent her to hell. Forgive me if I allow myself to be human for a moment, and reflect on that."

A/N: So Harry fought his mother, survived, and sent her to hell. GroupYZ said to give Harry worthwhile opponents to prove his worth against, and I can say that I will take that mantle easily. But no, he will not be fighting his father.

Secare: Latin for " To cut." It is the same word that the math term Secant comes from.