A/N: Soz for the wait… again… '
Disclaimer: I own nothing… I see nothing, I speak nothing, I… Well, you should get it by now.
Chapter Ten
Harry's lips curled into a snarl.
The professor continued the lesson, feigning ignorance of Harry's animosity. But Harry knew that the professor was aware, watching and conniving against him. Harry could smell it in the air, and it was a stench Harry likened to spoilt, rotting meat.
Something bad was festering, waiting for its moment to be unleashed.
And Harry couldn't wait.
Lately, Harry had found his life rather monotonous. He craved something else, something he hadn't craved before. It was a yearning he was unused to. Unlike his need and lust for blood, but also alike. It demanded that he take action, throw caution into the wind, and yet… Harry was content to let things take time, in spite of his impatience. He wanted things to move quickly, happen now and satiate his need. But he was willing to simply let events unfold, wait as long as it took.
It confused Harry, himself, but he did not question what his mind was telling him, what his instincts were assuring him of.
So Harry would sit, and watch, and wait. Things had a way of doing just what you wanted them to, if you were patient enough.
His eyes skated past the professor and rested on Draco. The blonde was watching the professor with a curious expression that intrigued Harry. The grey eyes were clouded in thought – no doubt far from anything to do with the lesson's topic – and Harry wanted to know what was happening in that cunning Slytherin brain of his.
However, Harry's musings were cut short by the professor himself.
"Mr. Potter!" He barked, and Harry unhurriedly let his attention shift back to the present. "Perhaps you could inform the class of the symptoms relating to a vampire's shift of power during the New Moon?"
Harry cocked his head to the side, narrowing his gaze on the professor. What a bold question, Harry reflected in curiosity. Then he smirked, and decided he'd like to play the game.
"Certainly, Professor D." Harry said, purposefully impertinent. He told the class about the heightened blood lust, the almost unbearable need to find a mate, of sorts. Vampires do not mate as other Creatures do. Harry explained that they were a race that took one lover and one lover only, for the rest of eternity, but that this choice was made of their own will and the will of their chosen lover, not through any divining fates, or nature, by any means.
It was at this point in Harry's monologue that he flashed a grin back at Draco, and winked. The blonde flushed a pretty pink, but Harry was already launching himself back into his speech, to finish with a grand finale.
"And, of course, their powers magnify tenfold during the dark moon. It is usually when past injustices, as perceived by the vampire, that have not been avenged, are brought to the forefront, and they seek revenge in the most torturous way possible. Enemies beware."
Harry had to force himself not to laugh at the Professor's expression.
Harry made his way languidly down the hallway, listening vaguely to the echoes of the corridors as he ruminated on the day's Defence class. It amused him to mess with the man who dared to enter the castle and spy for the Dark Lord right where Harry could see – and to stay there, even when Harry threatened him directly. The man was either very confident or very stupid.
As Harry passed the dusty portrait of a woman in a very large dress with entirely too many ruffles, he pondered whether or not he had said too much in his explanation of vampire transformations during the Darkmoon.
Harry had read every text in the Hogwarts library on vampires in the first week of school, Merlin only knew he had enough time, and he therefore knew what people had already deduced about vampires, and what they were as yet still ignorant about. He did not want to spoil all his secrets, after all.
So it had come as a surprise, even to himself, that he would reveal a vampire's need for revenge during the New Moon. It had just been so very much fun to torment the professor, that Harry hadn't been able to keep himself in check.
Of course, it was a minor secret, really. And some things that were believed to be true were exaggerations. The powers increasing tenfold, for example. During any circumstances, vampires were always the stronger being to any human by double, and the New Moon did enhance this strength, though only by another threefold, not ten. Harry wasn't about to set that straight, however. There was no harm in it, as far as he could see…
A memory pushed against Harry's consciousness, and he let the silky tendril break into his thoughts.
Harry could still feel his feet touching the stone of Hogwart's floor, and he could sense the real world around his body, but it was as though a new vision had washed over him. He was still in the same corridor, in Hogwarts Castle, but it was in a different time. The walls were not mouldy and damp, and the paintings were not dusty and neglected as in the present, and most importantly of all, the moon was in a different phase. The night was the black of the New Moon.
Harry looked on in interest as a man cloaked in a robe, almost of darkness, hurried down the hallway. Leaving his body behind, Harry followed him in his spirit form. Tracking the route and implanting it into his memory, Harry watched as they walked through the myriad of hallways and corridors. Harry was made more and more increasingly curious as the man he followed as hastened more, emanating a sense of trepidation and anxiety, mixed with an acute fear that Harry could not ignore.
It gave Harry an invigorated rush of delight for some reason, but he did not change his pace in following the stranger.
Finally, the man stopped. He glanced around him for a second or two, before looking back at the wall in front of which he stood.
Harry nearly lost his spirit form back to his body when he heard the sibilant hissing of Parseltongue.
Hurrying after the man as a secret stone doorway was revealed, Harry stared at the face that was revealed at the dropping of the hood of his cloak. It was him. Salazar Slytherin.
Harry tried not to gape, but it was a close thing. Now curious beyond belief, Harry took in the secret room they had entered. Or rather, the secret passageway.
Slytherin inhaled a deep breath, before descending the steps that sunk into the damp floor.
They led to hidden exit that led out of the castle. Harry looked at it for long moments, admiring the perfect way in which the break in the brickwork was done, so as to be hidden from every angle, and marvelled that it would be unnoticed by the Marauders when they would scour the place. But his attention was diverted back to the still-hastening figure of Slytherin as he rushed across what Harry identified as the strip of grass closest to the Forbidden Forest, the only section of the forest that came even part-way close to the castle.
Harry followed him, but he could feel the memory waning, the emotions fading until Harry could no longer sense their influence. Furrowing his brows, Harry followed Slytherin into the Forest as far as he could.
Just as Harry was accepting that he'd have to return back to his body, Slytherin stopped, turning around as fast as a branch snapping back into place. His wand was in hand, and he breathed deeply.
A shape had shown itself in a shadow, and it seemed to shimmer in and out of existence on the precipice of the gloomy shadows between the trees. A foot appeared as the figure stepped forward into proper sight, and Harry felt an electric shock run down his spine at the vision of another vampire.
Slytherin seemed to be expecting him, however, and merely tightened his hold on his wand. The vampire leered at him, fangs glinting mercilessly as his lip curled. His eyes glittered with a cruel malice, the kind of malice that was determined and vengeful and unheeding.
"At last," he whispered, his voice like shards of ice that would pierce a weak heart with fear. "Salazar."
Slytherin narrowed his eyes, but held his ground.
"We both knew this day would come, my friend. It is my sad luck."
The vampire scoffed, taking a step forward in dominance. "Yes, indeed. It was inevitable that I would get my revenge, I had just hoped you would present me with a worthy chase. What do you say? I'll give you a five minute lead,"
Slytherin narrowed his eyes in anger, irritated by the vampire's mockery.
"I am sorry that I am unworthy game, my old friend, but I wish for my death to be more dignified than that of a cowardly victim."
Slytherin's eyes were dulled with sorrow, and Harry wondered what had happened between these two people who seemed to have once been good friends. But the vampire was there for justice, so whatever had passed between them had slighted the vampire to seek his revenge.
The vampire sighed, as though very put out. But the cruel glint of his eyes betrayed his act. "I suppose I must do as I will, then."
Quicker than the eye could track, he was pinning Slytherin to the leaf-littered ground. His fangs were pressed close to the clammy skin of Slytherin's neck, but the Hogwarts Founder showed no more forward sign of fear or weakness than that.
"Any last words?" The vampire asked, scraping his teeth across the flesh he would sink his fangs into. Harry held his breath.
"I'm sorry it came to this."
The vampire chuckled, and Harry dared not blink. The chuckle was cut off, suddenly, as Slytherin whispered an incantation. Thick, inconsistent blood dripped onto Slytherin's robes as he dropped his wand to the earthy ground.
Shocked, Harry saw that Slytherin had cut deep into the vampire's chest, where the heart should be, and where Harry could see that there was a gaping recess, devoid of any organ. The thick blood slithered out of the wound, as though unwilling to leave the body.
Uncomprehending, the vampire stared at Slytherin in horror and awe.
"What have you done?" he whispered, what little pallor had been in his face draining along with his immortal life.
Slytherin looked unaccountably aggrieved. "'While the vampire it as its most strong during the New Moon, so is it at its most vulnerable.'"
The vampire snarled, angered. Looking feral and beyond comprehensible speech, he made a lunge at Slytherin with the last of his strength, and buried his fangs deep within the Founder's throat.
The dying breaths of the two men were the last things Harry registered as he was forced back into his own body, shaking and shocked to his very core by what he had seen.