Disclaimer: I don't own Teen Titans, nor do I own Harry Potter or any of the characters associated with the two. Teen Titans is © of DC Comics, Harry Potter is © of J.K. Rowling, and Warner Brothers holds © over both of them.

Author's Warning: This is a crossover fic. :Watches people close the window.: Ahem. Those of you who do not like crossovers may leave now. The rest of you, I invite to continue on…

Summary: Trigon has returned, and Voldemort has joined him as a minion. Drawn by strange dreams, Raven must involve herself in the problems of others, including one Harry Potter, who is once again being plagued by strange nightmares. This year at Hogwarts, Harry and his friends are going to be pitted against their most difficult task yet. Destroying a force that even the Dark Lord himself fears won't be easy…

Harry Potter and the Demon's Wrath, or; Year Seven and Negative One-Fourth

Chapter 14 - Diabolic Dealings

No matter how many times she replayed the fight in her head over the next week, Raven couldn't find a definite way she could have helped avoid Professor Terlig's death. She'd thought a lot about it - in fact, Raven was fairly certain she thought about it enough for her focus to be bordering on obsession - but no matter how she ran the scenario through her head, she couldn't find a solution.

It didn't matter, of course. She couldn't go back and change things, and there were far more important things Raven needed to concern herself with, but all the same… No one had died on her watch before. There had to have been some way she could have stopped it.

Raven knew she ought to focus her attention on helping McGonagall and Dracona to figure out how the Halloween attack had happened. Instead, she had thrown herself into her studies, focused on keeping calm so that her power didn't topple everything over. She didn't think she was actually as close to the edge as she felt, but a pit of uneasiness had developed in her stomach and refused to leave.

It was that feeling of uneasiness that found her in this position, kneeling in front of the trunk at the end of her bed, fishing through piles of folding clothing until she reached the bottom. She pulled out her dark blue cloak, taking the raven embossed clasp from its place at the neck and clenching it in her hand. She knew it was unrealistic to expect to save everyone, but it didn't stop her from being shaken.

Not only did she feel estranged by the failure of her powers, but she kept having to entertain the thought that it could have been her. She could have just as easily ended up dead that night, her own defences broken by the same spell. She'd merely gotten lucky - she knew that - and just as well as she knew that, she knew she couldn't count on it happening again.

When she had left for Hogwarts, Raven hadn't expected it to be much different from the trials she'd faced with the team back at home. As she was quickly discovering, though, there was a massive difference in the villains. Yes, with the Titans she had saved the world a few times, but mostly they stopped petty criminals. The Titans had never faced off against anyone who tried to kill everything in sight.

Raven hadn't been prepared for that. Not at all. Now, though, now she thought she would be prepared for next time. This Voldemort wasn't some petty criminal. He wasn't even a villain of the same, higher level as Slade. He was some sort of magic-wielding terrorist who had been granted additional power by a demon who wanted to rid the earth - the universe - of all mortals.

It was overwhelming that a group of grown witches and wizards who had been fighting against this self-styled Dark Lord for three decades had chosen her to put a portion of their faith in. Overwhelming enough that she'd begun having dreams about going home, which turned into nightmares of entrapment. Maybe she would visit over the Christmas break after all.

Raven forced her fingers into a looser grip around the brooch, staring down at the red jewelled surface and sighing. Sitting around like this wasn't getting her anywhere. She was just wasting time, when she could be doing any number of other, more important things. Wishing the other Titans were here wasn't going to bring them any closer. Her friends were half a world away, and she'd been trusted to get this done on her own - she knew she could get this done on her own. It wouldn't only be Wizarding Britain she'd fail if she didn't manage. It would be the rest of the world.

Raven jumped when the brooch in her hands started blinking. She still didn't understand how her T-Communicator was able to work here, and the connection her cloak clasp had to the Titan's alert system should have been offline too, scrambled by all of the magic in the air at the school. She was grateful for whatever in the construction allowed the devices to work though. She had very little doubt that the team would have already tried to bust down the doors of the school if they hadn't heard from her at all.

However, this was the first time she'd happened to look at the brooch and seen it flash. It was the first evidence she had of the team actually fending off villains while she was away. In theory, she'd known there was no way Jump City could have been quiet all this time - especially if the criminals had found out the Titans were one member short. Theory was different than actually having proof in her hand though.

Sighing, and shaking her head inwardly, calling herself all sorts of idiot, Raven fished her communicator out of her book bag. She glanced around once to make sure none of her roommates were around, and then flipped it open.

"Everything okay over there?" she asked once the connection had been established. The team was gathered in front of the monitor and Robin, who had clearly been in the middle of saying something, turned to face the screen, surprise on his face.

"Everything's fine. It's just Mad Mod," he said, then frowned. "Are you okay?" he asked.

Raven hesitated. She'd called the team for her weekly check-in last night, but had avoided mentioning anything about the attack on Halloween night. She didn't quite know why she'd decided it a good idea to not say anything, but now that she'd made the decision, she certainly wasn't going to dump her problems on them. Particularly not when they had places to be.

"I'm fine. I was just looking through things and noticed my clasp flashing, so I thought I'd make it wasn't anything too serious," she said. She was only half lying, after all.

Robin, however, didn't look convinced. "Raven…" he began.

She waved a hand to cut him off. "Mod's getting away. Let me worry about what's going on here. I told you. I'll call you if I need help." With that said, she snapped the device closed. She shouldn't have called if she wasn't going to say anything, but she really just needed to unload everything.

"Who were you talking to?" a crisp voice snapped then, as Raven moved to tuck both T-Communicator and cloak clasp back into her trunk. She froze. The last person she needed to be accosted by now was Hermione Granger.

"I don't really think it's any of your business," Raven replied, teeth clamped tightly together so the sound came out grated. She folded the blue cloak at the bottom of the trunk back around the precious Titan paraphernalia, brushing her fingers briefly against the frame of her meditation mirror, also tucked safely away there, as she did. Maybe a visit to her emotions would help clear up this mess she felt swamped by.

She stood and turned to find Hermione standing in the doorway, arms by her sides, her body taut and her fists clenched as though she expected a fight. Since Raven didn't intend on fighting her, even to get out of the room, the lavender haired Titan wasn't entirely sure what this could be about.

"What are you hiding?" Hermione demanded. Raven stared at her for a long moment, then forced her face into a bored expression. This was getting tiring. Very tiring.

"Nothing," she stressed. "You know everything of importance. You know my background. You know my relation to current events. You know how I came to be here, and why I'm a student. You've made sure you knew everything about me, so why do you still think I'm hiding things from you?" she asked, irritated.

"Because you have some sort of power no one else here does, except Professor Seraphlin," Hermione replied. Raven barely refrained from groaning. She was fairly certain she knew where Hermione was headed with this, and she didn't want to go through trying to explain to the other girl why she did good things with her powers. That was something about her Hermione had no business knowing more about.

"Yes. I do," Raven cut across before Hermione could get her wind and start ranting. "I have the power needed to stop Trigon. That is why I'm here. It's my motives that are important, not the origin of my power. When you're finally prepared to comprehend that, we can talk."

Hermione glared at her. "What are your motives then?" she demanded. "How do we know it wasn't you who orchestrated the attack on Halloween? You knew how to get rid of the creatures that were here, so you could have just as easily summoned them and then banished them to look like you were on our side.

"Just like over the summer, when you caused Harry to fall into that coma and then you pushed him back out, but only after a few days. Harry may thank you for that, but since it was your fault in the first—" Raven held out one hand, effectively cutting off Hermione's tirade with a band of power that she slapped across the other girl's mouth.

"I am going to say this once," she stated. "I don't know where Harry got his powers from, but he has some level of psychic ability, more than anyone else in this school. We are working on his control, and have been since the school year started. He became trapped in the mindscape because of an inability to control the raw power his interaction with me unlocked. I had nothing to do with him becoming trapped there, and you will never accuse me of orchestrating schemes to make myself look better again.

"I don't care if you don't trust me, but flinging accusations at me simply because you've come to some incorrect, uninformed conclusion is not something I'm going to accept. I have a mission to complete here, and I'm going to fulfil it and return home. You don't have to appreciate it. You don't have to like me. You don't even have to speak with me, but don't stand in my way with your juvenile, jealousy fuelled attempts to drive me away from my mission.

"Since you know exactly what that mission is, I expect this will be our last encounter of this nature," Raven snarled, releasing the power she was using for Hermione's gag and then disappearing in her own swirl of energy, too frustrated to walk to her destination.

The little alcove she'd found in the Astronomy Tower was empty as she'd expected it to be and as soon as Raven arrived there she levitated to her usual lotus position and began chanting. She hadn't expected to get along with most of the students here. She hadn't expected even to get along with ten percent of them, and she certainly wasn't here to make friends, but Hermione's hostility toward her was frustrating.

So frustrating, in fact, that instead of calming herself to meditate, Raven found herself stewing. The more she tried to force her irritation away, the stronger it came at her, until finally the power lashed out, a tendril of black flaring from her chakra and a wind blowing her school cloak out behind her. The power swirled around then, and with a crash, Raven found herself lying on her back on the floor as she lost even the control needed to levitate.

This wasn't working.

She needed to be calm. She needed to relax. She needed to forget what was happening outside of this room.

"Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos…" she murmured, floating back into position as she slowly removed all importance from the fight she'd had with Hermione. She could deal with it later.

"Hogsmeade next weekend," Harry commented from in front of the notice board in the common room. He turned to look at Hermione, who had been awfully quiet for the past hour or so. Not that Hermione wasn't always quiet, but she was also acting strange, somehow. Harry wasn't entirely sure what it was, but he knew something was bothering her.

"What is it, 'Mione?" he asked, walking over to the couch and dropping down beside her. Her Charms text was spread out on her lap, and she glanced briefly up from her reading to look at him, then went back to staring at the words on the page in front of her.

"It's Raven…" she began. Harry groaned.

"What now?" he asked. He was ready for anything, really. Hermione kept finding out strange things about Raven, and no matter how much she seemed to be trying to help him, he was still quite ready to accept just about anything Hermione told him. After all, she'd found out things about Raven which Harry would have been more than willing to dismiss as nothing, and they'd ended up being true, so he readily believed she was hiding more.

"We… had an argument," Hermione replied at length. Harry wasn't surprised. All the two seemed to do was argue - when they weren't ignoring one another. "And I said some things I probably should have kept to myself. She… reacted really badly to them."

Harry immediately thought of the strange powers Raven had used during the Halloween fight - something he otherwise tried not to think about, because he didn't want to think about how close Voldemort could be. He wasn't ready to take on Voldemort. Not yet. Raven had controlled the dark energy she'd been throwing around well, but even Harry had been able to tell it was some sort of powerful, raw magic that was probably stronger than anything most witches and wizards learned in their lives.

"Did she attack you?" Harry asked, fearing the worst. He'd seen what Raven could do, and really, did he know enough about her to be sure she wouldn't attack someone? She clearly didn't like Hermione, after all.

"No. No, it wasn't anything like that," Hermione said, realising where Harry's mind had taken him. "But I think I've finally realised that she's actually here to help. I don't know what her motives are, or why she was chosen—" here, Harry forced himself to stay silent. As far as he knew, Hermione didn't know Trigon was Raven's father, and he wasn't going to be the one to tell her "—and I'm not sure if we can trust her, but… I think she's trying to help."

Harry raised one eyebrow at her. "Why are you telling me this?" he asked.

Hermione gave him an irritated look. "I'm trying to work it all out. I still don't think it all adds up, but… She mentioned she was teaching you something, and if she's helping you, then I guess I shouldn't be making things more difficult for you."

"You're not," Harry replied, and stretched his legs out so that the soles of his feet were closer to the fire. He threw his arms across the back of the couch, giving his whole body a stretch. "Raven's been pretty fair with not taking her disagreement with you out on me, except when I got involved in it." He brought his arms back to rest them across his legs. "But if you want to apologise, then you should apologise to her."

Hermione closed her book. "I don't think I have anything to apologise for," she said, voice a bit stiff. Harry rolled his eyes.

"Invasion of privacy?" he suggested.

Hermione gave an uneasy shrug. "I'm just… going to leave her alone," she replied. The uneasiness in her body language translated through in her voice and Harry was left wondering just what had happened in this conversation she'd had with Raven. "I think that's what she wants, anyway."

"Yeah, Raven seems to like space," Harry replied. Then, the conversation suddenly reminding him of it, he said, "Come down with me to visit Hagrid tomorrow? There's something I need to ask him." When Hermione looked at him curiously, he explained what Raven had mentioned about the wards in the Forbidden Forest.

After he explained, she sat quiet for a long moment, looking contemplative. "How did she find it?" she asked finally. Harry shook his head.

"I don't know. She didn't tell me, just asked what I thought."

Hermione continued to look contemplative, a bit of her expression showing confusion as well. "I just promised to give her space, but… I really do want to know what's going on here," she said.

"I'm not sure Raven would be able to tell you even if you asked," Harry responded. He wasn't. While Raven seemed to know more of what was going on than anyone else, Harry also had the feeling she didn't know as much as she pretended to. Sure, he knew she had more background information, but as far as he knew, the visions he'd shared with her were the only ones she had. If those visions were the only insight she had into what Trigon was planning with Voldemort, then Raven was probably just as in the dark as he was. It wasn't comforting, really, not when Raven was supposed to be this… hero who saved them all, but it wasn't her fault.

"Demons…" Hermione muttered. "How do you fight off demons?"

Harry shook his head. He had no idea.

"Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos… Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos… Azarath— ungh!"

The calm, dark place in Raven's mind she went to when she meditated flickered out abruptly and Raven found herself lying on stone, flat on her back for the second time that day. Though she could feel the stone of the Hogwart's floor beneath her, when she opened her eyes, it wasn't one of the vaulted ceilings of the castle she was staring at.

Instead, she stared at the stalactite-strewn ceiling of a cavern. She lay flat on her back on an island of stone, surrounded by jets of smokes and climbing walls of flame. She knew this place, and as well as she knew this place, se new her presence here could mean nothing but trouble. For who, she wasn't sure, but it certainly wasn't going to be the creature who had brought her here.

She glowered at the red eyes hovering just beyond the first wall of flame. "Whatever you're selling, I'm not buying," she spat as she got to her feet, arms in a fighter's stance out to either side of her body, hands aglow with power.

A deep chuckle filled the cavern. "How are you enjoying the witch school, daughter?" Trigon's voice asked. Raven knew this cave and the eyes floating within it were little more than a construct of the demon's subconscious - the only part of him able to reach here from his dimension - but all the same she looked around quickly, then focused back upon the eyes when he started laughing again.

"What do you want?" Raven demanded, not willing to bring any more attention than necessary to her skittishness. He had noticed - it was inevitable, but she didn't dwell on it. "You lost your chance to get into this world. Why even contact me?"

"Do you truly believe there was only one way for me to get into your world?" the demon asked, sounding amused. Since Raven was quite certain the only way for Trigon to actually bring himself into this world had been by using her as his portal, and since he'd used up his chance, she ignored the amusement. She was sure it was an act. If he could have gotten through without a vessel - fully through, as he was and not just the half form that sent her visions - there wouldn't have been any reason for Raven's birth. She was well aware of that.

All the same, she knew she ought to be wary, because Trigon proved last time he could mess with her even with the distance, and if he was contacting her now, she was sure that hadn't changed. She didn't need him messing with her right now. She had enough to be concerned about without him.

"I know there was only one way for you to get here, and we stopped that," Raven responded.

"If I had been stopped, would I be trying again?" Trigon asked. Raven scowled.

"Why not?" she spat. "You found a minion. Better, you found a minion with minions, and a well established position based entirely on fear. What did you promise him to get him to bow to you?"

"What else? Power, my daughter. He will have power beyond his wildest imaginings, simply for serving me, and I will help him achieve his own ends."

Raven scoffed, eyes darting to one side when fire exploded upward in a scalding jet. She refocused on the eyes above her again, certain that, wherever he was, Trigon was smiling. "You'll destroy him along with everyone else if you get what you want," she stated blandly.

"Serve me, and I will spare you and your friends." An image of the Titans back home, quickly followed by one of Harry, flashed before her and Raven clenched her hands into fists.

"Liar!" she shouted, power flaring from her fists at the sudden spike in her emotions, breaking the image and leaving her staring up at the Hogwarts ceiling, the echoes from her shout still bouncing around the small room. Shakily, Raven clamoured to her feet and wiped her hands down her back, brushing off the dust her cloak had picked up.

She knew he couldn't reach her here, but he had minions who could. If he really wanted her on his side, he knew her weaknesses. If he threatened her friends, she would have little choice but to do what he wanted - because she knew he would hurt them, and though she knew they would all be destroyed in the end, if there was even the slightest chance she could save them, Raven was willing to take it.

On her way back to Gryffindor tower, Raven cursed Voldemort for being fool enough to make a deal with a devil.

"As I have told you multiple times, Minerva, I knew nothing of the attack at Halloween. As far as I have been able to tell, the Dark Lord did not sanction it. However, as he does not wish to admit someone acted without his instruction - and with the backup of that creature he is answering to - I am having a hard time discovering just who was behind the attack.

"I do not care if you don't believe me. I have told you what I know."

Minerva McGonagall frowned, glaring at the man in front of her though knowing it was an utterly ineffective motion. He was supposed to be their spy. He was supposed to know everything that was going on in Voldemort's circle, yet he hadn't known of something directly affecting Hogwarts.

Perhaps it wasn't his fault, she thought as she showed herself to the door of the tiny little cabin he was staying in. Perhaps he was telling the truth, and Voldemort really hadn't known of last week's attack. If it was true, though, then Minerva, as Headmistress of Hogwarts, had even more on her plate. If the spy was telling the truth, and not feeding her false information on his Master's orders, then Minerva needed to find out who else Trigon could be speaking to, preferably, soon.

Resolved to speak to Raven at the next available opportunity, Minerva closed the door of the cabin firmly behind her, resetting those wards she had disturbed, and left the warded glen, and then the forest, behind.

Author's Corner

There's going to be a bit of Draco in the next chapter. I'm trying out a subplot with him which I hope will work. If not, he'll just be an out of character mess until I can resolve the massive plot hole I'll have constructed.

We'll see how it goes.

Completed - June 14/2009