Happy Friday!

Chapter 75

The basilisk was seemed mildly agitated as it drew closer to Jasmine. She knew from past experience that Death's magic tended to leave creatures warry of her. They knew better than to get too close to something that could kill them. Though, neither Jasmine nor Harriet could just access Death's magic in a way that could cause the mass destruction lurking beneath the surface of the Deity's cold exterior, not without a lot of preparation.

"You smell of he whom the cursed one feared most in this world and of time beyond your years. How did you acquire my true master's talent for speaking to our kind?" The basilisk asked, edging closer to Jasmine with every hissed syllable.

The young witch nearly let out a strained laugh. The creature knew that was descended from the Peverells by scent alone...not to mention that she had lived multiple lives. Why hadn't she spoken to a sane basilisk sooner than this? They seemed to have rather fascinating conversation starters…and wasn't that an interesting development?

Jasmine shrugged, she might as well be honest with the snake. "I came by the talent to speak through my mother's line. She hails from Austria's finest speakers. My father's line holds the power of Death. The man whom you don't wish to hear the name of has created some rather disgusting artifacts that I need to destroy."

The giant serpent leaned in closer to Jasmine, she could feel it breathing on her. The pointed fangs millimeters from her. She could die right here, and no one would know where she went or where to find the body. This had to be one of her absolute dumbest ideas…

"Yes, he created one by using my magic against my will. It is slowly poisoning me and driving me mad."

Jasmine winced, she had never realized that the crazed frenzy the basilisk had been in during her time at Hogwarts had to do with the creation of the diary itself. Horcruxes tended to drive anyone mad if they were close to the object, but to be the unintentional catalyst to it…that had to poison their magic nearly as much as the original caster. Merlin only know the extent it truly poisoned Tom Riddle.

In Harriet's time, Tom drove the basilisk mad and then Lucius, in a stroke of his mighty intelligence, set it free during Harriet's second year. "Would destroying the horcrux stop the madness?"

The creature was sentient, charming and extremely rare. It would be a travesty to have to end its life while it was still thinking clearly. The basilisk slammed its tail on the floor, causing the room to shake slightly. Jasmine flinched, but did not attempt to shy away from the creature. "No, my mind is barely my own. Salazar would be ashamed of what I have done in the name of his descendant. I was meant to protect the students at Hogwarts, but I killed a child, whose spirit still resides within the castle walls. I need you to do what your people do best. Kill me. My young died, I have no mate and I will soon succumb to the urge to rip, tear and kill everything within my path. I do not wish to live like that, young one."

Jasmine bit her lip. How was she supposed to kill it? She could use the transfiguration trick she had been planning on using. It would be over in a moment after the cock crows, but it just seemed like such an undignified way to go.

She raised her wand, but the snake pounded its tail again. It seemed Jasmine wasn't doing something correctly. She raised an eyebrow, eyes still firmly shut. "Is there a particular way you wish for this madness to end?"

"A kiss of Death."

She lowered her wand.

Now, that was something that Jasmine didn't have the power to do, yet. She might have some of her magic boosted by Death, but to actually commit a kiss of Death. She had done it twice after her seventeenth birthday in two different lifetimes, but they had been acts of desperation. Death had possessed her body, it wasn't something that she could do on her own and it took either her mind to shut down or magical preparation. She didn't have the raw magic to handle this.

Jasmine felt a skeletal hand settle on her shoulder. Speak of the devil and it shall appear. Death's hand slowly trailed down her back as the deity slowly draped itself around her like a blanket.

The hair on the back of Jasmine's neck stood on end as she felt Death lean in close. She could feel Death's cold breath ghost next to her right ear. "Magic will provide a small boon for you tonight. This is one of her beloved creatures. She does not want it to suffer any longer than necessary."

That was the only warning she was given before Jasmine felt the hand on her back plunge into her chest. She gasped and felt her magic being pulled out of her as Death's form became corporal. The black tattered cloak settled around her, but even fully formed, Death had no body heat. The hand plunged into her back was ice cold as it exited, wisps of pure grey magic dancing along his fingers.

Jasmine shuddered and nearly fell to her knees at the loss of magic as Death leaned over her and gave a small peck on the basilisk's snout. The beast took one last shuddering hiss, "thank you…" before collapsing. Jasmine felt her lungs constrict and her world started to spin and suddenly she was staring at the ceiling, her hair damp from the chamber floor.

Death hovered over her, the deity's form still physical. Death looked as concerned as a conceptual magical being could. She could barely keep her eyes open. The blood rushing in her ears was just so loud and she felt too heavy. "I may have taken a little bit too much magic…"

Bastard.

Jasmine woke to the sound of thundering feet and muffled yelling. How did she get out of the chamber? She distinctly remembers being on the floor down there. What did Death do? She was going to have a long talk with the Deity once she recovers enough to open her eyes and move around.

A boon indeed.

"Bloody hell! Padfoot! Moony! I found her! Jazz! This hasn't happened in months. We should have started looking for her sooner! What was she doing all the way over here?"

Was that James? She was too tired to open her eyes. It felt like she had been run over by a herd of Hippogriffs.

"Prongs, she's in a bathroom, girls use these things, same way blokes do. I have no idea what time she made her way down here…Merlin, how long do you think she's been unconscious?" Remus replied from her left. She didn't even have the magical energy to activate the rune under her eye.

She feels herself being lifted off the ground, her limbs heavy and hanging. She recognizes the smell of Sirius' cologne. She let out a small groan, to at least let them know she was alive.

"Prongs, we need to get her to Pomfrey. She's barely conscious, who knows how long she had been having fits before we got here. If that damn cat of hers hadn't been harassing us, who knows how long she would have been here."

They started walking at a brisk pace. Every now and then Jasmine would feel a small jolt as they walked down a flight of stairs, but it was a relatively safe trip.

"Are we sure that there was no dark magic at play here?" James asked as they rounded another corner. They had to be close to the Hospital Wing.

Sirius let out a sigh, "There wasn't any that I could sense. I suppose I could have missed something, but it seemed like it was one of her fits. Her magic is all riled up and lashing out a bit. It feels like it had been syphoned off or something. It's really strange."

"Syphoned? Padfoot, how can you even tell?"

"Family thing."

As if that was explanation enough. Leave it to the Black Family to have some secret way of sensing magical aura shifts. Though, it didn't really surprise her all that much. The Black family were notorious for finding out secrets. This would just be another tool in their arsenal.

Jasmine could hear Death chuckling not too far away from her. Oh, that bastard was going to get an earful when she was conscious enough to make the effort.

"Merlin, she's pale, Prongs she needs the Hospital Wing, now!"

She could feel herself fading out of consciousness as their footfalls picked up to frantic pace.

Jasmine woke up to the sound of Pomfrey shuffling out of the room with a swish of her robes. She still felt like she more dead weight than anything else, but she could twitch, which was a start. She forced her tired eyes open and noticed the Marauders on chairs next to her bed. Sirius and James were holding her hands and Remus was sleeping on her left leg. They had books spread out on the bed where she wasn't sleeping.

Jasmine wasn't sure how much time had passed since she fainted. Death hadn't tried to contact her, which only showed how much magic the deity had taken from her. Death almost made this the first life where she died at the Deity's own hands.

Harriet's magic might have been able to take that…and even then, she would have needed to have been over eighteen for that. It was probably only because Jasmine was a Peverell that she survived.

Jasmine let her hands twitch and Sirius shot up, while James let go and slumped further into the mattress.

"Jazz? Jazz!" Sirius whispered as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes. "Merlin, you've been asleep for nearly four days. They were really close to sending you to St. Mungos. What happened? There was Death magic all around you. Were you attacked or something? My family will look into it if you were, but if it was self-inflicted..."

"Is there a reason that you would think I would willingly offer myself up to die?" Jasmine asked, eyebrow raised as she shifted a little bit.

Sirius bit his lip, worrying it between his teeth. He kept his voice low to make sure that James and Remus stayed sleeping. "You've had a less than pleasant upbringing, Jazz. I know that you talk to a mind healer, but there's always a chance that something could change and you've been distant the past couple days. Remus told us that he found you doing charms work that you would have usually finished a week earlier."

It was kind of the boys to watch over her and her actions probably would have been problematic if she wasn't planning on killing a mythical monster in the bowels of the school that was actually extremely intelligent. Jasmine just wished she could have healed the creature instead of Death coming in and killing it.

She wished that she could just end Tom's reign of terror here and now, but she needed the location of the Horcruxes.

"I don't plan on dying anytime soon, if that statement will make you feel any better," Jasmine replied watching the two sleeping Marauders. James shifted again, but didn't wake and Remus was completely dead to the world as he snored away much to Jasmine's amusement. "I didn't want this to happen. Much like you, my family magic can get a bit out of hand. I was completely blindsided and it got completely out of control," she replied with a frown. She couldn't feel Death in the room with her or anywhere else in the vicinity. It was odd, usually he would have shown up by now since her magic was almost at a respectable level.

Sirius pinched the bridge of his nose and let out a breath. "Death magic, though? How could that even relate to family…The Tale of Three Brothers…Merlin, that story was more than likely based off of some real event?" he muttered to himself and then peered at her through one open eye, "Don't answer that. I don't need to know, but is this going to happen again?"

That was an excellent question and it wasn't one that she could really promise with certainty.

She pushed herself up on shaking on arms and sat up against her pillows. Sirius moved to help her, but she held out a hand. "It better not…happen anytime soon," Jasmine muttered, leaning back. "I'm not a fan of letting higher magical beings taking advantage of me when it's convenient."

Sirius let out a small, desperate laugh, "Your seventeenth birthday is going to be a nightmare when your family magic comes fully into play."

Jasmine gives him a small smile, he didn't even know the half of it. Her majority was going to be something special that was for sure. "There's a ritual involved, but it shouldn't be too dangerous." She hadn't gone through the entire ritual as Harriet, but she knew the basics and had been looking into it for the last couple months to make sure she had the right casting grounds and warding materials.

There was nothing deadly about it…that she could find unless death found her unworthy, which was highly unlikely.

"Being heir to an Ancient and Noble House is bloody awful. That's what I'm slowly coming to realize as time goes on," Sirius replied, leaning his neck back in the chair and staring at the ceiling.

They were quiet for a few minutes before Sirius spoke again, "You know, when you didn't show up in the common room we really thought something had happened to you. Last year you had been attacked in the halls a couple times. You kicked those people's arses, but you still got hurt. You were so pale on the floor of bathroom when we found you. Whatever happened, you're lucky to be alive at all. Your body almost shut down from the shock of the magic that was taken from you."

"What color is Death magic?" She asked after a few beats of silence filled with only Remus soft snores.

"What?" His voice went a little bit higher at the odd question.

"You said earlier that you saw an aura of Death magic around me. What color is it?" Jasmine asked, her head turned towards him her only functioning eye boring into his. He flushed a light pink, "Unless it's too personal of a question for you to answer?"

"No, it's not overly personal. It just isn't a question that I get very often. It's a pure grey color and it left me feeling very cold. I could feel the chill in my bones as I picked you up. If Prongs and I didn't see you breathing we would have thought you were dead."

"A little like a dementor I'd imagine. Sorry that you had to deal with that." Jasmine shifted just enough to nudge both James and Remus to wake them up. James mumbled something, grumbling as he readjusted his glasses. Remus jumped and nearly fell out of his chair. Both of them tiredly turned towards Jasmine, but their eyes lit up when they saw that she was awake.

"Jazz!" Remus whisper shouted and James looked like he was tearing up. "How are you feeling? We were really worried about you."

"I think I'll live. Thank you for finding me. I don't know what would have happened. Which one of you noticed I was gone?"

All three of them shared a sheepish look with one another. James rubbed the back of his neck. "Lily noticed you weren't in your room and came looking for us. She thought we were using you for prank ideas in our room. When she realized that you weren't with us…well, she demanded that we find you."

"Lily said if we didn't find you by curfew she was going to get McGonagall involved and both Padfoot and Prongs took offense to the notion that a teacher could find you before they could," Remus replied with a roll of his eyes. Jasmine bit her lip to stop herself from laughing. She knew that Remus would have no doubt agreed with both Sirius and James over not having a professor involved.

"Not to mention your monster cat followed her into our room and hissed at us until we took the map out. You raised a bloody menace!" Sirius added, arms crossed. He and Ro seemed to have an interesting relationship, to say the least. She hoped they would get along one day, but she honestly doubted it would happen any time soon.

"You didn't grow closer to my darling cat over my disappearance?"

He raised his scratched-up hands. "No, your monster gave me these parting gifts when I offered it food this morning!"

James scoffed, "You threw her food at her! If you thought that she would take that lying down, you're more of an idiot than I thought."

They continued to quietly talk with each other, the boys never straying too far from her side. James would grab her hand every now and then to make sure she was still there. It wasn't until Pomfrey came back into the room and started to usher them out did she feel Death's presence enter the room. She felt a bony hand on her shoulder. She kept her eyes on the door where the Marauders were exiting and saw Sirius glaring right past her. Death's hand tightened as if daring Sirius to say something.

That's the end of this chapter. RIP snake. Also, Death has no idea what he's doing and I love that brand of chaos. Anyway, next chapter will contain some fun times at Hogwarts as Jasmine attempts to make her way back to the Chamber to get the fangs.

So, this chapter almost didn't make it out. I was in the ER last week...apparently a migraine that lasts longer than two weeks isn't healthy so...now I'm being put on daily meds to stop that. XD Things are crazy for me right as I started my 50 hour work weeks.

I hope you enjoyed the chapter this will be the last one till April. All your reviews, favorites and follows are greatly appreciated!

See you all in April! DO YOUR TAXES!
~Animerocker