This chapter hasn't been edited - apologies for any spelling errors.

Chapter IV - The Essence of Exploration

Exhaustion seeped through her entire being. Padma lay flat on her back, too weak to stand after Harry had rolled her off of him. She could hear him conferring with Aashni and her henchman a dozen paces away. In any other situation, she would have been worried, but she knew Harry would keep her safe - he was as loyal to his friends as the most dedicated Hufflepuff.

'What am I going to do?' Padma fought off a wave of despair, the failure to keep the Lost Continent safe from intrusion weighing heavily on her. Now that they were here, it was up to her to stop them. There was no doubt that two of her three erstwhile companions were her enemy - but Harry…

At least she had time to work out how to get him alone, to bring him over to her side. Light steps approached, the shifting swish of the sand beneath boots an obvious getaway. "Help me up?"

Harry came into view, and he looked just as haggard as she felt. "I'm considering joining you, actually." Nonetheless, he took her hand and pulled her to a sitting position before dropping next to her, a burst of dust rising from his landing.

"What the hell kind of ritual was that? I'd have thought you'd outgrown that sort of insanity by now!"

"Some old spell that Aashni picked up from somewhere," he replied, waving his hand in a vague motion. "Are you ready to explain what you're doing here? You nearly killed us all jumping in like you did."

Irritation welled up inside her. "You shouldn't have been in Tamil Nadu at all! You lied to me!"

"Professor!" They both looked up at Aashni's approach. "There's something wrong. We're unable to reverse the shrinking spell on our supplies!"

With a speed she wouldn't have anticipated him capable of, Harry whipped out his wand, reaching into his pocket with his other hand and withdrawing a trunk that was the size of a gobstone. A wave and a tap produced no change.

"You're probably just magically exhausted," she said, but he frowned, his brows furrowed in consternation.

"No. It's something else." Harry took a deep breath and tried again, focus and concentration obvious. There was no change. "It's like there's some sort of dampening field. I can still feel my magic, but- hold on."

Padma watched in abject curiosity as he returned his wand to his sleeve, and in the same motion drew a different wand. A wave and a tap, and this time his trunk sat in the sand in its original form.

Harry swayed, and were he not already seated Padma feared he would have fallen. "Are you okay?"

"You did it! Marvelous! I will bring our supplies over for you to restore!"

"This doesn't make sense. Magic is innate; it comes from within us, it shouldn't be possible to block spellcasting in this manner."

"You were still able to manage the spell," Padma pointed out.

"Yea, it only took-" he cut himself off as Aashni returned with her shrunken baggage, but he was clearly disturbed. It was only when Aashni and her henchman had lay down to rest for the night that he spoke again. "Do you sleep on the right or the left?"

"What?"

Harry reached into his trunk, withdrawing a bedroll and laying it on the sand. "You don't look like you came supplied for an expedition, but I'm a generous guy. You can share with me, my sleeping bag's a roomy single. So: left or right?"

"I'm not sleeping with you!"

He made no effort at hiding his grin. "Suit yourself. Watch out for scorpions, I hear that deserts are lousy with them."

Harry slowly stripped out of his robes, and with that same smile slipped into his sleeping bag. There was some rustling as he removed his shirt and trousers, popping open the trunk next to him and tossing them inside before carefully setting his glasses on top.

"Wait, you can't-" Padma knew, even if there weren't whatever ward or spell in place that was restricting their magic, that channeling so much power that day had weakened her to the point that even a levitation charm was beyond her. "Conjure another bedroll for me."

"Sorry, no chance I can manage conjuration or transfiguration. I doubt I could even pull off a cushioning charm. C'mon, hop in," he said, still with that infuriating grin on his face.

"In your dreams, Potter," she said, stretching out in the sand next to him, feeling the sand shift around her with every move.

Despite her exhaustion, sleep eluded Padma. Kumari Kandam's unnatural sky didn't change, so she put one arm over her eyes to try and block out the eerie dark blue while she tried to cushion her head with her other. She couldn't get comfortable, no matter how she tossed and turned.

And Harry, the prat who had the gall to fall asleep immediately, was snoring! Some hero he turned out to be, abandoning a lady to sleep in a pile of sand while he rested in that fluffy, cushioned bedroll.

She sighed dramatically, several times, but he didn't wake up. Finally, Padma pushed herself up on her hands and knees and unzipped the side of his sleeping bag. "Move over."

Harry opened his eyes, and the alertness he displayed suddenly made her doubt that he'd ever fallen asleep. "You're covered in sand."

"So? We're in a desert, that's a given."

"Well, I don't want my sleeping bag to be all scratchy and grainy. You should probably take off your clothes," he said, with an innocent - but exceptionally punchable - expression on his face.

"In your dreams! Are you going to move over or not?" He shifted a few inches to the side, and she crawled in with him. "You better not try anything."

Harry gave her a 'who, me?' look, but didn't respond, instead closing his eyes once more.

It was neither hot nor cold outside, but the heat that they produced inside the cramped bedroll was uncomfortable. Lying on her back, Padma felt droplets of sweat trickle from her forehead onto her scalp. She'd never be able to sleep like this.

Watching Harry carefully to make sure his eyes stayed close, she slipped one arm, then the other through the sleeves of her robes, shimmying her way out of the garment. That was better, but still not enough, so she unbuttoned the shirt she wore beneath.

There. No longer suffocating but still maintaining some modesty, her breathing evened out and Padma finally started to relax. Tomorrow, when she'd recovered she would speak with Harry and tell him of the consequences that unsealing the Lost Continent would bring.

Harry opened his eyes to the unchanged expanse of Kumari Kandam's sky. Unexpectedly, he felt nearly as drained and tired as he had after the ritual. Even now, motionless in his bedroll, his limbs felt heavy and listless.

A light hint of saffron brushed across his senses as Padma burrowed further into his side. His assumption weeks back at Hogwarts, that she'd taken up with the Department of Mysteries, was clearly incorrect. What was she doing here? Was she working with the subcontinent's magical law enforcement?

She'd nearly killed them all, interfering the way she did. Still, he thought while his gaze drifted over her almond shaped eyes capped with lengthy lashes, her complexion a buttery ochre even in the dim lighting, her arrival wasn't an entirely unpleasant surprise. He could feel the softness of her body pressed against his arm, firm muscles padded in velvet.

Now that he thought about it a little more, maybe her hijacking his expedition wasn't such a bad thing, after all.

Padma's eyelids fluttered. "Harry? Merlin, I feel like I barely slept a wink."

"We had a long day, I'm sure we'll feel better once we have some food in our stomachs," Harry offered, briefly rolling on top of her on his way out of the bedroll.

"Get a good feel?" His cheeky grin in response didn't go over well. "You're such an arse."

Harry pondered this, bracing himself above her with both arms, palms on either side of her head. "I don't know, I mean here we are, sharing a bed, half-dressed, in an exotic locale…"

Padma pushed him over, ejecting him out into the sand outside. "First off, it's a bedroll, not a bed. Secondly, I hardly think a desolate wasteland counts as an 'exotic locale'. And finally," she concluded, face turning dusky. Harry liked the thought it was from his proximity. "I don't have a trunk full of outfits to change into."

"If you're asking to borrow my clothes, I'm afraid you'll have to wait til we've been going out at least a month. If I let every woman that spent the night with me into my wardrobe, I'd scarcely have a stitch to wear."

She didn't miss a beat. "I can't blame them, new clothes are tough to resist. I'm sure after a night with you they were desperate for some satisfaction."

He couldn't help but laugh. "Can I help it if comely witches take advantage of me? Don't blame me for being a hopeless romantic!"

"Right, The-Man-Who-Conquered, victim to the seductive wiles of witches everywhere."

"I am but a humble hero of the people. It would be cruel to spurn their gratitude."

Her lips twitched, like she was trying to hold back a smile. "You talk big, Potter. And having seen you change in front of me twice now, I can confidently say that 'talk' is the only big thing about you."

"Ouch! If we're going to play below the belt, it seems only fair you take your pants off, too."

"Am I… interrupting?" They both turned to Aashni, decked out in a resplendent sari, the pendant she'd shown him at Hogwarts worn outside her clothes. "We should decide where to go from here."

Harry buttoned his trousers, slipping his arms into a t-shirt before pulling on a set of brown robes. "Of course. How do you feel, Your Highness?"

"Exhausted, weak. How long do you believe the after-effects of the ritual will last?"

"I'm not sure. Do you know how long we were asleep?"

"I do not," she replied, glancing up at the opaque sky. "There does not seem to be a delineation between night and day here."

Harry nodded while digging around in his trunk. When he emerged, he passed a baggy with jerky and dried fruit along with a bottle of water to Padma. "You said yesterday we didn't land in the right place. Where were we supposed to end up?"

"I'd thought that the ritual would take us to the imperial palace. Instead we appear to be in one of the peripheral regions."

Harry lifted a handful of sand in his fist, slowly letting the grains trickle from his palm. "So which one, do you think? The front or the back?"

Aashni smiled at his question. "It's something of a mistranslation - in this context, the words for 'front' and 'back' are synonymous with 'new' and 'old'."

"Oh. That's a lot more helpful, actually." Harry took a careful look around. "In that case, we likely landed in the front sand lands."

"Why do you say that?"

"If you look closely, there are still echoes of the terrain prior to desertification. Over there, that's a dried riverbed. And if you scratch the surface," Harry crouched down, using his bare hands to dig a shallow hole. "You can see how there's still solid earth beneath the top layer of sand. Definitely the 'front'."

"What are you two talking about? What does it matter how old the desert is?"

Aashni didn't react to Padam's question, continuing on as though she hadn't spoken. "We should make for Oddainila, it was the capital of this region. I'm sure we'll find some answers on how best to make our way to the palace there."

"Isn't that in the opposite direction of the palace, though? Shouldn't we head directly for the imperial capital?"

"The distances involved make that journey difficult. We have to think of our supplies."

Harry shrugged. "You're the boss. Let me pack our things and we'll head out."

It took the strength of the Elder Wand to power the shrinking charms on their baggage, each spell feeling like he was attempting to cast grand magics. Something was very wrong here.

Padma plodded along just behind Harry, the two of them almost a dozen paces in front of Aashni and her bodyguard. They'd been walking since they'd woke up, hours of dragging their feet and taking frequent breaks for rest. This place was most assuredly cursed in some way, shape, or form - all of them were staggering, propelled forward simply by the strength of their will in screaming defiance of their exhaustion.

"Hey."

Harry raised his head in recognition she was speaking, but continued walking. "Yes?"

"What was all that about before, the front and back sands?"

"Right, I keep forgetting you haven't spent days and days researching this," he said, and Padma lowered her gaze, pondering how far ahead he was and whether it was worth giving him a kick in the arse. "The legend says that Kumari Kandam is divided into seven regions, each with a radically different climate and geography, arranged in a hexagon around a central, mountainous region. We were supposed to land in the center."

Padma thought about the sameness of the land around them, how little change in scenery there had been throughout a day of walking. "How big are these regions, exactly?"

"Well, it's a continent. So - big."

"That's helpful, thanks," Padma said in irritation, and by some blessing from the divines Harry didn't respond. It was much easier, she mused silently while following his footsteps through the sand, to enjoy the view of his arse in his trousers without any sarcastic replies.

When they finally made camp, after hours of walking, Padma had to force herself to eat rather than simply fall asleep where she sat. Harry had laid out the bedroll, and she climbed inside without complaint, too tired from walking and the cursed environment to make an issue of sharing the sleeping bag again.

To her surprise, though, Harry didn't join her, sitting on the closed lid of his trunk, writing in a leather-bound book that sat on his lap.

"You should get some sleep."

He didn't take his eyes off the journal, the quill in his hand smoothly continuing a rhythm of writing three lines and then inking before writing more. "I will, soon enough."

She frowned. He had to be just as exhausted as she was, and all signs pointed to a long journey waiting for them the next day. "What are you working on?"

"I guess you could call it a personal project. Something that piqued my curiosity."

Padma opened her mouth to point out he'd regret satisfying his curiosity when they started walking the next day, but Harry was a big boy and taking care of him wasn't her responsibility. Instead, she looked beyond him to where Aashni and the other man were, making sure they were asleep and not listening in.

"I need to talk to you."

Harry continued to write. "We'll have nothing to do tomorrow except chat, but I can't work on this while walking."

"It's private," she insisted. "Something I don't want to share with the others."

At this, he finally put his quill down. "Oh? Got some Boy-Who-Lived fantasies you want to bring to life? No need to be shy, I've heard them all."

"Believe me when I say any such hopes were dashed by how underwhelming you turned out to be in real life."

"But you did have fantasies? Do tell!"

By the gods, he never gave up! "Harry, you have to abandon this expedition. Kumari Kandam is lost for a reason, no good will come from this quest to unlock its secrets." She waited, but he didn't respond, didn't even react to her plea. "Aashni is dangerous, whatever she's told you is a lie, designed only to gain your service. I tried to warn you at Hogwarts, and I'm telling you now - you cannot allow her to achieve her goals."

"Aashni is many things, but opaque is not one of them. Why don't you tell me who you're really working for?"

"Does it really matter? You wouldn't understand, I-"

Harry closed his book, setting it aside and leaning forward. "I can understand you showing up at Hogwarts, after disappearing from Britain for years. I can understand you then accompanying Indian aurors in their assault on Aashni's compound and interrupting a ritual that very nearly killed us all. If you want me to listen, then start telling me the truth!"

She shouldn't have expected him to take her word for it. She closed her eyes, taking a deep breath and touched her connection to the divine energies of the Siddhar, willing her teacher's essence to manifest.

Nothing happened. For the first time in years, Sathogan didn't answer her call.

Padma suddenly felt very vulnerable, very much alone. How could the curse over this land diffuse the power of the Siddhar? Surely they were the ones responsible for it, so why was she cut off from harnessing the abilities they'd granted her?

"I'm not working with the khandas. I received an offer after graduation, a chance to learn from one of the most learned scholars in the world. He was the one to warn me of the danger Kumari Kandam represents. Unsealing the Lost Continent will bring consequences you can't comprehend! What could she have promised for you to so blindly empower evil in this way?"

Harry opened his trunk, placing the leather-bound book inside, then stripped out of his shirt and trousers, sliding into the bedroll beside her. "Are you familiar with the legendary Tamil academies? The Sangam?"

She frowned, not able to grasp his reasoning. "You're doing this for poems?"

"Not exactly," he said with a grin. "I've read the legends of the ancient academies, of centres of learning spanning thousands of years. In a magical kingdom like Kumari Kandam, can you imagine what secrets are held within such a place? Hogwarts has existed a fraction of the time the first Sangam did, and we're still unable to replicate its mysteries! The resources contained here, in the royal academy, might well dwarf any magical discovery made in history!"

"How did you get sorted into Gryffindor with an attitude like that?" Padma murmured, then in a louder voice continued. "There are some things better left unknown, some magics too cruel and powerful to be shared-"

"I don't believe that," he interrupted. "Others have tried, but secrets are always found out, usually by those willing to abuse them."

"What are you talking about?"

"Do you know what a horcrux is?" She shook her head. "It's Dark magic, with a capital 'D', a ritual involving splitting your soul powered by the murder of an innocent."

"That's horrible!" Padma shivered at the thought of mutilating one's self in such a manner.

"It is, and it's how Voldemort came back to life. Only the preeminent scholars of his day tried to lock away any mention of horcruxes from the public consciousness, to keep such a terrible power unknown."

"But Voldemort found out," she said, starting to understand where he was going with this.

"Yes, and because no one else had the information, no one could destroy the tethers keeping him alive. Maybe if we had collectively been aware such foul means of immortality existed, he never would have come back the second time."

Padma didn't know how to answer that, not without revealing she'd been taught by an immortal being with a questionable history herself. She wasn't sure relaying Sathogan's first-hand knowledge of the ruling dynasty as a servant of their evil ambition was the way to reassure Harry her side was good and Aashni was not.

She hadn't thought he'd have arguments which were - on their face - reasonable to counter her warnings. Was Harry a potential ally she'd yet to turn, as she'd thought before? Or was he her enemy, an obstacle standing between her and saving the world?

Maybe it didn't matter; in all likelihood, without any effective means of combating the curse on this land, they would all eventually die of thirst or starvation. Padma did her best to quiet her internal conflict, turning on her side and resting one arm on Harry's chest. The feel of his heartbeat beneath her palm beat a soothing rhythm, lulling her into a deep slumber.

A/N: This story has vexed me for months. It's really tough to write because, a) most of the legends and history it deals with are very foreign to me and (I imagine) most of my readers, and therefore requires a TON of exposition to explain, and b) as MrOmega573 pointed out to me, I'm not writing about *mythology*, I'm writing about topics that are loosely related to an actual religion practiced by a billion or so people. So - trying to thread that needle is complicated.

Still, I promised I would finish my stories, and I will. This chapter didn't have a lot going on, but I wanted to show Padma's doubts and concerns, and give Harry a little more motivation than "ancient ruin = fun!" Hope you enjoy. Next update will probably be SAS, then AMR.

Stay safe, healthy, and happy! ~Frickles