warning disturbing scene in this chapter read with caution. ok im not 100% happy with this chapter im really struggling at the moment to find motivation. still looking for a beta let me know if anyone interested anyway please enjoy.
Hogwarts third year was a mixed bag for him both equally boring and yet strangely exciting, after the first few lessons he continued to be on a more advanced schedule than the rest of his year even the ever stoic, Snape had him brewing slightly more difficult and complicated potions or demanded he read a certain book.
After a trip to Hogsmeade in which he spent much of the day with Daphne, during the trip he decided to buy a pair of simple black glasses, it was after Draco had bought an expensive pair of Quidditch goggles that he had an idea to charm the glasses as well as place some handy runes etched onto the black frames.
The glasses would auto adjust to someone's eyesight no matter how bad the persons eyesight, they would never have to be cleaned no matter the weather conditions, they would be unbreakable and could only be taken off by the person they were keyed to using the same runes etched on a wand holster.
He and his fellow Slytherin's each wore a pair that were charmed to protect against the weather during a Slytherin vs Hufflepuff Quidditch match in which it had rained heavily, the match had lasted four hours before Draco had caught the elusive snitch which was lucky as his and the rest of the glasses exploded in a shower of sparks.
Between him and the vast Hogwarts library he could perfect his glasses, he knew that if it wasn't for the ritual that he performed before he even started Hogwarts, he would have extremely poor eyesight much like his father it seemed to be a genetic flaw in all Potter men besides it was a nice side project to occupy his mind when not studying.
He had discussed his glasses in depth with not only Professor Flitwick but also his Runes Professor each of them had been surprised at the idea and encouraged him to continue his little side project, he had also written down some ideas on how to create communication devices for his group to use maybe as an earring or mirror.
Ron Weasley had become even more unbearable than ever this year if that was at all possible, his disgust pet rat had vanished leaving the ginger boy distraught and angry, Ron constantly accused anyone that even looked at him the wrong way even those from his own house weren't free of his accusations but none more so than the Slyherin's.
Harry could easily handle the boy's taunts but what annoyed him the most was the boy and his two friends Dean Thomas and Seamus Finnigan had started to terrorize the Slytherin first years, not that any of the teachers did much to stop the bullying even Dumbledore would wave away the bullying as children being children.
One morning Harry, Daphne and Draco were coming from the dungeons to get breakfast and had caught Ron casting the jelly-legs jinx charm at Astoria, the poor crying girl was begging the laughing boy to stop as she struggled to stay standing up.
Harry's Holly wand slipped into his hand and with little effect three Expelliarmus's fired from the tip of his wand and hit the unaware Gryffindor's, he plucked them out the air and tossed them to Draco who sneered at the three boys.
He lifted the spell from the sobbing girl who wiped away her tears and muttered a thanks to him before she and her friends went back to the dungeons no doubt returning to the common room.
Daphne had slipped quietly into the great hall as he and Draco taunted Weasley and his gang and just as the three boys tempers reached breaking point a furious Professor Snape arrived the three boys cost Gryffindor 150 points loss and a month's worth of detention as punishment.
None of that though concerned him, what truly concerned him and kept him up most nights covered in sweat and his scar bleeding as it pulsed with pain was the strange dreams or more accurately visions, he started to have while he slept, Harry could still vividly remember the first dream that opened the flood gates to the many dreams he had since.
The room was dim a large fire heated the room and lit the room in an orange glow, within the room a short balding man was huddled in the corner his head was bowed and his body shook with sobs.
A large snake was wrapped around a large red chair covered in dust the snake watched the scene before it with an odd intensity as its tongue flickered out tasting the air.
Laying on a dirty mattress lay a gasping woman, her hair was stuck to her face covering most of her features, white teeth clenched and unclenched as she screamed in agony, in the low lightening the woman was revealed to be heavily pregnant and completely naked except for the red Runes etched around her bulging stomach.
The woman's stomach rapidly stretched and bulged her hands and feet were restrained to the ground by large black chains, the woman had been in labour now for a few hours not that she understood her situation she was nothing but a shell.
With an almighty scream the woman's eyes rolled into her head her stomach stretched so much that it became almost see through before the skin ripped apart spilling blood and organs onto the mattress as the woman fell silent.
The baby within the woman's womb shifted slightly as a small cry echoed around the room, the snake slid off the chair and slithered its way across the room to reach the child, upon reaching the baby the snake shivered and hissed loudly as a black oily mist oozed out its body.
The mist shifted in the air above the child before it sunk into the skin of the child, the room again fell quiet except for the man's quiet sobs and the crackling of the fire until a raspy voice full of malice hissed out "Wormtail."
The man jerked at the sound "My L-lord." He stuttered as he scrambled across the room trying his best to avoid all the gore scattered across the room, he reached the cooling woman's remains and with trembling hands reached into the woman's corpse and picked up the baby.
The baby if it could be called that was deathly cold and extremely deformed it had thin arms with long skeletal fingers and elongated legs its skin while covered in blood was extremely pale, the man carried the baby across the room to a small table with that had a towel and a bucket of warm water on.
The man spent a few minutes cleaning the baby who hadn't moved or even opened its eyes yet before wrapping the baby in a black robe, the man then carried the baby to the chair and gently placed it in the seat before hurriedly stepping back as the snake once again wrapped itself around the chair.
"Master." The snake hissed as it lovingly rubbed its face across the baby's face.
Only then did the baby move a hand with long fingers reached out of the robe and slowly moved towards the snake, the fingers gently touched the snake before the hand moved away "My wand." The raspy hissing voice said.
The man fumbled as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a wand, the wand handle was curved at the bottom and had a single spike where the handle met the shaft, with a hand trembling so much the man feared he'd drop the wand he held out the wand.
The hand grasped the wand and with a small hiss of delight brought the wand closer another hand reached out of the robes and caressed the wand "Hello old friend." The same raspy voice hissed.
The baby flicked the wand and frowned when nothing happened before with a more forceful flick a mirror appeared floating before the baby, the baby spent a few minutes admiring its face.
The baby raised a hand to touch its face as it admired the high cheek bones flat slit like nose and sunken ruby red eyes and skin that looked almost bruised, the baby smiled revealing rotted misshapen teeth and glanced at the cowering kneeling man "Lord Voldemort has returned." He hissed before chackling with delight.
The man in his dreams was extremely short with grubby skin, small watery eyes and a pointed nose, his hair was colourless with bald patches, he spoke in an almost squeaky voice, and his features where almost rat like attributes. He knew the man to be Peter Pettigrew the one who betrayed the Potters to save his pathetic self.
Peter had run away to Albania after while hiding as rat learnt many animals feared the forest because of some dark presence, while hiding in a town near the forest he had been seen by a woman, the woman was Bertha Jorkins a noisy witch that loved to gossip.
Peter in a rare stroke of intelligence had quickly cast the imperius curse at the shocked woman and together had set of to find the dark presence.
It was as the pair where deep in the forest that for the first time in thirteen years that Peter's dark mark started to twinge, after searching the forest for nearly a week the pair finally found the dark presence.
In an area with dying trees and the carcass of hundreds of dead animals they had found a rather large snake feasting on the corpse of a dead unicorn, the snake had hissed at the pair ready to strike when Peter dropped to his knees as the mark on his arm flared with pain, the snake upon seeing the mark shook and hissed as oily black mist oozed out the snake.
The mist gathered in the air above the snake before with an almost animalistic roar it plunged into the shocked woman, Bertha seemed to struggle for a few minutes as she swayed from side to side before her eyes rolled into her skull and she dropped to the ground with a thud.
The snake who was watching then protectively wrapped itself around the woman, Peter could only watch on helpless unable to move under the watchful gaze of the serpent, it was hours later that the woman awake with as gasp and turned to Peter with eyes that where very familiar.
The dark lord had possessed Bertha for a time using her body to sustain him the possession revealed that someone had placed a memory charm on Bertha, after ripping through the charm the dark lord found out that Barty Crouch junior one of his Death Eaters had escaped from Azkaban with the help of his father Barty senior and was being kept hidden at the Crouch family manor.
The snake Nagini revealed that Bertha was in the early stages of pregnancy and so after preparing a ritual that used Bertha own body to accelerate the baby's growth the dark lord returned to possessing Nagini.
The dark lord after returning to a rudimentary body then used the death of Bertha to make Nagini his familiar into a seventh Horcrux, the pain he felt as his already fractured soul being mutilated again was indescribable and left his rudimentary body both physically weak but also magically weak.
Since the night he dreamt of the Dark Lords return to a body he would catch sight of his reflection and for a moment his face would be replaced with a pale deformed face that had slits for a nose and animalistic ruby red eyes and during the night he relived thirteen years of memories.
Harry spent much of his free time within the chamber training, The vast library within the chamber was incredible the ancient tomes and scrolls had been written by Salazar, the man had charmed the chamber in such a way that as his understanding of magic grew and he mastered new spells then they would release new knowledge.
He had also decided to train inside the room of requirement the room would become a battlefield in which he would attack an ever-growing army of dummies that to a limited degree acted quite lifelike all to tire himself out enough that he didn't dream not that it worked.
Many nights he would leave the room with plenty of cuts and bruises, but he was definitely seeing the fruits of his labour, he could now chain attacks together easily and he refined his style to suit his needs, he had the room turn into a muggle style gym and worked on strengthening his body.
He even tried to identify magic based solely on using his magical senses which admittedly was very limited at the moment it required a lot of concentration on his part, Occlumency was the key one of its many benefits was the ability to multitask with ease.
He spent hours in the library and chamber devouring texts and scrolls while not in classes or in the room his friends had taken over he was the best student in his year by far, but it wasn't enough he needed to push further, compared to the skills of Voldemort and Dumbledore he was a child.
Dumbledore for all his appearance as an eccentric old man was a prodigy, he held the highest NEWTS score in recorded history Griselda Marchbanks later recalled that he did things with a wand that she had never seen before, he had fought and won a duel against Grindelwald and was the only wizard that Tom feared and respected.
Voldemort like Dumbledore was the second most powerful wizard in history, while he was a gifted student quickly becoming a prodigy his true skill lay in unnatural grasp for the dark arts, growing up at the orphanage he could torture and control anyone he wanted, he pushed the very boundaries of magic.
He knew it would be difficult to even measure up to these two, but he was nothing if not ambitious, but he had an advantage that they both didn't he had Salazar Slytherin portrait, the portrait boasted to have knowledge on Battle magic, potions, ritual magic, Runes and Legilimency to name a few.
The books on Legilimency the founder pointed out proved difficult to understand they spoke of abstract things related to the mind and its chemistry, and while he could already brush against someone's thoughts with nothing more than a look, Salazar in his time knew your every thought as you decided them, he could counter your spells before you could even cast spells it made him a truly feared warrior.
Salazar couldn't offer much help with his dreams or vision, the portrait knew about Horcrux creation and even boasted to having scrolls written by the creator of the Horcrux ritual and its deprived creation but never had one soul absorbed another in the way he had.
The portrait explained that Horcrux's by their very nature where parasites, they would slowly feed of a person's magic and life force until the soul of person effectively died leaving the body free for complete possession.
The diary for example had charms placed upon it that once you touched the paper within with a quill it would slowly indoctrinate you its presence would slither its way into your mind talking to you offering advice once powerful enough you would experience black outs where your actions were not your own and like a dementor it would feed on your soul.
What would happen should two or more Horcrux's ever be released would they become subservient to the main soul fragment Tom would never allow himself to be controlled not even by himself and so would they end up destroying the other Horcrux's and thus destroying Tom's immortality.
He and Tom were linked together by something far greater than destiny, sorted into Slytherin house both half-bloods from ancient families dating back thousands of years, they shared brother wand cores, both spoke parseltongue and a prophecy had been made regarding them both although Tom and he didn't know the full prophecy.
During the night he could glimpse into a mind that Tom had spent considerable time learning to protect yet when he slept, he became Tom he knew what the man knew, saw what the man saw and felt Tom's emotions as his own, how did the absorption of Tom's soul affected him he knew he wasn't possessed but he also knew that after that fateful night he had been changed in a way that he didn't understand.
Since Voldemort's return to a body his scar now looked inflamed and when touched it felt almost burning hot and lumpy, he wasn't vain in any sense but he hated that lately it stood out so much, he applied a cooling lotion to it daily as it burned with pain and during the night, he awoke to find blood oozing out the scar like puss.
Professor Snape was concerned about the scar any diagnostics spells he tried all proved fruitless they didn't report any issues with the scar except that the scar was dark in nature, the man had brewed him a soothing potion that effects lasted longer than the standard potion, they contemplated telling the headmaster, but Harry refused he didn't trust the man and he doubted he would be forth coming with answers.
His friends noticed his erratic behaviour and he was thankful that when he needed to be alone, they often backed off and let him cool off when he felt like snapping at them, Daphne though was different during the nights when he would awaken from a vision he would go into the common room and look out through the charmed windows looking into the depths of the black lake.
The beautiful blonde Slytherin would often find him sitting before the charmed windows in the common room and without saying anything she would sit next to him her hand would take his and she would offer her silent support as she read from a book or stroked lish.
Harry had moved the Gaunt ring, Tom's diary and had retrieved Ravenclaws Diadem from the room of requirements to the Chambers study, since Tom returned to a body the Horcrux's in his possession called to him, it was like a pressure at the very back of his mind they whispered words he could never hear but understood on some level.
It was months after that first dream and nearing all hallows eve that the dark lord returned to Britain, Peter for all his incompetence had managed to use muggle means to get them back into Britain and although Tom was reluctant, he sought shelter in his disgusting ancestral muggle manor.
While Peter had been at the ministry in his rat Animagus spying on Bartemius Crouch Senior, the man had unwillingly been followed home as Peter hid in the man's coat pocket, once arriving at the Manor Peter found that the manors wards while impressive didn't view animals as a threat.
Voldemort found that using his connection to Nagini he could exert a level of control over the serpent and so with Peter they snuck into the Crouch family manor at night, Peter had once arriving at the man's bedroom quickly transformed and forced a potion down the mans throat to put him to sleep before he and Nagini went to fetch Barty junior.
Barty Junior was overjoyed to found out his master had returned and was eager to join him once again, together he and Voldemort planned Barty junior would use polyjuice potion to take the place of his father and be a spy for Voldemort within the ministry, Barty senior was kept sedated with the potion draught of the living dead.
It was while Barty Junior was polyjuiced as his father that he learnt of Fudges plans with the tri-wizard tournament and Quidditch world cup, the man had quickly reported this to his lord.
Harry sat in the great hall Daphne sat to his left chatting to her friend Tracy while Draco sat to his right, today was Halloween and as such the great hall was decorated for the occasion, scary pumpkins floated above their heads instead of candles laughing and swooping down to torment the students.
The Hogwarts house ghosts also joined in the fun they would chase the students through the halls or would turn invisible and move things around all except the bloody Baron although he did seem to look more bloodier than usual, Peeves caused the most trouble especially for Mr Filch the poltergeist had gotten hold of dung bombs, fanged frizbees and water balloons filled with a sticky green goo that he used without mercy.
Thousands of charmed bats flew around the room and would swoop down to terrorise the students both young and old, charmed snakes slithered between the rows of students and even some charmed witches on brooms would fly around casting spells that made loud bangs, a large wardrobe was placed near the entrance of the great hall that housed a boggart much to the dismay of the first and second years who jumped at the banging and rattling wardrobe.
Harry looked on in disgust as Ron was sat on the Gryffindor table was shovelling food down his throat, the boy would seemingly take a bite out of a chicken leg before dropping it and shovelling mash into his already stuffed mouth.
He turned away with a scoff and pushed his plate away from him just looking at the boy was enough to put him off what little food he had on his plate, he wondered how the people next to the boy could stomach eating next to the animal.
He would be preforming the traditional all hallows ritual tonight he longed to feel the comforting presence of his ancestors, hopefully the ritual would sooth his turbulent emotions.
He leaned back in his seat and ran a hand through his hair before reaching into his pocket for the lotion Professor Snape had given him, once he had the correct amount on his finger, he rubbed the cool lotion onto his painful scar.
"Are you ok harry?" Daphne asked as she looked at him with concern shining in her ice blue eyes.
He smiled at the young woman "Yeah I'm fine." He closed the lid on the lotion and placed it back into his pocket "My scar has been hurting for a few days." He frowned at Daphne as she reached out and placed her cool finger on his scar.
"Hm it is hot to the touch and feels lumpy. What has Professor Snape said about it?"
He nodded as he stared into Daphne's beautiful ice blue eyes "That my Scar is unique, all diagnoses spell he tried provided little information. He could only give me a soothing lotion and told me to come to him with any other problems." He looked away briefly to have a sip of cool pumpkin juice.
He turned back to her "I wonder if Professor Lupin is feeling better?" he said changing the subject, he watched as the young woman turned her attention to the high table to look at the dishevelled man.
"He still looks ill. I wonder if he's recovered from his latest illness." Daphne ran her hand through her long blonde hair "Do you notice anything strange about the man."
He shook his head "No more than any other magical person at least." He said as he turned his attention back the feast and reached for his cool goblet of pumpkin juice enjoying the cool liquid before turning his attention to the outlandishly dressed Dumbledore who stood up from his golden throne and fired a single bang from his wand.
"Student's now that we have all enjoyed our wonderful feast, I wish to say." Here Dumbledore paused as a swarm of annoying bats flew towards the man who nimbly dodged them with surprising ease "Happy Halloween everyone." With that the man then left the great hall through one of the side entrances.
He and his group of friends left the hall and descended down into the dungeons of Hogwarts before reaching the blank wall that served as the secret entrance to the Slytherin common room "Basilisk." He said before stepping through the wall and into the room beyond.
Harry found Lish stretched out before the large fire enjoying its heat, he noticed a rather large rat on the ground beside his familiar. He walked over to the sofa and hissed "Enjoy your hunt Lish, hope you remembered to stay safe." he turned his attention to Draco who was nervously looking at the seat just behind lish "You can step over her she won't bite."
"Yes Harry, Rex kept me safe." Lish then turned to look at Draco "I won't bite hard anyway" Lish raised herself up slightly and playfully tried to take a bite at the boy.
He chuckled at lish and waved away Draco's uncertain look "What?" he asked as he pulled out his potions book from his school robes pocket.
"It's really creepy hearing you hiss like that it's incredibly cool but still creepy." Draco shuddered as he stretched out on the sofa and closed his eyes.
Harry shrugged "Your jealous you don't have the gift." He dodged the silver pillow that the blonde boy chucked at him with a smile before he turned back to his book and settled in to read for a few hours using the silver pillow to lean back on.
It was near midnight that he along with his dorm mates settled on the stone floor of the common room, Harry had lish wrapped around his shoulders, with his eyes closed he like his dorm mates had done the ritual and he could feel his ancestor's soothing presence.
He vaguely wondered how the ministry could deem this ritual dark and dangerous sure the ritual involved using a small amount of blood but again it was a prime example of the ministry not understanding and had banned the practice.
Tom's goals had been noble once he saw the damage that the ministry was doing and although he amassed a strong support with the ancient families and formed his knights which voted against any legislation on suppressing the ancient traditions but it wasn't enough, the ministry continued to ban and restrict many branches of magic.
As Tom continued to mutilated his soul he lost sight of his goals and ruled through fear, he went from wanting to change the status quo, to destroying ancient families, how many gifts blessed to the old families had been lost due to Tom's short-sightedness, you just had to look at Hogwarts as an example the castle could house thousands of students yet after Tom's defeat the castle barely housed a few hundred students.
Dumbledore for all his titles decided that as muggleborns were now a majority at Hogwarts used his power within the wizengamot and ICW to pass may bills that benefited the muggleborns lives, he had amassed his own group of followers that could further his goals and fight against the pureblood faction.
Harry shook away all thoughts and instead simply basked in the comfortable feeling surrounding him, it was well passed two in the morning when he and his dorm mates stumbled into bed Harry got himself comfortable as Lish slithered next to him to enjoy his warmth, the entire school had the day off tomorrow, so they had the entire day to recover.
Albus sighed as he stood near the entrance to the Slytherin Common room hidden beneath an invisibility charm normally he would be either patrolling the castle with the prefects or in his office working his way through the ever-growing pile of letters scattered across his desk.
Instead he stood waiting the wards that surrounded the castle had alerted him to the presence of foreign magic being preformed and knew that as tonight was all hallows eve many of the more traditional families would be doing the ritual to communicate with their dead ancestors.
Every year since becoming headmaster he found himself stood before the Slytherin common room waiting to see if anything bad happened, he knew that it was unlikely to happen, but he couldn't ignore the many deaths throughout history it was why he worked as hard as he did to suppress the old ways, he kept Binns teaching for a reason the ghost made history sound extremely boring and only those who had a passion for history would research and find the old ways.
He felt the foreign magic slowly dissipate and the wards around the school settle before he turned and walked the long trek back to his office, things in the wizengamot had been quiet lately the dark factions hadn't voted to stop any bills that he tried to discreetly using a proxy which in itself was strange.
He learnt that Lucius Malfoy was spending a large amount of time within ministry more so than usual, the man had made a rather large donation to Saint Mungo, while that wasn't anything major it was what the hospital had done with the money, through discreet enquiries he learnt they had hired mind healer.
He knew that no serious accidents had occurred lately that warranted such a specialist he would have to make careful enquires he knew that it wasn't any of his business but if Malfoy had something planned, he needed to gather as much information as possible to counter the man's schemes.
He reached his office a few minutes later and decided to call it a night it was well past 2am anyway.