Nobles, Orphans, Street rats and Scholars

by Moxie

We all know that Voldemort is the Heir of Slytherin... or is he? What if there were other heirs, to all the houses? What if they were thrown into a fray of makebelieve from real, even in the wizarding world?

9. Do You Believe in the Impossible?

Gabriel ran. She really didn't have the faintest idea to where she was running to, but she only had to look behind her at the disappearing black smear that was Castle Sapius to see what she was running from.

A part of her was dismayed: she was running from her problems, and in short, was acting like a scared rogue with no honor. But, what other choice was there? She sure as sure wasn't going to go back to face Tom Riddle, who was under a drugged sleep. Right now, she was reconsidering the wisdom of this action. Considering the fact that the five of them were bound to him by many complex spells in a pendant, drugging and running away from the person that basically held their lives in the palm of his hand...Well, dying like a hero would be better than living as a cowardly Dark Wizard, supposed Gabriel grimly.

Finally, Hayley collapsed on the ground, breathing heavily into the dust. Gabriel stood to wait for her, but when she stopped, she got immensely lightheaded, and her knees gave out from under her. Wiping sweat from her eyes, she flopped on her back next to Hayley, feeling her heart thumping in her throat.

She felt a sudden rush of air on her left side, and a groan. Sarah had fallen on her other side. Opening her eyes to slits, Gabriel saw the blurry figure of Robert, keeling over for breath, and Chenelle, who was sitting down across from her. Sweat decided to drip into her eyes at that moment, which burned.

"What.....does everyone.....say to....a nice.....rest?" panted Robert. Breathing too hard to talk, Gabriel nodded, and everyone leaned back on their elbows.

After a few minutes, Hayley hoisted herself up onto her haunches and looked around at her exhausted comrades.

"Does anyone have anything to eat?" Hayley asked, slightly breathless still. Sarah, Gabriel, Robert and Hayley looked at each other and groaned.

"I can't believe that we didn't think of that!" Sarah cried. "Robert, you're supposed to be the genius here, why didn't you think of it?"

Robert groaned again. "I am a genius. On paper, that is." Gabriel growled at him.

"Well, you being a genius on paper isn't going to help fill my stomach, is it?" she snapped at Robert. Chenelle just giggled.

"It's lucky for you that I was invited," she said coolly, producing the burlap sack that she had been toting around. Reaching into it, she threw everyone a shiny red apple, slightly bruised.

"Well, now we know why we weren't complete in number four," Sarah grumbled, biting into the apple. "We would have starved to death otherwise," she finished, spraying small flecks of apple flesh everywhere. Hayley wrinkled her nose.

"Don't chew with your mouth open, Sarah. It's disgusting," she complained. In response to this, Sarah gave her a sugary smile, and proceeded to chew as loudly and with her mouth as open as humanly possible, smacking her lips together.

Robert looked at her with disdain. "Why'd you have to bring it up, Hayley? You knew that that'd happen."

Hayley just looked at Sarah sadly, who was still putting on a show of what was in her mouth. Gabriel giggled.

"That's sick, Sarah. But, it's funny." Sarah smiled and swallowed.

"I live to displease," she said happily. She looked over at Hayley, who was picking at her apple skin, and peeling it off. Sarah was shocked out of her apple-eating charade for a moment.

"What're ya doin, Hayley?" she asked. Hayley looked at her for a second before resuming her peeling.

"I hate the skin of the apple. It tastes bad," she said softly. Gabriel and Sarah looked at her in disbelief.

"Here we are, in the middle of some desert, practically, and you're worrying about how something tastes?!" Gabriel cried, nearly dropping her apple. Hayley shrugged.

"I can't eat it with the skin on. It makes me gag, and I can't swallow it," she explained, tearing a shard of red off of the apple. "You want it?" she asked, holding it out to Sarah.

"Yes!" Sarah cried, taking it and jamming it in-between her teeth. Gabriel scowled.

"No fair! I get the next one!" she declared. Chenelle looked at the both of them, thoroughly amused.

"I never knew a pair to fight over the skin of an apple before," she said, grinning from ear to ear. Throwing her apple core to the side, she got up off of the ground, dusting off her hands on her coarse gown.

"I suggest we get a move on. If we're going to get anywhere from that castle, that is. Hayley can eat her neatly peeled apple on the way."

Hayley glared at her, but unrolled the tapestry that had been lying across her lap during the entire conversation. Unraveled, she ran her finger along the blue river that was their path. To her surprise, along the river, there was the tiniest little golden boat, which was apparently floating placidly on the shore.

"I think that we're right here," she said, pointing to the boat, which was about an inch along the river, and the river was about twenty inches long. There was one unanimous groan from the five of them.

"The stupid cross-stitch didn't say anything about a scale!" Robert cried, looking incrediculously at the marker, and at the distance that they had to travel.

"How long have we been running?" inquired Gabriel. Chenelle looked at the sky, as if trying to tell by the shade of the sky.

"Well, we left at about nine, so I'd say it's about one in the morning," she said smoothly. Sarah looked at her, jaw dropped.

"We ran for four hours straight?! That-that's not possible!" she protested. "We would have collapsed by now, into a faint!"

Chenelle shrugged. "That's what time it is, and the sky doesn't lie, so they say."

Hayley squinted back at the black dot on the horizon that was Castle Sapius. "Well, whatever we do, I don't care how long we've been running, now isn't the time to stop!" she said. Four other heads nodded in agreement, and they began, slowly, painfully, to walk.

# # #

With all of the sleeping spells, Light and Dark, that the foursome had conjured, you'd think that Tom Riddle would have slept for about a century. But, unfortunately for the five traveling children, Tom had acquired a resistance of some sort to Dark magic. With a soft snort and a loud groan, Tom Riddle roused from his drugged slumber.

At first, he just sat there contentedly, gazing at the wall through half-lidded eyes. Then the events of the past hours hit him in the face. Eyes bulging, he rocketed awake, leaping out of the chair.

"What.....?!" he asked confusedly, trying to recall more than scant wisps of memory of what had occurred right under his nose. Walking over to the forsaken teaset, he looked at the teapot and teakettle. Squinting at them, he noted that they shimmered faintly.

"Cloaking spells, Light cloaking spells at that," he noted carefully. Opening the teakettle, he saw that some of the 'water' from his tea was still in the kettle. Dipping a finger in carefully, he noted that it had congealed, and was sticky, like glue.

"Sleeping potions...." he opened the teacaddy and took a small sniff. "...and Tahara leaves. I always knew that they were smarter than they let on to be," he said slowly.

He blushed faintly at the fact of how five barely trained children had outwitted the Dark Lord. But he shook it off, and the blush turned to one of a tinge of anger. A couple of weeks in the dungeons ought to change their tunes, he thought angrily.

"And if all else fails, there's always the trump..." he trailed off, fingering his pendant. But he wasn't going to kill them. Not yet. There was too much potential there to be wasted like that, judging from the fact that they had been able to pull a fast one on him, and he had never really suspected anything.

Snapping out of his daze, Tom dropped his pendant from his fingers, and started to pick up his pace to a quick trot. Ripping through tapestries, talking to pictures with hidden entrances behind them, pulling levers and pulleys that were disguised as other things, he made his way through the castle.

Finally, he emerged outside, near the western wing of the castle. Looking over the barren landscape, he saw no forms of life anywhere, and he sighed. They had to be somewhere. They couldn't leave the dimension without his knowing so, right? Right. But, why were they running away if there was nowhere to go?

Brushing this thought from his mind, he turned to the expanse of stone wall in front of him. It was the only one that was seemingly just a stone wall, with no windows, drawbridges, or large doors on it. But looks were deceiving. Tom planted his feet and turned to face the wall.

"Come out," he said to the wall. Except for the fact that he didn't say it, exactly. He hissed it.

From behind the wall, there was a great amount of rustling and thrashing about. The wall of the castle started to distort itself, until there was a gaping black hole in the middle of it. Tom Riddle waited patiently for his 'pet' to appear.

In one fluid, watery motion, a gigantic snake slithered out of the hole, rearing its head up in a dramatic display. It was a large cobra, with fangs longer than redwood trees, whiter than snow, and sharper than serrated steak knives. The serpent itself was a black, that was darker than night itself, and the markings on the folds of skin that framed the cobra's head were a dark, bloody crimson.

"Very good. I need you to go on a mission for me, my friend," Tom hissed out. "There are five people on our lands. I need you to go and put them under the Big Stillness for me. No Bloodkill, just Big Stillness. Bring them to me."

If you're going to work with snakes for allies, Tom learned quickly; you have to talk the way they talk. When a basilisk Petrifies people, they know it as the 'Big Stillness'. But when a victim is killed by the full blast of its deadly glare, or is bitten fatally by one of its saber-like teeth, it is known better as the 'Bloodkill'.

"Big Ssstillness....yesss Masster...." the snake said faintly, as if already envisioning it's victim's fate. Tom Riddle nodded.

"Be off with you, then," he hissed. The gargantuan serpent nodded, and slithered off in the direction that the fivesome took; it's delicate tongue tasting the air.

Tom Riddle watched it for a moment before turning on his heel and walking in the castle once again.

# # #

Robert looked over his shoulder. He had the strangest feeling that someone was following him, but whenever he looked behind him, there was nothing there. Biting down that horrible feeling that you get when you think that something is stalking you, but you can't see it, he forced his wobbly legs to take one more step.

Panting, he wiped sweat off of his forehead. They must have at least been walking for twelve hours. How Robert made it that far, was obviously not for him to know. Finally, he knew when his poor limbs had had enough. Letting his knees cave in from under him, he fell onto the ground, and looked up at the girls. They weren't looking that keen themselves, either.

Petticoats and heavy shoes and stockings had long since been discarded haphazardly along the path side. When Robert saw Hayley throw her last stocking over to her side, he sighed sadly. Now anyone could follow their trail, just by looking.

Sarah flopped next to him. She cut a comical figure, with one of her petticoats wadded up around her head like a turban.

"I'm exhausted. Does a little nap sound good to anyone right now?" she asked. Everybody nodded, except for Chenelle, who frowned.

"Not that I'm against a little rest, but someone needs to stay up, in case...well something attacks. You never know when Mast-I mean Tom, will wake up. Now, who will take first watch?" she asked. Nobody volunteered.

Gabriel groaned, and took her sword out from where she had thrust it in her velvet dress. "I'll put this on the ground and spin it. Whoever it points to is the person with first watch. Fair enough?" she proposed. The others shrugged.

"Sounds fine with me," Hayley said. Gabriel put it in the center of them, and gave it a hefty twirl, so nobody could accuse her for being biased.

The sword spun crazily for hours, so it seemed. Then it slowed down a bit. Then a little bit more. Finally, it was going slower than a turtle crossing the road. Slower....Slower....Slower still......Stop on.......Hayley.

Hayley made a face. "Darn. How long is first watch?" she inquired. Sarah unwound her petticoat-turban, and fluffed it into a pillow.

"When one of us wakes up," she said drowsily. "Which won't be me for a while, I'm afraid. I'm totally zonked."

Chenelle saw the dismayed look on Hayley's face, and patted her shoulder. "When you think that you're going to fall asleep, just wake me up. I'll take second watch. Unlike lazybones over there," she said with a venomous glare at Sarah. "We'll just make sure she has the longest watch of all."

Sarah just smiled with her eyes closed, and yawned slightly. "Just as long as I can sleep for about eighteen hours, I'll watch as long as you want...." she trailed off, ending with a snore.

Gabriel put her hands under her head. "Just don't make too much noise, all right, Hayley?" she mumbled as she fell into slumber.

Robert didn't say anything; he rolled over and gave a sleepy snort. Chenelle gave Hayley a small wink. "It won't take that long, I promise."

Hayley watched, jealous, as her friends slumbered. "Stupid sword," she growled, looking at the blade that Gabriel clutched to her chest.

That was when the first wave of real sleepiness hit her. Her eyelids felt like thousand pound granite slabs, and it took all of her strength to keep them open. Hayley's arms and legs felt suddenly too heavy, and her heartrate seemed to slow.

"They won't mind if I just rest my eyes for a moment," she reasoned with herself sleepily. And with that, Hayley Hufflepuff drifted into a deep sleep, just like her friends.

# # #

The deadly basilisk flicked his tongue in the air, tasting the thickness of it, and searching around with its eyes that could not see color.

Flicking out its tongue again, the adder tasted many things on the wind. It tasted of the dryness of the land now, and a slight hint of vegetation hung in the air; signs of what this place used to be before evil contaminated it. The great serpent also tasted the hot air, and the magic that had swirled into the sky, polluting the atmosphere. It left a sour tang on the snake's delicate tongue.

Shaking his head, the basilisk strained its abilities to the farthest to seek its prey. Finally, after about five more minutes of tasting, the serpent found what it was seeking for; the arid-salty taste of human sweat. Taking a deep breath in its nostrils, he breathed in the scent of damp breath, human skin, and the shampoo that humans always used.

Looking down, the adder noticed a large scrap of light cloth - a petticoat. Nudging it around with his nose, he got the scent down pat, and roused up again, taking another deep smell of the air. The smell was strong here. They couldn't be far.

Arching its head over to the left, the snake saw a little smear of blackness on the horizon: the camp that the fivesome had staked out.

The basilisk slithered quickly and quietly over there, trying to use the snake's ability of the element of surprise. When he got up there, the snake was pleased in a cynical way to find that his prey was fast asleep. But, sadly for the serpent, the slight gust of wind caused by the snake's movements was enough to wake Gabriel.

# # #

Gabriel had been enjoying a peaceful slumber, when a blast of wind hit her in the face. It wasn't very strong, but strong enough to wake her up slightly.

"'Not time for my watch yet, Chenelle. Five more minutes," she complained. She was about to roll over and go back to sleep, when there was an odd occurrence.

Bright red, misty fog erupted in front of Gabriel's eyelids, spoiling the darkness. Before she could react, a voice sounded in her brain.

"Rise, Gabriel! Rise now, lest you meet your doom!" the voice implored her. Gabriel noted the fact that the voice was male, and very gallant sounding. Gabriel thought that the voice must know what it was talking about, so she opened her eyes a crack.

You could imagine her reaction when she saw a gigantic black snake looming over her, ominously. A blood-curdling scream escaped her lips, waking Chenelle, Hayley and Robert. Sarah remained asleep.

The snake lunged on Gabriel, and Gabriel did her first reaction, she pulled out her shield, and the serpent bounced off of it, hissing angrily. With the impact, Gabriel felt her bones rattle, and the shield slip.

Robert was too awed to move a muscle. He sat there stupidly, staring up at the reptile, with a dropped jaw, when a voice rang in his head, loudly.

"Don't look it in the eyes! Whatever you do, don't look it in the eyes!" an intelligent sounding female voice said.

"Don't look it in the eyes!" Robert yelled to Gabriel, who was clumsily fending off the adder with her sword. This was fortunate, since at the next moment the snake decided that fighting was silly, and to paralyze this feeble human would save precious energy. Gabriel shut her eyes just in time.

Chenelle looked at Sarah in awe, who was still snoozing though all of the drama that was taking place. "How can she sleep through this?!" she cried.

Sarah rolled over, smacking her lips contentedly, while the basilisk and Gabriel battled on. Sarah herself was enjoying a peaceful nap, when it was interrupted the same way that Gabriel's had been, almost.

Green fog swirled in front of Sarah's eyelids. A snooty, slightly stuck up male voice spoke loudly, as if he were yelling into her ear.

"Get up! Fight!" it screamed at her. Sarah winced in her sleep and tossed in her spot on the ground, sending up dust.

"Don' wanna fight. Don' know how to fight. 'Wanna sleep," she mumbled to the annoying voice. There was something of an aggravated sigh.

"I'm not arguing with you, you impudent child! Get up! You're a parseltongue, you can help! That's all I have to say, all in the Slytherin blood line are....." the voice trailed off.

Sarah's brain festered in her half-awake daze. Wasn't a parseltongue someone that could talk to snakes? She couldn't talk to snakes, could she?

Opening an eyelid, Sarah found herself face to face with a scene that was both horrifying and amusing at the same time; Gabriel trying to take on a gigantic snake. Strangely, Sarah felt no danger from the snake, but she felt more afraid for Gabriel's welfare at the moment. Finally, the snake got tired of Gabriel's antics, and caught her in a sideswipe with it's thick tail. Gabriel screamed and landed on her left ankle with a slight crack.

Sarah was furious. Grabbing her chain-whip, she slung it out with no grace of muscle or thought. But it hit the mark. The metallic crack of metal hitting scales echoed throughout the area, and the next sound was the snake screeching in pain. Sarah sighed.

"Along with breaking that dragon'sss arm, running away from Tom Riddle, that wasss probably the third ssstupid thing that I've done here," she muttered. Except for the fact that she didn't exactly mutter it.

"She-she just hissed!" Robert cried, backing away from Sarah as if she were some kind of monster.

"What'sss your problem?" asked Sarah, momentarily forgetting all about the adder, who was also looking at her curiously. Then Sarah noticed that she had just issued a hissing noise from her throat. She reeled back a couple of steps, clutching her throat.

"What the...Well I'll be damned! I really am a parssseltongue!" she hissed happily. The snake reared its head level with her own. Sarah forgot not to look in the snake's eyes, but, oddly, she hadn't been paralyzed. The snake's eyes were black and glossy, just like a normal snake's would be.

"Massster call? You no Massster. Massster bigger," the snake hissed curiously, trying to identify her scent. Sarah frowned.

"Masster? What Masster look like?" asked Sarah. The snake looked at Sarah harder. The other four humans looked at Sarah in surprise, but Sarah ignored them.

"Masster look like you, two legged snake. He dark topped. Masster talksss to me. You no Masster, but you talk," the basilisk said. Sarah tugged on her lip slightly, thinking. That did sound like Tom Riddle. But then she brightened. This could be useful.

"I your new Masster for now. Me and other two-legged sssnakes need help from great reptile you are," Sarah said, trying to sound flattering. It must have worked, since the snake seemed to puff up proudly.

"What you and other two-leg sssnakes need?" the adder asked. Sarah grinned.

"We need ride from big ssstrong you. Can you handle that?" Sarah hissed. The basilisk gave something of a snakey grin.

"Yessss, Massster," the snake said. Sarah turned to the others, grinning.

"What would you guys say to a little lift?" she asked, in plain English. The other four gawked at her as if she was crazy.

"On that thing?!" asked Hayley, pointing a crazed finger at the snake. "Are you insane?! He'd eat us, or something!" Sarah shrugged.

"You want to walk?" she asked again, looking at Robert.

Robert looked up at the ninety-foot tall reptile. This was against his better judgement, but he didn't think that his legs would willingly take another step. He looked at Hayley, Chenelle, and Gabriel, who was shredding up Sarah's head-petticoat to bandage her swollen ankle that she had fallen on. Gabriel looked angrily at the snake, but then sighed.

"Well, I don't think that I can walk on this ankle," Gabriel reasoned, wincing as she wrapped the white strips around her injured limb carefully. Robert sighed.

"I don't think that I could walk anymore anyway," he admitted softly. Chenelle looked at Hayley.

"You're outnumbered," she pointed out to Hayley. "I'm all for accepting a ride. It'll be faster," Chenelle said sensibly. Hayley scuffed a bare, dirty foot up against the ground. Finally, she threw her hands up in the air in resignation.

"Oh, all right. I could use a sleep, anyway," she said forcibly. Sarah grinned at her four friends.

"I knew you'd see it my way," she said, winking. She turned to the gigantic snake, hissed something, and he leaned his head down on the ground. Gingerly, the fivesome climbed on the large head of the reptile.

It was quite slippery, and there was nothing to hold on to. But as the snake started to move, they were relieved to find that the ride was a little wavery, but smooth. After hissing instructions to the snake, Sarah settled back onto the scales, basking herself in the sun.

"Well, this isn't too bad. We've got a ride at any rate, and we don't have to walk anymore," she said lazily, toying with her chain. Hayley yawned and settled back on the scales with Sarah.

"Yeah, but that doesn't mean that this is the end of our problems."

# # #

Far away, there was a heated debate going on.

"That was too close for comfort," a worried, motherly voice said. "They're going to get themselves killed."

An aggravated sigh sounded. "They're fine," a slightly nasal, flutey voice said angrily. "Honestly, they can take care of themselves. You act like they're children."

"They are children," a highly educated female voice snapped. "And you act as if they are competent adults, which they aren't."

"Now now," a tired male said. "Arguing about it isn't helping anybody do anything."

The owner of the motherly voice turned around and glared at the man that had just spoken. "I don't think that arguing about it is doing anybody any good either!" she cried. "But warrior man over there is going to get our descendants killed! Don't you care?"

"Of course I care, Helga," the male voice snapped. "I just happen to think that they should fight their own battles! Us interfering isn't going to help anybody either!"

The owner of the male voice that spoke first sounded astonished. "Why, Godric, you agree with me! That's a first," he finished sarcastically.

"Shut up, Salazar. You're just still bitter over that fight that you lost-"

"I didn't lose! You cheated!"

"Cheated? How did I cheat?!"

"You used Light Magic, you fool! That's not exactly allowed in a wizarding duel!"

"I only used it to counter your Dark Magic! And is that regulated, using the Arts?!"

"Light Magic is more powerful than Dark! And I didn't use the Arts, either!"

"Well, Dark Magic is stronger than wand magic! And you did too!"

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"Did not!"

"You did too, you-you cowardly snake!" Godric cried, fumbling for words.

Salazar stared, aghast for a moment, before falling on his side in peels of laughter.

"Well, Godric, old friend, you've got me there! I'm-I'm a cowardly snake! Oh oh oh oh oh oh!" he said, tears of mirth starting to spill down his cheeks. Helga, the owner of the motherly voice, looked at the pair incredulously.

"I fail to see what is so funny, Salazar. But, you two and your childish fights aren't helping this anymore than Rowena and I worrying. In fact, this is probably making it worse."

The intelligent sounding voice rang out again. "I think that we had better just sit around and see what happens. If we are needed, we shall know."

"Are you sure?" asked Helga uncertainly.

"Have I ever been wrong?" countered Rowena. Helga gave a faint smile.

"Well, no. Not to my knowledge, at least, Rowena."

The two ladies looked at the men, who were still squabbling over nothing at all. Helga sighed.

"You know, now that I think about it, it's better that we oversee things at a distance. If anybody met the real Hogwarts founders, I'm afraid of what they would think."

Rowena gave a short laugh, and preceded to watch the two male founders fight.

# # #

Tom Riddle thumped his foot against the floor in aggravation. What was taking that addlebrained snake so long? The children couldn't have gone that far, could they? It was humanly impossible in such a short amount of time. And besides, a snake's keen sense of smell would have sought them out by now, wouldn't it?

Finally running out of patience, he sprang to his feet, and walked over to the fireplace.

"Elestrapa," he said, pointing to the unburnt logs in the fireplace. The logs instantly exploded into a roaring purple inferno, quickly swallowing up the wood.

Walking over to the mantle, he pulled off a small pouch, and looked inside of it. It was a black velvet sack, and the inside had a slight dusty sheen to it, indicating that there had been powder in it at one point in time.

"Wonderful timing to run out of Seerdust," Tom cursed under his breath. Looking from the pouch to the fire, and back to the pouch again, and sighed. Walking up to the flames, he tossed the pouch in the fire.

The velvet instantly roared into a purple fireball, and shriveled up into a smoldering scrap in an elapsed time of about ten seconds. The powder that had been in the pouch crackled over one of the logs, making the fire flicker and pop.

Finally, the flames changed from the purple to an eye scorching yellow, to a mellow green, and lastly to a black. Black fire! A very odd occurrence, but Tom Riddle paid it no heed. He waited patiently, until a very blurry image of Hayley, Sarah, Robert, Gabriel, Chenelle, and the basilisk riding through the desert-like countryside appeared in the leaping obsidian flames.

Tom gnashed his teeth together in anger. So, he had been betrayed, had he? And by his own serpent, too! But when he leaned forwards for a closer look, there was a dazzling explosion of white, red, green, blue and yellow light, knocking Tom back onto his heels, covering his eyes in pain.

When he got up the nerve to look again, all there was a pile of charred logs and a hearth that was covered in black ash. Picking up a poker that was in a fire set by the fireplace, Tom smacked at one of the logs, to see if it had been magicked.

The log broke into two and crumbled into the fireplace, just as a normal firelog would have. Putting down the poker, he ran his hand along the ash that had been scattered onto the hearth.

On closer inspection, the ash felt like regular ash, it smelt like regular ash, and it even tasted like ash, once he got up the nerve to taste it. Spitting ruefully onto the ground, he wiped his hand on his black tunic and rose to his feet. He wanted to try to See into the fire again, but for one thing, he was out of powder, and for another, he had seen all he really needed to see. His adder had betrayed him.

Walking to the exit of the room, a small smirk emerged on Tom's features. He knew what he was going to do now. Sure, the snake had left him, but that didn't mean that there weren't other creatures around to do his bidding.

Now, where were those dragons at?

# # #

Chenelle smoothed out the tapestry/map, and looked down at it. Sweat dripped off of her nose and onto the map. Cursing lightly, she wiped her face off onto the sleeve of her rough gown and looked at the others.

They weren't looking so great either. It was hot up here on top of a giant black animal, and what was worse, was the fact that there was no water. Chenelle hadn't thought about it, the night that she had fled from the castle, and she was sorely regretting it now.

"You know," Robert rasped, "human beings can't go more than four days without water. And with the weather always like it is, I don't know how much longer we'll last out here."

"Oh, that's comforting," Sarah snapped weakly. "That's all I need to hear, is the fact that I'm gonna die here soon."

Hayley raised her head off of the snake's head. "How many days has it been, Chenelle?" Chenelle looked up at the sky. She had long since lost track of time and its meaning, but she tried to answer her friend.

"I think three days, but I have no clue," she answered faintly. "All of the days have gotten muddled up in my head. But look, we only have about three more inches to go on this map of yours, Hayley."

Gabriel groaned, and tenderly rubbed her ankle, which had since swelled to the size of a balloon. "Good. The way this snake sways is making me seasick. Is everyone sure that they didn't learn some sort of healing spell?" she asked hopefully. Everybody else groaned. Gabriel had been asking that question for about the last two days, at least.

"No, Gabriel, I don't!" croaked Sarah. "Please stop asking. It's too blasted hot to get worked up."

It was true. While the land of Sapius (as they called it), was freezing at night, it was very hot during the day, and all five of the children were sunburnt quite badly.

"I'm thirsty," complained Hayley softly. Sarah felt her head beginning to throb with anger and heat, and she was about to retort, but decided that it was too hot for annoyance.

Robert, who was sitting on the snake facing backwards, watched the desolate landscape pass by behind him. He yawned. Although that he wasn't doing any walking, the heat was making his sleepy. That was when he noticed a faint smear on the horizon. He squinted at it.

"Hey, you guys....What's that?"

# # #

Tom Riddle kicked the sides of the dragon that he was riding on - Aquanus- viciously.

"Come on, can't you go any faster?" he snarled at the blue dragon. The dragon turned its head slightly, just barely resisting the urge to buck the rider off. But he knew that if he did that, he would be Tom's new throw rug in the morning.

--I could, Master, but then we might fly by them,-- he contented himself to saying. Tom groaned.

"Isn't there a happy medium between going too fast and too slow?" Tom snapped. Carnash sighed, and scratched at her pink scales.

--Forgive me, Master for asking, but I have a question,-- she said. Tom looked over at her.

"What is it?" he asked angrily. His tone of voice didn't put Carnash off at all. She scratched at her pink scales again before answering.

--We can see the humans that you're after. I just don't see why we can't attack them now, and get it done with. Why all of this following?--

Tom sighed. Dragons had no sense of logic about them at all. "Because, I want to see where they're going, so I can prevent them from leaving again. If I just take them back now, I what's going to stop them from trying this again?"

Hunter, the green dragon, sidled up to them. --Umm, aren't they just children? Can't you just put some kind of tab on them, Master? You know, to keep them from running away again?-- he asked. Tom started to get aggravated.

"I do have tabs on them! They're called binding pendants!" he cried, barely keeping his voice from a shout.

--Then why don't you use them?-- Aquanus asked innocently. Tom smacked a hand to his head and drug it down his face.

"Because I don't want to kill them! It's a waste of talent! If they could get past me, then they must be pretty talented! Now stop bugging me with your idiotic questions and get moving!" he screeched.

The dragons flew on.

# # #

"What's what?" Gabriel asked lazily in response to Robert's question. Robert pointed to the moving dot on the horizon.

"That. See it? That moving smudge. I think we're being followed again," he said heavily. Gabriel squinted at he sky, shading her eyes.

"I don't - oh wait, yeah, I see it. Hey Sarah?"

"Hey what?"

"You don't think that you could make this snake go faster, do you? We're being followed," Gabriel said, pointing to the sky.

Sarah, Hayley and Chenelle rocketed up at once. Chenelle scrambled over to the other side of the snake's head, and peered at the sky.

"What? Oh my God. Sarah?"

"All right, all right! Give me a second to get over there, would you?" Sarah asked irritably. Crawling over to the snake's face, she leaned over to speak to him.

Despite his passengers deteriorating health, the adder was quite healthy, and enjoying his spell out in the sun after being in the dark for so long. Basilisks could go without food and water for centuries if need be, and could travel nonstop for about a month on end.

"Hey....We're being followed. Do you think that you could go any fassster?" Sarah hissed in his ear. The snake looked back.

"Okay, if you ssssay sssso," the serpant hissed back. "Hang on..."

It's a little known fact, Sarah and her friends soon found out, but snakes can go very fast if they want to. Pretty soon the adder was slithering at breakneck speed down the desert, kicking up a large cloud of dust in its wake.

Everybody was thrown totally off-kilter by the speed. In an act of desperation, Sarah hurled her chain whip around its throat with one hand and caught it with the other when it came back, so it acted like a crude bridle. Chenelle clamped on her legs, and Gabriel grabbed Chenelle's waist, and at the last moment, Hayley caught a fistful of Chenelle's dress.

Robert, however, was another story. Poor Robert tried to grab on to Hayley, but his grip missed, and he fell off of the head of the snake.

Luckily for him, before he hit the ground, the snake's tail, (which was switching madly back and forth), stopped him from being splattered onto the ground. When he hit the flesh, he bounced slightly, but he caught a decent grip on the whipping tail, and held on for dear life, coughing up trail dust as he went.

This was not going too well, thought Robert idly as he fought to breathe.

# # #

Essex walked around the corner. Her next class was Astronomy, but it was too blasted hot in the tall tower to sit through it and listen to Professor Copperpot put her to sleep. Walking around aimlessly, she decided to skip. It wouldn't matter anyhow, for the fact that there was no exam today or anything, and she could get the notes off of someone else. She was looking around for a place to hide until class started, when she found it. Moaning Myrtle's bathroom.

Looking up and down the halls to make sure that nobody was around, she pushed open the door to the bathroom.

It was pitch black, as the small guttering candles decided that they had had enough of trying to keep alight, and had finally gone out. Taking out her wand, she waved it in the air a few times.

"Lumos," she muttered to it. The tip of her wand lit up with a slight pop and a sparkle, and threw shadows over everything.

There really wasn't much to look at. The floor was totally covered with water, and it reflected the light of the wand around the room hazily. Gray, rotting stalls stood silent on the left side of the room, some of them nearly falling apart. Essex sighed. What a fun way to spend the hour. Still, it was better than broiling up in the Astronomy tower with Professor Copperpot.

Shoes squelching in the water, she walked up to the row of sinks, the one that was farthest from the door in particular.

The mirror in front of the sink was severely cracked, and a huge portion of it had finally fallen out, and the pieces of it were on the floor. Looking down at the sink, she saw the fabled snake engraved on the tap. Although she knew it was useless, she gave the knob a slight turn to the left.

The Chamber of Secrets lay behind this plain sink, and it was fascinating to think that something so ordinary could hide something so significant behind it. That Salazar was a crafty one, that was for sure. Sometimes Essex was almost jealous of her best friend for being related to him. What right-minded Slytherin wouldn't be at least a little jealous of the girl that shared the same name as one of the Hogwarts founders? Although Essex wasn't so sure that she would want Hufflepuff for a last name, the recognition...

"So, you've come in here to disturb me too?" came a blurble of a voice.

Essex's heart nearly jumped into her throat when she heard that. Whirling around, she was relieved to find that it was only Moaning Myrtle.

"Myrtle, oh, you gave me a fright. I'm glad to see that it's only you..." Essex breathed in relief.

Myrtle gave a strangled sob and buried her face into her hands. "Only me! I'm sorry that I'm not good enough for you!" she sobbed.

Essex slapped a hand to her head. Myrtle had a knack for taking things the wrong way. "No, no Myrtle, I didn't mean it like that..." she began, but Myrtle cut her off again.

"I know when I'm not wanted! You could have just told me in the first place!" she cried, flying back into her stall. Essex started to go after her, when Myrtle plunged into the toilet, and started sobbing around the U-bend.

That was when Essex heard a sneeze in the stall next to her. Sloshing through the near three inches of water, she gently pulled the stall door open.

It was Alex! Essex was just as surprised to see him as he was her, and they silently regarded each other for a few seconds, before Alex piped up.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, seeming genuinely surprised. Essex raised her eyebrows.

"Same to you. Hey. Aren't you a Ravenclaw?" she asked. Alex, who had been using the broken toilet as a seat, stood up.

"Yeah. What's it to ya?" he asked indignantly. Essex scratched her head.

"Don't your kind, like, never miss a class, or something to that degree? Aren't you supposed to like school?" she asked. Alex shook his head.

"I like school. I don't like Professor Trelawney's class, though. It's a load of crack, and I don't even care about what happens in the future much anymore. It's best just to take it as it comes, as I say. What are you skiving?"

"Astronomy. It's hotter than Hell's inferno up there," she answered, backing up and leaning against one of the sinks.

Alex studied her for a moment. "Aren't you Sarah Slytherin's best friend, or something? I saw you with her all of the time before she disappeared."

"Yeah. You hang with that Robert kid, don't you?"

"Before he left, I did," Alex corrected.

"Same difference," Essex replied, rolling her eyes in the back of her head. Alex fiddled with a strap on his bookbag.

"Worried?" he asked softly.

"Worried about what?" Essex asked, although she knew what he was trying to get at.

"You know, Sarah and crew."

"Well, yes, but I think that she's got...a decent head on her shoulders, and she can take care of herself. Isn't Robert like, tied for smartest kid to ever grace the halls of Hogwarts or something? I wouldn't worry too much about it if I were you," Essex answered confidentially.

"Yeah, I guess you're right," Alex admitted softly, looking out of one of the heavily fogged windows at the dismal sunlight that filtered in the room.

# # #

If Alex could have seen the position of Robert at the moment, he probably would have gone into hysterics. Riding on the tail end of a snake, grabbing on for dear life, and under constant danger of suffocation by breathing in too much dust, the going was not easy for Robert. Although he was - quite literally - hanging in there as well as he could.

"The tapestry!" came a faint cry from Hayley as a white piece of fabric smacked into Robert's face.

"Gyah! For the love of Christ!" Robert cried, as he tried to peel it away from his face. But then he decided to keep it there, for even though he couldn't see anything anymore, the cloth made it easier to breathe.

"Slow the snake down, Sarah!" came the bedraggled voice of Gabriel. "For God's sake, slow it down! Robert's getting trampled down there!"

"Sarah?" Chenelle yelled over the rush of air. "Sarah, can you hear us? Slow the stupid reptile down!"

Sarah's voice seared through the atmosphere like razor-sharp scissors through fine linen cloth. "I'm working on it! Give me a couple of seconds! Sheesh, crucify me, why don't'cha?"

"Well, work faster," Robert mumbled into his cloth-headcover. Although for the fact that he probably could have yelled at the top of his lungs, and Sarah wouldn't have heard.

Straggling to the snake's head, Sarah started to hoarsely whisper to the adder.

"Okay, that'ssss enough, you can ssstop now!" she cried. The snake gave something of a shrug.

"Asss you wisssh," it hissed in reply. Abruptly, the snake stopped in place, making everybody fly forward slightly.

Robert moaned, hoisted himself up onto wobbly knees, and peeled the dirty tapestry from his face. When he could see again, he nearly fainted.

About fifty feet in front of him, the pinkish-purple-gray cloud cover parted, and a beam of yellow sunlight streamed forth from the partition. Where the sun hit the ground was a small patch of green grass, in a perfect circle. On the patch of grass were the charred remains of wood; there had obviously been a house there at one point of time.

Letting out a whoop of delight, Robert sprinted towards the grass, forgetting all about his sore body, and leapt onto the grass.

It felt wonderful. After weeks of living where the only scenery was barren, dried dirt and leafless trees, lying in a patch of cool green grass was pure heaven. Rolling over onto his back, he peered up into the break in the sky. The tiniest space of bright blue sky showed up livid against the ominous purple-pink clouds. Robert sighed, and forgetting all about everything else for the moment, relaxed in the sun. He had forgotten how much he missed it.

He was rudely aroused from his half-slumber by Sarah gently prodding him in the stomach with a dirty foot.

"Come on, Lazybones. You can bask in the sunlight when we get back home. Get up," she ordered him, offering him a hand, which he grudgingly took.

Gabriel sighed pleasurably and rubbed her bare feet in the grass. "You've got to admit, though, it feels good to walk on nice, fresh grass again."

Sarah sighed and lightly ran a hand along the tips of the grass blades. "Well, yes," she admitted. "It's amazing how much you take it for granted at home."

While the other three were admiring the grass, Chenelle and Hayley were rummaging around in the remains of the house, looking for stuff.

"Whatever was here sure did a number on this poor house," Chenelle said, holding up a bent spoon. Hayley nodded.

"I'll say, what if this happened to all of the other houses and the people?" she asked, pulling away a slab of charred wood. "Hey, look!" she cried, hoisting something up.

It was a very burnt, rusted poker. It wasn't much for looks, but the edges were sharp, and it had some pretty carvings on it. Chenelle shrugged.

"It'll do in a pinch," she said, hoisting up a short section of wood with a nail protruding out of it. "What do you think of this for a weapon?" she asked, giving it a practice swing. Gabriel looked at her oddly.

"Why do you need a weapon?" she asked. "We're going to be leaving soon, I hope." Chenelle turned to her and gave a slight shudder.

"I don't know. It's like a premonition, or something. I have a terrible feeling that we're going to need something to defend ourselves with in a moment. And last time I had a premonition like this was way back when I was very little, and that was the day that Voldemort killed my parents and made off with me," she finished. Robert looked over at her.

"Well, let's get out of here, then! I don't want to be around here to find out if your premonition is right or not. Now, does anybody know how to use Yongher Meridian?" he asked.

Silence fell upon the five. Then there was a unanimous groan from them all.

"You mean to tell me that nobody looked up how to use Yongher Meridian?!" Sarah howled to everybody.

"I know the rhyme for it, but not how to use it," Hayley groaned, slapping a hand to her face. "Well, what now?"

More silence. Sarah opened her mouth to make a very sarcastic; cutting remark, but it was cut short by a booming chorus of voices so loud that it made the fivesome clap their hands over their ears. No matter, though, since the voices came from inside their brains, and plugging their ears didn't help much.

"Blood will take you home with ease,

Use the spell as you please,

Though time and dimension it will freeze," the voices chanted.

The five stood there for a moment, massaging their sore skulls, which seemed to be throbbing from the volume of the voices.

"Well, blood it is, then," Robert said weakly. Hayley went slightly green at this, but then reclaimed her posture.

"Anything to get me home again," she said heavily.

Gabriel found a thorny branch under the smoldered rubble of the forsaken house, and thoroughly cut her hands with it until they were bleeding profusely, and passed the sharp branch over to Chenelle.

"Aren't we supposed to unite, or something? Well, cut your hands up, and then we can join hands, and do the little spell thingy," she ordered, pointing with a bloody hand.

"Capital idea," Robert said, looking sickened by Gabriel's palms. Anyway, the stick was passed around to everybody, and when they were done savaging their flesh, Gabriel dropped the thorny stick, and held one hand out to Chenelle, the other to Robert.

When they had worked themselves into a circle, gripping hands, Hayley took a shuddering breath.

"Shall we get on with it?" she asked meekly. The others nodded, but Sarah turned around and winked at the basilisk, which was waiting patiently.

"You were awesssome," she hissed quietly. "Thank you." The adder gave something of a faint snake blush.

"You're welcome, Massster," it said, seemingly sheepishly. Sarah grinned.

Chenelle rolled her eyes in the back of her head. "Now that the reptilian good-byes have been issued, can we leave?" she asked.

Gabriel sighed. "Let's get on with it, shall we?" taking a breath, in unison, so it seemed, the fivesome began to chant.

"In the name of all joy and Light,

I call upon the spell of the Yongher Meridian,

Take me from this wretched place tonight,

And send my spirit home again."

The first time they said it, nothing happened. They tried again, and nothing happened. On the third time, nothing happened either. Feeling heartbroakenly disappointed, they were about to drop hands and try to think of something else to do, when it happened.

It was at first little more than a slight tickle in their clasped hands, but the tickle soon advanced to that of a scratch, and then it emerged into a fierce burn. Forgetting all rules about being as quiet as possible, they all screamed.

The sunlight seemed to transform into something of a watery thread, weaving between their bodies in a rhythmic pattern. Current started to run through their bodies, faster and faster until it felt like a raging river was coursing through where their hands interlocked, and a suction made it so that they couldn't let go of the grip on each other, even if they wanted to.

As for the place where their hands gripped each other, they were glowing with a light so radiant that it even hurt when they closed their eyes, and it seemed to burn at their skin. It felt as if the spell was trying to melt their flesh and connect their bloodstream to meld them into a singular being.

Tears streamed out of Chenelle's tightly shut eyes. She was filling with blood from her other companions, and power from the magic words - she couldn't handle it all - she was going to burst from all of the foreign matters running through her skin like an overfilled water balloon - it was all too much....

The five, as one, let out a single unearthly shriek that seemed to rattle the sky and earth as one. Then, abruptly, it stopped.

Collapsing to their knees, Sarah and the others panted heavily, Hayley felt her dress sticking to her body with sweat, and she felt some of it drip off of her nose like rain.

Then, she felt overly light, like gravity had ceased to exist, and she was simply floating in empty space. Cracking open an eye, she nearly screamed in surprise. She was floating, in a great white void. There was nothing there, except for absolute whiteness. She could not see Sarah, Gabriel, Robert or Chenelle, but she felt their grip on her palm. Hayley didn't care. The pain was over, and she relaxed in the nothingness of it all.

Suddenly, she stopped floating, and started being dragged to the ground. It was as if someone had suddenly put three-ton weights on her feet. Slowly, painstakingly, she was drug down, until she hit some sort of surface. She felt her hands being released, and she looked at her palms.

Oddly, they weren't bleeding anymore, or covered in welts or scabs. There were about fifteen slender brown marks running rampant across her hands, but nothing more. They were very sore, though. Rubbing at them, she looked around, and was relieved to find that everybody else was there too, and she wasn't alone.

"Where are we?" asked Robert, looking around the white void. Gabriel winced and closed her eyelids slightly. It was hurting her eyes to look at so much white nothingness.

"You're in the gap between dimensions," a familiar voice said smoothly. "I stopped you from going all the way back."

"Tom Riddle," hissed Sarah. "Can't you leave us be?" she screamed in the void. "Are you really that dense to see that we don't want to be your apprentices?"

"I can see that, but are you that dense to believe that I'd let you go that easily?" Tom countered, materializing in front of them, riding on Aquanus.

Robert swallowed. It would be a feat in itself to hold the Dark Lord off. It was going to be nearly impossible to hold the Dark Lord off and his three pet dragons.

"Attack," ordered Tom to Hunter and Carnash, who were on his sides. They charged. Chenelle swallowed as she looked at the dragon's flashy white teeth. She was looking at her doom.

Black lightning, smooth as water, leapt over their heads. At first, Gabriel though it was Voldemort chucking spells at them, but was soon put to rights when she saw the adder that had given them rides sinking it's teeth into Carnash's body. Carnash roared with pain and turned around to swipe at the adder with her razor-sharp claws. The basilisk swatted her claws away with a careless swing of its tail.

Hunter, however, was headed straight for Hayley. It bowed its head to try to headbutt her over, but Hayley, given extra strength by her fear, leapt about five feet into the air, consequently, landing on his back.

The dragon roared with frustration and tried to flail its arms back to hit Hayley. Hayley tried to dig her fingers under the scales of the dragon - they were as large as dinner plates - for a grip. But the scales were brittle and snapped off easily. Each time Hayley snapped a plate off of the dragon's back, it would scream with agony.

Meanwhile, the four still on the ground were watching, horrorstruck, at the scenes in front of them, until Tom sent a ball of black fire at them.

"Arrgh!" Sarah cried as it scorched her foot. "Let's get him!"

Tom sent another ball of Darkness at them, and this time Gabriel swung her sword at it - not unlike one would do to a baseball - and it bounced off of the sword and back at Tom Riddle, who had to throw up a shield quickly to diffuse it.

"Help me!" cried Hayley, still scrabbling for a grip on the dragon's back. Robert looked around, and saw the poker that Hayley had dropped laying in the middle of the void.

"Catch!" he yelled to her, throwing it like a javelin at her. Unfortunately for Hayley, it lodged in her leg. Wincing with the sudden pain, Hayley grabbed it, and looked for a place to smack the dragon with it.

After a few unsuccessful smacks, Hayley discovered that the dragon's scales, while brittle, were like armor. Then Hayley noticed that by trying to grab onto the dragon's scales, and accidentally snapping them off, there was a rather large patch of unprotected white skin in front of her eyes. Looking at the poker, she swallowed.

"God help me," she whispered, and drove the sharp end into the patch of skin. Hunter roared, flailed in the air, and screamed as black blood flowed freely from where the poker had pierced the back of its neck.

"Walzermiser!" came Sarah's voice from behind her. Whirling around, she saw that a ball of white magic had hit the back of the dragon, and now they were both freefalling through space.

With the green dragon's last movements, he whirled around, grabbed Hayley, and flung her at the ground. She hit with a sickening thud and lay still.

Whipping around quickly, Hunter smacked Sarah in the face with its razor-sharp tail, sending her sprawling. Then Hunter hit the ground and breathed his last.

Green fire sprang around his body, and he evaporated into thin air, a dragon's death, if the death was not an honorable one.

Another loud thud sounded next to it. Whirling around, Chenelle saw Carnash the dragon exploding into pink flames. She had finally succumbed to the venom that had been circulating around her body, and fell to the ground dead. Next to her was a heavily breathing, badly burnt, basilisk.

Robert ran over to Hayley, and pulled her body off the ground. Her eyes were shut, and she was ghostly white. Quickly taking a pulse, he was relieved to find that she still had one, though it was very faint. In the meantime, Sarah had staggered to her feet, clutching her face.

"Sarah?" asked Chenelle. "Sarah? Are you all right? Sarah?" Sarah looked up from her hands, revealing a nasty gash that reached from the top of her left temple to her jawbone on he right side. Chenelle recoiled.

"Apart from the fact that my face has been torn apart, I'm fine!" she sobbed out, still keeping her sarcastic attitude about her.

Gabriel was still sending back Tom's fireballs with her sword. It was quite apparent that for the fact that Gabriel was certainly holding her own, the Dark Lord was getting the better of her.

"Getting tired, Gryffindor?" Tom yelled as he sent a fireball down at her. Gabriel blinked sweat from her eyes and swung her sword to send it back.

"You wish!" she cried back. She knew that she was practically lying, she was in reality, very tired, and her muscles were starting to burn, but she couldn't stop now.

Robert was still frantically trying to wake Hayley, when she finally did, and started to sob into her arms. Robert stared, suddenly uncomfortable.

"Hayley? What's the matter?" he asked. Hayley just shook her head.

"Oh, oh, oh! I'm a rotten, cowardly murderer!" she sobbed. "I just killed! Oh, oh, oh!"

"It was either you or him, Hayley. It wouldn't have done us any good if you had died!" Robert tried reasoning to her. Hayley would have none of it.

"That doesn't make any difference!" she cried. Robert gripped her shoulders and shook her roughly, until she stopped crying.

"Hayley Hufflepuff! Get a hold of yourself! You're becoming hysterical! He was an evil, deleterious dragon! Do you hear me?! A foul, vile creature of the Darkness!" he cried, nearly going into hysterics himself.

Hayley looked at him through red-rimmed eyes, sniffling. Finally, she nodded. "Right," she whispered. She stumbled to her feet, and Robert noticed that she had a nasty bout of bruises running down one side of her body. He winced when he saw them, but said nothing.

Gabriel had finally run out of energy. She let her guard down for one second, and Tom Riddle took the opportunity. The bolt of darkness hit her in the chest, knocking her over. Tom grinned.

"Looks like I win. Why don't you just make life easy for yourself and - OW!" he cried as a large chunk of wood hit him in the back of the head.

He looked down to see Chenelle, who had picked up the wood, and was waving it at him menacingly.

"How'd ya like some blood and vinegar, Master?" she spat at him. Tom curled his lips in an angry sneer.

"You again?!" he snarled at her, and raised his hand to send a black fireball at her, when something long, metal and snakelike wrapped him around his neck.

Gasping for breath, he yanked the thing away from his neck, and looked down to see Sarah.

"You like my little toy, no?" she asked, grinning slyly. Tom gritted his teeth, but before he could do anything, something hit him hard in the side of the head, and he finally fell off of Aquanus.

Gabriel's shield fell to the floor of the white void with a clatter. Robert, who had hurled it like a Frisbee, stood there panting.

Aquanus tried to rush to his master's aid, but was intercepted by a rather angry basilisk. Tom staggered to his feet, and looked at the five faces, so dead set against his own. He snarled confidently, but inside he was slightly nervous.

"You are in the debt of thousands of people, Tom Riddle," came Robert's voice, deep and low. "We have come to avenge those debts."

"I'm shaking in my boots," Tom said snottily. In reality, he was trembling, but ever so slightly, so that nobody noticed.

"Grasshopper have little sense but big mouth," Sarah quoted with a sly grin. Hayley couldn't stand it anymore.

"Eeeeyahhh!" she cried, swinging at Tom Riddle with her poker.

Something very strange happened then. Hayley's vision was so blurred by angry tears and sweat, that she missed him totally. But, the curved part of the poker caught the thin silver chain that held the pendant on Tom's neck, and broke the chain.

A moment frozen in time, the pendant twirled in the air, and seemed to hover there for about five minutes before falling to the ground of the gap between dimensions with a loud clang.

A loud cry from behind Tom made him turn around. Gabriel had staggered to her feet, and she vaulted herself at the pendant. The sword seemed to glow with all the power there was in the world, and with one swift stroke of the blade, the pendant was sliced in two.

Tom Riddle screamed with pain, as he started to dissipate into nothing. In about five minutes, the Dark Lord was gone. Vanquished from all dimensions....forever.

There was silence for a few moments. Then, pain jolted through Gabriel's body like a three thousand-volt shock. All five of their bodies spasmed several times, and started to glow an eerie purple glow, and the pendants that the five wore were starting to take effect. With a last glance at each other, and a final scream, they collapsed on the ground.

The spell of Yongher Meridian picked up again, now that the dark force holding the five in the gap was gone.

But the spell now only took along five empty shells. In the single stroke of Gabriel's sword, six lives were put to an end.

# # #

Hogwarts was chattering over lunch and over the excitement over what was going to happen tomorrow: the rescheduled Quidditch game of Slytherin verses Gryffindors. Of course, both teams had balked considerably about being thrust into this situation only a week after they had gotten new players on their teams. But it was either this, the teachers said, or not play a game at all. It was getting close to the end of the year, and they wouldn't be able to give away the Quidditch cup otherwise.

Rosemary was in the middle of eating a sandwich, when there was a bright flash of red, green, yellow, blue and orangish in the center of the room.

Dropping the sandwich, Rosemary whirled around, like the rest of the school, and watched the colors right themselves amongst the floor, and they slowly fizzed into people. Gabriel, Robert, Sarah, Hayley, and some other unknown girl were lying in the center if the room.

Rosemary squealed with delight, as did several other people, and sprinted to where her friend lay.

Those people that did get up there, however, were not half as happy as they were when they realized that the foursome and the other girl were laying there motionless, and very mangled looking.

All four were covered in dirt, caked with blood, and covered in a horrible sheen of sweat, that made them look ethical, and not real, almost. Essex ran a finger gently down the large gash that Sarah had down her face, and winced.

But far worse than any of this, was the fact that none of them were breathing.

Frantically, Alanya grabbed Gabriel's wrist and felt for a pulse. Nothing. She tried again, this time grabbing the fold of skin by Gabriel's neck, where the pulse was a bit easier to detect. Still nothing.

Alex sat back on his heels, shaking his head. He spoke slowly and mechanically, as if he were in a daze.

"It's no use. They're dead," he said disbelievingly. "They're....dead."

# # #

Something warm and slightly damp settled on Robert's head. He was about to get up, but then then events of the past....well, when he was last conscious sprang into his head. He thought that it might be best to pretend he was still out cold before he could act.

"Oh, oh dear, do you think they'll be all right?"

"Come off it, Helga. They're already dead. What could possibly happen to them?"

That jolted Robert up in a second. He came face to face with four people who were looking placidly back at him.

The first was a stout; plump woman with cheeks the exact color of perfectly toasted marshmallows. Her brown eyes were soft and sparkly, and they crinkled kindly at the edges with age. Her brown hair was done up in a very soft-looking pouf, and she wore a pale yellow robe.

The second was a female that was quite a bit skinner and more severe-looking than her other counterpart. She had deep blue eyes the color of Robert's own, and her hair, which was jet black, was drawn back in a tight ponytail. A slight smile turned her lips up slightly, and with her right hand, she adjusted a pair of glasses. She was in a robe the color of a perfect summer sky.

The first of the males had brown eyes that darted smartly around the room, and his chin was set at a jaunty angle, in a swaggering, gallant look. His hair was of a light blonde, and was cut close to his head in an old-fashioned crop. In his right hand he sported a shiny blade, studded with rubies the size of eggs, almost. Clad in a deep maroon robe, he flashed a dashing smile at Robert, which he timidly returned.

Lastly, there was a man, with eyes of a deep green, so deep that they were almost black darted around the room sharply, as if looking for an exit. He had long, pale fingers that drummed up against a table, and he had this aura around him that made you believe that he was rather cold and calculating. He had a massive headful of black hair that was curly, almost, and he was wearing a robe in the color of a deep evergreen forest. Around his neck was draped a cobra, black with dusty maroon markings.

"I told you nothing was wrong," said the male with the snake around his neck. The old woman that had the yellow robe on rolled her eyes.

"You think you know everything, Salazar," she said, a bit huffily. Robert paled, and backed up a little bit. Salazar?

"I know who you are!" he finally blurted out. "You're...you're Salazar Slytherin, aren't you?" he asked. Salazar raised an eyebrow.

"The lad has half the smarts of a bar of soap. I'm impressed," he said sarcastically. Robert winced. Now he knew where Sarah got it from.

"Godric Gryffindor, Helga Hufflepuff, Rowena Ravenclaw? But....but you're all...all dead.." he trailed off. Rowena raised an eyebrow.

"My dear boy, look at yourself," she said coolly. Robert did, slowly, afraid of what he might find.

He was startled to find that he was clad in black robes, there was no sign of wounds anywhere on him, and he felt fine. But even more surprising then this, was the fact that he was translucent, almost.

"Oh my God...." he whispered. "Am I dead, too?"

"It sure looks that way, doesn't it?" Salazar said, running a finger down his snake's back, and hissing to it.

"Where's everybody else? Gabriel...Chenelle..?" he asked, still too stunned to put a proper sentence together.

"In the other room," came the deep rumble of Godric Gryffindor. There was a sudden smashing noise, and a shout.

"I can't be dead!" came the shrill voice of Sarah. "I haven't even really lived yet!"

Robert sighed. "Yep. That's Sarah, all right." He lurched to his feet, and began crookedly walking to the door, of the house that they were in.

Beyond the door was a room with a couple of couches in it, a soft rug, a beautifully carved mantle, and a bed. All of which was in pastels, or white. It was a very airy, light feeling place. On the floor, however, was a broken vase.

"She lost her temper," came the voice of Chenelle, who was sitting on a couch, pointing to Sarah. Sarah just gave her a half smirk and flopped back on her couch. Robert noted that they too were also in black robes, and seemingly dressed as normal.

"Where are we?" came the forlorn voice of Hayley, looking positively worn out. The founders of Hogwarts had come in after them, and Godric gave them a half-smile.

"Heart strengthens the soul," he began.

"Blood strengthens the spell," Salazar intervened.

"Up - as is," Rowena commented smartly.

"Then, I will return as well," Helga finished softly.

There was silence for a moment, before Sarah's jaw dropped, and she ran to the window and flung the curtain away.

"You mean this....this is Castle Sapius?!" she cried. "But...but..." she chattered on, looking at the landscape, which was complete with rolling fields, colorful flowers and sunny skies.

Helga gave a motherly chuckle. "You five relieved the evil, followed the clues, and fulfilled your destiny. You saved two worlds from evil, yours, and this one. Quite an accomplishment for one of only fourteen years, Sarah."

Sarah made a face. "This is incredibly selfish sounding of me, but at the cost of our own lives, we relieved the evil!" she spat.

Godric raised his eyebrows. "Look, Salazar. It's someone that's related to you that actually knows when she's being selfish. Your bloodline has hope yet."

"So, where are we, exactly?" asked Hayley again, not wanting Salazar and Godric to get into a pointless squabble. "Is this Heaven?"

"No," said Rowena flatly. Chenelle's eyes bulged.

"Then is this..."

"No, dearest. This isn't Hell either," Helga interrupted her.

"Then where are we?" asked Robert. Godric shook his head.

"You're in the dimension that you came from. You know, the one that Tom Riddle made?"

Jaws dropped all around. Finally, Sarah let out an aggravated screech.

"All that work to get away from here, and now we're here again!" she cried angrily. Rowena pushed her glasses up her nose.

"Look. You're not going to be here forever. The Ones Above have given you a choice."

Robert raised an eyebrow. "Who are the Ones Above?" he asked. Helga waved an impatient hand.

"No time for questions. You have a choice. One, you will come up Above with us, or two, you will go back to where you came from."

There was silence again.

"You mean that we can go back along the living, if we want to? Isn't that impossible?" Chenelle asked. Godric shook his head.

"The Ones Above can do whatever they want. Nothing is impossible to them; they just keep it the same to keep the mortals happy. It's not very often that they give people a second chance at life, but they can."

"But if you choose to go back to the living," Salazar warned, "you won't remember meeting us. You're memory will be erased to the point when you just died."

Sarah shrugged. "I'm all for returning, no offence to you guys or anything. What about the rest of ya's?" she asked her friends. Robert nodded.

"I haven't lived long enough yet."

"I haven't even gotten to enjoy life yet," Chenelle said ruefully.

"I haven't been a wizard long enough yet," Gabriel agreed.

"I just want to see the looks on everybody's face when we come back," Hayley said, grinning.

Helga nodded, smiling back. "That's m'girl. We were hoping that you would choose to go back to the mortals, anyway."

"Just a couple of other tidbits; Robert, your parents send their love, Gabriel, so do yours, Hayley, your Aunt Michelle says hi, and Sarah, your Grandparents say that they're very proud of you. I think that that's it," Rowena finished, grinning at the looks of amazement on their faces.

"You know Mum and Dad?" Gabriel said, voice cracking slightly.

"Don't let that sway your decision. Your parents want you to live a full life also, and they don't want you to squander the second chance that the Ones Above are giving you," Helga said.

Salazar adopted his most mysterious voice. "The Ballad of the Underworld has been completed."

"What?" Robert asked.

"I said, The Ballad of the Underworld has been completed. That's all I'm saying."

Sarah wrinkled her nose. "Salazar, you're an angel, right?" she asked.

Salazar looked at her oddly, while stroking the snake on his shoulder. "In technical terms, yes."

"How did you, um..."

"Become one? Are you asking why I'm not rotting away in Hell because of all the things I've done to Muggles and Mudbloods?" he asked bluntly.

"Well....yes."

Salazar gave a slight snicker. "So much you don't know....there's just so much."

"Don't tease, Salazar," Helga reprimanded him. Salazar just shook his head, still grinning.

Godric shook his head. "Oh wait. You'll be needing these," he said offhandedly, tossing them each something.

It was their wands.

They all nearly squealed in happiness, that is, except for Chenelle, who still didn't have one. Helga smiled kindly at her and threw her a wand, also.

"That was your mother's wand. Maple. Dragon heartstring and unicorn hair. Good for Transfigurations. I think about fifteen inches. Sound good?"

Chenelle looked at the wand shaft, nearly speechless. "Thank you," she whispered. Helga waved her arm, dismissing the expression of gratitude.

"Just promise me you'll use it," she said. She then looked at her three counterparts.

"Ready?" she asked.

"Ready," Rowena, Salazar and Godric said at once. They all looked at the ceiling of the castle, and started mumbling some words to the Ones Above.

There was a gentle, powdery explosion in front of Gabriel's eyelids. She then felt pleasant warmth spread through her body, and she smiled. This was much better than Yongher Meridian. With that thought, she blacked out.

# # #

The bodies of Sarah, Gabriel, Hayley, Robert and Chenelle had been taken to the infirmary, for burial later on. For now, though, the Quidditch games were beginning to start, with a very depressed attitude. The stands were full, although, because everybody was trying to keep their minds off of what had just happened.

Then corpses of the four lay still and lifeless on the beds. Then Chenelle's finger twitched. Gabriel heaved in a breath, setting her organs to work again. Hayley flexed her legs, as Robert's eyelids flickered open. Sarah drug herself to a sitting position.

"We're back," she whispered, though none of the others were able to understand her, since her throat was so dry.

"What happened? Did we die or something?" asked Hayley, trying to remember something, though she couldn't remember what.

"I know. I feel like I've missed something. Something really important," Robert said, rubbing his temples. "What about you, Chenelle?"

Chenelle shook her head. "Not Chenelle. My name isn't Chenelle," she said decisively. "Don't call me that."

"Then what is your name?" inquired Gabriel. Chenelle sat up and looked off into the distance.

"Well, once upon a time, I suppose, I was known as Samantha Bronxton. I guess that's my name now," Chenelle/Samantha said.

"What about your middle name?" asked Hayley. Samantha wrinkled her nose.

"I don't think I had one. If I did, I don't remember it."

"I think you should make it Chenelle," Robert said, seeing what Hayley had been getting at. "So you'll never forget what happened, and so it won't be like a bad dream. You'd remember it forever."

Samantha smiled crookedly. "I suppose that I shouldn't want to forget it? Oh, alright, Chenelle it is, then."

"Samantha Chenelle Bronxton. It has a ring to it, I guess," Sarah said, shrugging. "Well, let's go to the Great Hall. We can sort things out there."

After the five minute lurch to the Great Hall (normally, it would have taken about half a minute to get there, but they were still kind of weak from their death and revival), they were amazed, and a bit angered to find it deserted.

"All of that walking for nothing?!" Gabriel said, irate. The others didn't pay much attention, but went over to the leftovers of lunch, and started to inhale the food a s if they had never seen it before.

"That hits the spot," Sarah sighed after downing an entire pitcher of ice water without stopping.

"I wonder where everyone is," Robert mused between bites of a turkey sandwich.

"And I wonder why nobody picked up lunch," Hayley said, agreeing.

"Who really cares?" asked Samantha. "At least it's here to eat."

After a few minutes of shoving food down their throats, Gabriel noted a piece of scrap paper lying crumpled on the floor.

Hey Patil, (it read),

Are you going to be at the Quidditch game today? I know that Quidditch is one of the most pointless things on Earth to spend your time on, but it is the rematch of Gryffindor verses Slytherin, and I'm going. Do you think that we have half a chance with Dean as our Keeper? Not that he's that bad, but...he's no Oliver Wood or Gabriel Gryffindor.

Ugh. I can't believe that Snape had half of the nerve to put me with Vincent Crabbe. He is such a git. 'Can't even count to fifteen without screwing up. How are you doing with that Pansy Parkinson character? You don't look too happy, but...who can blame you? But the one good thing about these Slytherin-Gryffindor partnerships is that they put Malfoy with Harry. You should look at them argue. It's so funny!

-Lavander

There was no date on the paper, but it didn't look that old. Gabriel put down the letter and smoothed it out before calling to her counterparts.

"I think that there is a Quidditch game today, the rematch of the Gryffindor verses Slytherin," she said.

Sarah put down the second pitcher of water she was chugging with a loud clunk. "D'you think that they've started?" she asked frantically.

Gabriel shrugged. "I have no idea, they might've."

Downing the rest of the pitcher, Sarah wiped her mouth on the back of her sleeve. "Let's go find out then," she said with a sly wink in Gabriel's direction. "Unless you're scared," she taunted.

Gabriel sneered elegantly. "Yah, you wish!"

With that, Gabriel and Sarah went tromping off down the halls, poking playfully at each other with mock insults. The three left behind stared after them.

"What do we do?" asked Samantha. Robert winked at her.

"We go and get seats. Come on, Hayley and Sam."

# # #

"Come on, team. We can do it," Fred said, looking a little beaten already, though the game hadn't started yet.

"We're perfectly competent of the game, more so then the Slimy Slithering Serpents in the other room," George finished for his twin, coaxing a slight grin out of a few people. Nobody really felt like playing Quidditch.

"You know, this doesn't seem right," Alicia Spinnet said morosely. "Should we really be playing Quidditch right now? Isn't this like, wrong somehow?"

Harry sighed. "Well, I don't think that Gabriel would want us moping over her. She'd rather us beat Slytherin for her."

There was an agreeing shuffle and mummer that ran through the room. "She could be watching over us right now..." Angelina Johnson started dreamily, when she was interrupted.

"Or she could be standing behind you right now, wondering why you all aren't dressed," came a smooth, familiar voice.

George gaped. "Back from the dead to play a Quidditch game!" he croaked out. Gabriel grinned.

"That's right, I guess. Well, where's my broom at?" she asked. Dean Thomas looked up at her nervously, and handed her the broom timidly.

"Are - are you really alive?" he asked, still staring at her. Gabriel looked around at the people that were looking back at her.

"Oh, come off it. Cry me a river, build me a bridge, and get over it. Now, where's my robes so I can play?" she asked irritably, getting tired of having people staring at her.

Fred grinned and clapped a hand over Gabriel's back. "That's the Gabriel we know!" he roared, new energy seemingly flowing through his body. "The robes are in the fourth locker to the left. Hurry!"

Gabriel grinned back, and hastened to oblige.

# # #

The Slytherin team was getting dressed lethargically in the locker room. Sprite even seemed depressed. It flew around slowly and its antennae drooped sadly.

There was a rattle at the doorknob, as if someone was trying to get in, but the door was locked. The figure figured that out, and rapped on the door loudly.

"Interviews at halftime or after the game!" Marcus Flint yelled at the tightly bolted door. The knocking came again, except for this time, it was louder.

"Team members only!" Flint yelled again, becoming angrier at this incessant knocker-of -the-door.

Now the knocking had turned into practically beating at the door. Draco looked up. Who wanted to talk to the Quidditch team that badly?

"Open the Goddamn door, before I bust it in!" cried a familiar voice, though nobody could exactly put a finger on it.

"Who are you?" asked Flint, his anger turning into interest. There was an aggravated sigh.

"I am the one that goes without a name," the voice yelled through the door, dripping with sarcasm.

"You'll tell me your name, or you won't get in!" Flint yelled, becoming angry again. He hated riddles.

"Mystery Woman," yelled the voice, matching the volume of Flint's own.

"No women allowed!" roared Flint, seriously aggravated now. There was another exasperated sigh.

"That didn't stop you from choosing me as your Beater, the first female Slytherin player in a century! I was one of the reasons that the first Gryffindor-Slytherin game was canceled, in fact, my last name is Slytherin, and if you don't know who I am now, you need your head examined!"

"Slytherin? Sarah Slytherin?!" cried Flint, his voice about an octave higher than it normally was.

The door was banged on one more time and it few off of its hinges. There stood Sarah Slytherin, and when the door hit the ground, a cloud of dust was sent up about her, making it look like a movie scene.

"That's right! Now, where's my robes?" she asked, grinning largely at the look of repulsed amazement that was written all over their faces.

Draco pointed to the locker three paces to the left of him. Sprite the butterfly flew around in a fast circle, landing in Sarah's hair, its favorite place.

Sarah sniggered at Draco, who had his mouth hanging wide open. "You didn't think that you'd get rid of me that easily, did you?"

"Well....Not really...." he stuttered, trying to think of a good answer.

"Good," Sarah said, cutting him off.

# # #

Lee Jordan was commentary, as normal, and he was babbling on something about the weather, the statistics of the game, and such, but nobody was really listening.

Until, that was, Hayley, Robert and Samantha came up into the commentary box. Then the crowd was overtaken by a bout of stuttering by Lee, and then finally a scream and running footsteps. The crowd looked up with interest. Was this some kind of skit?

"Err, looks like we've scared off Lee.....Sorry Lee..." came a familiar voice over the loudspeaker.

"No matter. We can commentate now! I'm Robert Ravenclaw, this is Hayley Hufflepuff, and over here is Samantha Bronxton. We're back from the dead to commentate for this fine...fine game!" he said, falling over with laughter from his own bad joke.

Hayley looked at him. "Yeah. Right, then. Hello everybody!" she called, waving at the people, who were now clambering over to get a good look at the press box. Those who did, related the story back to those that couldn't get a good look, and soon the entire school, professors included, were silent with amazement.

"But you're dead!" came a random voice. Samantha grabbed the mike from Hayley.

"Do we look like we're dead?" she asked.

"But...but...." several voices chanted. Rosemary, Essex, Alanya and Alex were struck completely dumb with amazement.

"Oh look," Samantha said, changing the subject. "Here come the teams!" she called.

With that, the school clattered over benches and shoved through each other to see if Gabriel and Sarah were there too. There was more confused talking as they realized that they were there also.

Gabriel, for one, was grinning at all of the people that pointed and screamed in her direction, Slytherin, Gryffindor, Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw alike. Tilting her head up to the sky, she felt the sun caress her face and arms. It was wonderful. The grass crunched softly under her feet, and a gentle breeze was blowing. If ever Heaven made a day, Gabriel thought, it would be today. Sarah waved at her from the Slytherin team, and Gabriel winked back.

"Captains!" Madam Hooch shouted. Fred and George pushed Gabriel forward.

"Since it's your first deathday, you can have the honors of being Captain for a day," Fred sniggered. Gabriel rolled her eyes.

"Whatever." When she got up there, she was pleased to see that Sarah was there waiting for her, not Marcus Flint. Sarah winked.

"We should die more often. I like all of this complementary stuff I get for coming back to life," she said. Gabriel rolled her eyes.

"Once is enough for me, thank you," she replied. Madam Hooch intervened before more conversation could be said.

"Captains, shake!" she ordered, as if she were talking to a pair of dogs. Gabriel held out a hand, and Sarah shook it.

"You know that I'm going to have to beat you like the dog you are, Gabriel," Sarah said, smiling. Gabriel just sighed.

The loudspeakers blared with Hayley's voice, the hum of the crowd was louder and friendlier than ever, the sky was cloudless, and the world was perfect, for now.

"Whatever you say, Snake Girl," she replied softly. Sarah grinned and dropped Gabriel's hand, and gave her a short nod before retreating into the cloud of green uniforms.

"Mount your brooms!" Madam Hooch bellowed.

Sarah clambered onto her broom, looking at the faces of grim determination on her fellow teammate's faces. She giggled inwardly. She would never admit it right now, but she really didn't care if they won or lost. She had all ready had her major battle for her lifetime, and that was enough for her. But, for now, she put on her best game face, and kicked her broom into the air.

There was a game to be won.

# # #

And so 'twixt these white walls I write,

Once again under the rule of the Good King,

The trees do sprout as the hills roll,

Forever evergreen.

The battle was won and lost,

Dove, Snake Eagle Lion and Badger,

Through the fabric of time they came,

To defeat the dragon and befriend the adder.

The seasons may come and go,

Wood, shield, sword, poker and chain,

The scars of combat might be forever gone,

But the legend shall remain.

The story started as all others, and shall end the same,

The Dark is powerful, put the Light will always prevail,

With all the stories told,

Here ends this tale.

-(Exert from the last page of The Ballad of the Underworld)

THE END

Author's Note: I bet for a fact that you never expected to see 'The End' tacked on this story, huh? Well, it's over (finally!) but I think it might be a little bit before I write another story. I want to take a break and read some of the other author's work for a change! Ick. Well, when I write another story, I can assure you wholeheartedly that it will NOT have four main characters in it! (Although I suggest that every author should write something with more than one main character at least once! It's a rather enthralling experience....) Well, I hoped you enjoyed this, and review! My heart goes out to all of you nice people who have stuck with me and reviewed this entire thing from beginning to end! Signing off until inspiration hits me again....

~Moxie ^_^

Disclaimer: You know by now what's mine and what isn't! Kapeesh? Kapeesh. ^_~