X - Gladiator

     Hu Li was staring into the mirror at the face that was now her own – truly her own. Sou Mei's memory may live on through her face, she thought, but never again would anyone think she was Sou Mei. Sou Mei was truly dead. Hu Li had been in the girl's toilet for nearly an hour, alone with her mother's body, and it had not moved once. Her jade knife that she has given to Hu Li had been her own doom as well.

     Hu Li sighed – a long shuddering sigh. She looked horrid – her eyes were bloodshot and shadowed. Her lips were cracked and parched from so many fallen tears. There was a terrible dark stain of blood down the front of her robes – blood that would never wash out. She gazed into the mirror, a lump of sadness in her throat. Her father was gone. Her mother was dead. What was she going to do?

     She raised a hand and pressed it against the glass, watching the girl in the mirror do the same. The girl looked tired and wretched and lonely – not the image of a triumphant gladiator, glowing golden with victory. That image was an illusion, Hu Li thought bitterly. Death could never bring complete happiness.

     Hu Li glanced back at the dagger on the floor. Lugala, it read. Suddenly it clicked with Hu Li. Lugala was Latin for "cut throat." She swallowed. How appropriate.

     Just then Hu Li heard a slight noise and soft mutters outside the door to the toilet. She froze, her dark eyes staring into the mirror, wide with fright. What would she do if anyone came in and found Sou Mei, dead on the floor?

     Just then, someone did come in. It was Hermione.

     The first and only thing she saw was the body – or rather, the body and the head, lying several feet away. She cried out, "Oh, Hu Li, no!" Hermione sunk to her knees, moaning, her head in her hands.

     Then Draco Malfoy came crashing in. He was looking worried and then, when he saw the body, stunned. His jaw dropped open and his eyes were horrified. They traveled across the room to Hu Li, standing at the mirror.

     The expression on his face changed into a mixture of anger and fear and loathing. "The Phoenix!" he hissed.

     Hu Li felt as though cold iron fingers had suddenly plunged into her and and dreadfully been wrapped around her heart. She stood, staring stupidly at Draco, unable to say anything, yet understanding horribly what was going on. What an irony, she thought miserably.

     Draco snarled, "You killed her!" He took a step towards her and then dove for the dagger on the floor.

     He pointed the dagger at Hu Li, who could do nothing but stare at him. "If you move," he spat, "I'll -"

     Then he stopped, his eyes raking Hu Li's face up and down. His eyebrows shot up and he said softly and disbelievingly, "Hu Li?"

     Hu Li wetted her parched lips and nodded. He though I was Sou Mei, she thought. He thought that Sou Mei killed me. She felt suddenly faint. That could just as easily be you dead, she told herself. What if…?

     Draco dropped the dagger onto the floor, a dark look on his face. "I – I'm very sorry," he said blankly, comprehension beginning to dawn on his face. "I thought – standing there –"

     Hermione was also staring at Hu Li, her hands still near half-covering her face. She gulped audibly. "If this is Hu Li," she said slowly, "then who is on the floor?"

     Hu Li sighed, her shoulders slumping. She wanted nothing more than to crawl into bed and sleep off the events of the past three hours. But she owed Hermione the truth. She owed herself the truth.

     Hu Li took another glance into the mirror, still hating the sad face that stared back at her. "Hermione, Draco," she muttered. "This is my mother."

     Draco looked uneasy. Hermione looked confused – that would be a first, thought Hu Li. "Hu Li, you told us your mother was dead," said Hermione.

     "She is now," said Hu Li sadly. "She is never coming back now. But she was very much alive before. Hermione," she said carefully, "do you know who the vampire Sou Mei is?"

     Hermione nodded, looking slightly worried as the implications began to strike her. "Er, yes, she was that horrid ancient Chinese vampire who used to be one of the Dark Lord's biggest supporters. I read a book on her over the summer –" She stopped suddenly. Hu Li shut her eyes and thought she almost heard the snap! of a puzzle piece being put into place. Hermione said slowly, "I remember now – there was a picture in the book– and then in the dorm with Lavender and Cecelia and Parvati – and Snape was so nice to you – and you came back to life – " She scrambled to her feet and backed away against the door, staring wildly at the body on the floor. "Are you saying…?" she whispered, and went on staring.

     "I am saying," said Hu Li, her head pounding with a vengeance. She felt suddenly very dizzy from loss of so much blood and swayed on her feet for a moment, clutching the sink to support her. Draco moved forward to hold her up, but Hermione dragged him back. "Don't you get it?" she shrieked at him. "This is the Phoenix's daughter! She could kill us all just like she killed the Phoenix herself!"

     "Hermione!" Draco said sharply. "Hu Li is no more dangerous than you or I. She had countless opportunities to murder you in your sleep, and to kill me as well. She is only a half-vampire and has no evil intentions whatsoever."

     "How do you know?" she snapped. "She lied to us!"

     "Because I know," he said to her. "Now shut up."

     Hermione looked indignant. Hu Li put her face in her hands and said, "Do you understand why I lied to you, Hermione? You would never have accepted me knowing my family. But Draco is not lying – I wish for nothing more than to try to live a normal life. I am someone who does not enjoy where she is or what she is, but I am also someone who is trying to deal with the cards Fate has dealt her. I killed my mother because she was going to kill me – and because she killed my father."

     Hermione's face became repentant. Draco looked devastated. "Hu Li," he said.

     She shook her head violently. "No," she muttered. "Don't talk about it – I have cried for an hour and that solved nothing." She took her hands away from her face and stared at the body on the floor. "Poor Sou Mei," she said softly.

     Draco was thunderstruck. "Hu Li," he said incredulously, "this is the Phoenix we're talking about. She murdered your father – she murdered millions of people for the fun of it! Why do you feel sorry for her?"

     Hu Li stared once more into the mirror – it told no lies and spared no feelings. She didn't know if that was a good or a bad thing. "She never knew how to act. No one ever taught her right and wrong. She became a vampire when she was barely eighteen – she didn't know what to do. I can never forgive her for what she has done, but she did not know the right thing. She died wretchedly – killed by her own daughter. I am very sorry for her." She swallowed her tears. "A piece of my soul was severed when I swung that knife down. A part of me died with Sou Mei." She looked down and let out a soft breath.

     Hermione said quietly, "Hu Li, I'm so sorry. I – I didn't know. Please forgive me for – for misjudging you."

     Hu Li closed her eyes but still saw Sou Mei's miserable face staring at her – staring through the mirror as Hu Li brought the knife down on her throat. "I killed my own mother," she said in a barely-audible whisper.

     Hermione came forward and put her arms around Hu Li in a tight hug. Hu Li felt compassion and peace spread through her. Hermione didn't hate her, she thought. "Thank you," she said, sighing.

     Draco said hesitantly, "I hate to break things up, ladies, but what are we going to do with the body?"

     Hu Li opened her eyes and stared at him. "We?"

     Hermione said determinedly, "Yes, we're all in this together, like it or not."

     Hu Li cracked a feeble smile. "You two are the best," she said. "But there's one thing I don't understand – what are you doing wandering around the castle together?" She caught Draco's eye in the mirror and gave him a weak wink.

     He was visibly affronted. "Absolutely not," he said haughtily. "I would bloody die before I would – Well, we were looking for you. We cut class and went up to the hospital wing to bring you presents and stuff but you weren't there. We didn't say anything to Poppy, thank heavens, or she'd be in here now too. We heard talked to that sick Hufflepuff and he said he'd heard strange noises from the girl's toilet, so we went to investigate – and found you."

     Hu Li said in amazement, "Hermione, you cut class for me?"

    Hermione said defensively, "We have notes from Professor McGonagall saying that we could go visit you."

     Draco grinned dimly. "Yeah – too bad old McGonagall didn't know she was signing a pass to skive off Potions."

     Hermione cleared her throat and pointed to the floor. "Can we get back to the problem at hand? What are we going to do with – this?"

     Draco said brilliantly, "We could Transfigure it into – er, something."

     "Do you know how to Transfigure humans?" said Hu Li worriedly, glancing at the door. "I think that's sixth year magic."

     Hermione rolled up the sleeves of her robes and said in a businesslike way, "Well, I was doing a lot of reading over the summer and I may know how to do it." She squinted at the body, muttered something, and green light shot out of her wand. Suddenly the body and the blood disappeared and in their places was a large pile of dust.

     Hu Li stared bleakly at the dust – all that remained of her mother's terrible life. Draco sensed her discomfort and awkwardly swept it under the sinks with his foot, casting apologetic glances at her while he did this.

     Hermione said in an effort to distract her, "Hu Li, did you cut your hair?"

     She glanced half-heartedly into the mirror. "Yes," she said glumly, "yes, I did. I cut it so as not to be mistaken for Sou Mei – although that rather backfired on me." She glanced at Draco.

     Draco looked up. "I am sorry," he said uncomfortably. "I thought, since you told me you hadn't cut your hair in years, that Sou Mei would be more likely to have the shorter hair. When I saw your face up close – I knew I had the wrong one." He glanced down and then did a double take, staring at the front of her robes. "Are you bleeding?"

     Hu Li sighed softly. "Not anymore." She turned to Hermione and said, "I need to talk to Professor Dumbledore. Do you two mind if I go?"

     "Not at all," responded Hermione. "Potions is nearly over by now – we'll just go warn that Hufflepuff to say nothing to Madam Pomfrey about you going missing. But perhaps," she added, "you should change your robes. There is quite a bit of blood down your front, and if you were ever stopped by a teacher -"

     Hu Li shrugged. She casually bent down and picked up the dagger, and then shuffled out the door, leaving Draco and Hermione looking wary. 

     She wasn't really watching where she was going – her feet seemed to take on a life of their own, taking her down, down, down – right to Dumbledore's partially open door.

     Hu Li stared intently at it, as if she could divine the future by using its knotty wooden surface as a tool. Finally she raised her hand and knocked as if she were knocking on the door of Death itself.

     "Yes?" called Dumbledore, and she pushed open the door to reveal herself in all her miserable glory – hair askew, face tearstained, robes bloodied and torn, eyes forever darkened.

     Dumbledore's eyebrows went up ever so slightly. "Hu Li?" he asked carefully.

     He thought she was Sou Mei. She stared at him with wild eyes. "Yes," she blurted crazily, "Yes, I am Hu Li! I am not Sou Mei!" If Albus Dumbledore did not know who she was – how could she be sure that she was indeed Hu Li?

     He blinked his wise eyes in astonishment. "Forgive me for misleading you," he said quietly. "I did not mean to make you think I did not recognize you. It merely startled me to see you in such a state."

     Realization crept through Hu Li suddenly. "Oh," she said stupidly. "Sorry."

     He nodded toward a chair. She sat. "Now," he said gently. "What happened to you?"

     Hu Li exhaled. "Sou Mei came for me," she said, breathing slowly. "She tried to kill me. I let – I let her stab me with the dagger and I played dead. Then I beheaded her with her own dagger." She shuddered.

     Dumbledore folded his hands and rested his head on them, saying, "This sounds like only the end of a very long story that I have yet to hear."

     Hu Li nodded wearily. "I have not told you much," she confessed, "and I am very sorry for it. I only wanted to save you some worry." She reached into her pocket and pulled out Sou Mei's letters and her dagger and laid them on his desk. "Sou Mei has been sending me things through owl post - this dagger, and these two letters. Also I have been having strange nightmares – first about Jun Tao, when I was in his torture chamber – then about Sou Mei coming out of a mirror to stab me – then about my own reflection turning into a horrible thing and saying it was my soul." She leaned back in his chair. "I did not want to worry you," she said again.

     Dumbledore had been examining the letters and listening to her talk with interest. Now he looked up. "And you beheaded Sou Mei?" he inquired.

     "Yes," said Hu Li wearily. Then something frightening occurred to her. "Oh God – she can't come back from that, right? I mean, I know that most vampires do not return from either being burned or beheaded, but Sou Mei – she won't come back, will she?" Fear clutched at her heart and clawed at her soul.

     Dumbledore shook his head. Hu li exhaled. "No vampire could ever return from such a death," he said. "Not even the Phoenix can regenerate a head."

     Hu Li shut her eyes, remembering one more part of her story. "And," she mumbled, hoping she wouldn't break down in tears, "Sou Mei went to Hong Kong and murdered my father."

     Dumbledore looked at her, sympathy deeply etched on his face. "My apologies," he said softly. "If I had known her intentions, I might have been able to stop her. But it is no one's fault but Sou Mei's."

     Hu Li nodded, eyes still closed. "Professor," she said tentatively, "right before I – before Sou Mei died, she looked at me with such regret in her eyes that I almost felt sorry for her. She seemed to be nothing more than – well, a lost little girl."

     Dumbledore seemed to smile sadly. "Very apt description of the Phoenix. You see, Hu Li, Sou Mei was a nobleman's daughter, thousands of years ago. She was captured by a slave merchant and sold into slavery to a traveling band of criminals. She was not treated well – beaten and spit upon and abused for two years before her original captor came back for her. He was a vampire and a depraved man. He changed her into a vampire and made her the monster she was, never telling her that she needed to only take a wineglass-full of blood to satisfy her hunger. When she found that she had to wallow in blood and death for the rest of eternity, it drove her mad. She killed him – merely the first of millions. Sou Mei developed a name for herself in little time – perhaps two or three hundred years. She has been feared and hated ever since then. She has gloried in her image of a Phoenix of Death and lived up to it with exultation. But I have suspected that Sou Mei has long wished to be peacefully dead, instead living to murder and torture the innocent. It is very tiring, to be as old as she was. I almost suspect that she knew you were more powerful than she, and that is why she came for you – to have you put her out of her misery."

     Hu Li rubbed her eyes tiredly. "What's going to happen to me?" she asked, a little plaintively. "I have no living relatives left – Sou Mei said they were all demons of hell or angels in heaven."

     Albus Dumbledore sat back in his chair and gazed at the ceiling. "I believe Sou Mei was referring to the fact that all of your father's family are dead, and all of your mother's family are vampires. Perhaps …" He looked at her gravely. "Would you object to living with a family of vampires?"

     Hu Li felt a slow shiver start at the base of her spine and creep up her back. "I don't know," she said slowly. "What are my other options?"

     Dumbledore said cautiously, "I don't believe there are too many more. Of course, you could live in a wizard orphanage, or a foster home of wizards."

     Hu Li swallowed. She missed her father with a fiercely painful ache already. "I don't know," she said again in a small voice. She shut her eyes. "I can't believe I killed my own mother."

     Dumbledore said seriously, "You must be commended for your bravery in the face of danger and death, Hu Li. The people who have fought the Phoenix and lived to tell about it can be counted on one hand."

     Hu Li debated telling Dumbledore about Luis Perone, but then decided against it. He'll never come after me now, she thought. "I almost wished I hadn't lived," she said instead. "What do I have to live for? My father is dead. My friends will never look at me the same again. I have to live with strangers. And I am haunted still by gruesome memories of murder – Sou Mei's doings and my own." She let out a long, shuddering sigh.

     Dumbledore said, almost to himself, "Those who have nothing to die for have nothing to live for." Hu Li looked at him, startled. Hadn't that been almost exactly what she had said to Sou Mei?

     "Yes," she said quietly. "The only thing that I could die for was to win the chance to live."

     Dumbledore looked her in the eye. "And you won that chance. You came out of the arena alive, Hu Li. Not all gladiators did."

     The medallion! She recalled. "Professor, why did you give me a medallion inscribed with the phrase, we who are about to die salute you?"

     Dumbledore looked very calm. "It was Lamia's medallion. She had it inscribed, not I. It was not that I thought it appropriate for you and your situation – although I did think that if Sou Mei ever saw it that she would appreciate it. But I did not give it to you because I thought you were going to die, but because I knew you were going to live. Not all Roman gladiators died in the ring, either, Hu Li. The gladiators understood that they might die, but they still went into the ring. It was the threat of ever-present death as they entered the arena that made them so heroic and so brave – the possibility that they could die, but the hope that they would triumph. I have told you before that I need no faith or hope in you because I know that you will achieve whatever you wish to achieve. That stood for both your dealings with the diplomats as well with your mother, and still stands. You are one of the gladiators who have triumphed."

     Hu Li stared at him. Professor Dumbledore was a very wise man, she thought – far wiser than she would ever comprehend. But she thought she had a glimmer of understanding just then. "Thank you, sir," she said, rising and bowing deeply to him. "There is no greater honor that I could ever receive."

     He just smiled. "Oh, you shall have many greater honors in your life than the wandering words of a foolish old man, Hu Li. This is merely the beginning. Remember that, Miss Zhang. What seems to be the end is really just a new beginning."

     Hu Li slowly walked back to the hospital ward, holding her medallion in one hand and her dagger in the other. As she turned a corner and found herself outside the bathroom once more, she wondered for just a fleeting moment that if Sou Mei had known Lamia, then maybe the Phoenix would have turned out differently.

***

     Once again, she was dreaming.

     Hu Li stood at a distance looking up at the Hogwarts castle. It stood imperiously on its hill, surrounded by fog and commanding cliffs. Somewhere in the Forbidden Forest near the castle, an owl hooted, low and mournful. The half moon shone down on the castle, illuminating parts of it in an eerie chiaroscuro. The bright silvery moonlight lit up the snow that was drifting down like uncertain fairies. The snowfall pulled a soft blanket over Hogsmeade, muffling all noise and calming Hu Li. She shivered. She was thinking about her choices. Her past was about to collide with her future and she didn't know how to handle it.

     She had not decided what to do. Did she want to stay in Britain and continue with her assignment? Or go back to Hong Kong and finish school there? Should she leave all her friends and Hogwarts? Or return to her people, the Chinese? Did she want to live with vampires? Or live in a wizard foster home?

     Sighing, Hu Li turned her back on Hogwarts and found herself in the middle of a crossroads. All three ways appeared the same at the beginning, but as she peered down each one in turn, she found that because of the snow she could not see more than a few feet into them. The snow was all around her now, heavy and thick, but she was not cold. Rather, she was strangely comforted.

     Hu Li closed her eyes and thought of what she could do. She missed China and Hong Kong, but she didn't know if she could leave Britain. She was accustomed to living with wizards, but would it be better to live with vampires who were related to her rather than strange wizards? She didn't want to disappoint Professor Dumbledore, but she wasn't sure if she had the strength or the honor left in her to continue her assignment.

      Hu Li stood at the crossroads, looking around her. She was completely alone. She inhaled a sharp, cold breath. It seemed to bring life back to her spirit and restore her senses. She felt incredibly alive all of a sudden. She breathed in once more, pulling snow and crisp winter air and vitality into her lungs, into her soul. Hu Li suddenly thought that it didn't matter about her choices. It didn't matter what decision she made. She had gone into the arena and come out again. She was alive. And that was all that mattered.

     Hu Li knelt in the snow and kissed the ground, whispering a prayer to her father for guidance. And then she made her decision. She took her road. And she hoped for the best.