Some questions will be answered and new ones will arise today on Winds of Aeolus!

Chapter 17: Kuja and Tom Riddle

A ringing laughter filled the still, stale air. When Kuja had appeared, I had fallen into a trance so deep I could not see clearly. However, whatever spell he'd had on me was lifted at last and I could see where I was. I wish I couldn't.

"Angel? Are you all right?" Draco helped me to my feet.

"Yeah, Angel, you okay?" Hermione asked quietly.
"I think I am," I licked my lips and twitched my nose. We were in the same place that I had seen in my dream, or vision, or whatever it had been. The dark room, crowded with things. Things that I could see now that the light was a little better.

Dark powers contained in bottles dripping evil. I didn't have to be able to sense anything; the place reeked of a venomous air which could not be escaped. Immediately, glancing around at the others, I felt ostracized.

Yet I knew that I was not alone.

"So, it appears the dream team has arrived at last," said a sinisterly familiar voice. A voice so familiar, I couldn't help but make a double-take.

"D-Daddy?" I whispered in surprise.
"No," he laughed, not with my father's voice, but with a whole different tone and purpose. This was not my father. He was cloaked, as Kuja had been. "You will not discover my identity until your death is at hand. Until then, watch."

A white screen was conjured up, upon which was my brother, the real Dumbledore, and Remus. They were glaring at the screen. The scene flickered a moment, then backed away. The one person I had expected to see was there. Voldemort.

"Get 'im, Dee," I murmured under my breath. "You destroy that baka."
"Destroy him, yes," hissed the person cloaked as my father. "Then his purpose will be fulfilled and he will be exterminable."

"Exterminable!?" I shouted, turning in a wave of white fury toward the man posed as my father. "What the hell?" The gears in my head clicked and finally, I landed upon the man's true identity.

"Aeolus," Draco growled, falling into a warrior's stance he had learned from reading my mind, most likely.

"Of course," his facade disappeared with a whisper of wind. "And you know my son, of course, the one you fight now."
"S-So you're really..." my eyes went wide in shock.
"Tom Marvolo Riddle, the original," Draco's voice mirrored my thoughts. "A demon beyond all thoughts."
"Precisely," Aeolus grinned. "I am the Opposite of yourself, Angel. The precise mirror to the girl who changes winds, always for the better. I change them for the worst."

"Your winds may blow, Aeolus," I drew myself up high, an indignant look upon my face. I did not know what he was talking about, with all the "good winds" stuff, but I did know a little about him. "But you forget one thing."
"What's that?"

"That you brought not only me, but my friends as well!" I gave a single, simple wave of my hand, and the others, including myself, suddenly changed. Hair lengthened, straightened, changed to one shade of pure white. Eyes became a color of purest silver, the color of the purest dragon scale. Clothes wrapped themselves around their person, forming a simple robe of clear white and clear silver, the wands in each hand becoming a staff of silver, with a single simple ruby embedded at the top.

"The Winds of Aeolus blow strong," I grinned, my pale face drawn in a simplistic satisfied gesture. "But the Winds of Angels blow stronger!"

Harry, Hermione, Draco, Hagrid, Ron, and myself lowered the new staffs, most not even realizing what they were doing. As quickly as a silver light shot from the tip of each ruby-encrusted staff, we were back inside Dumbledore's office, as if it had never been.

David stared at the six of us. He was surprised, to say the least. Voldemort lay dead at his feet, Dumbledore and Remus both breathing hard, staring at us as though we'd all gone mental.

"Well," David coughed promptly. "What happened while I was here?"

We all launched into an explanation of what had happened at once.

***

When we had finally gotten everything straightened out, we headed back to our dorms, Dumbledore stressing it on us not to tell a soul. With that bearing in mind, Hermione and I went to our dorm, Draco to his, Harry, David, and Ron to theirs, Hagrid to his hut, and Remus to his office.

No one asked where we had gotten our sudden scars the next morning, nor did they ask what all the commotion had been about. When things had settled down, two days before Christmas break (we would be spending it with the Weasleys), I headed to Professor Dumbledore's office on my own, wanting to know something.
Draco intercepted me on the way.

"I want to see Dumbledore, Draco, can I get by?" I asked after a moment of trying to dance out of his reach.
"I know where and why you are going," he smiled sadly. "You want to know what the hat meant, don't you?"

"Yes," I said hesitantly.

"You chose to be in Griffindor. I chose to go into Slytherin to please my father. You know as well as I do that it's the choices we make that makes us who we are," Draco said.

"I know, Draco, but-"
"Come with me, Angel," he led me by the hand through the corridor and stopped outside of the old common room, the one in which Hermione and I had been closed into with Remus.
"I've already seen this place, Draco, why-"
He placed his index finger over my lips, quieting me before I asked the question. "I only want you to see something."
"B-But Draco..."

"Don't worry," he smiled warmly as I blushed. "Just trust me."

I entered the room after he had struck the stone a few times. Inside, an obvious party was being held.

"What is this?" I asked, shocked.

"It's a celebration, Angel. For you and for me."

"Huh? Why me? Why you?"

"You're achievement last night, and my birthday," he smiled again. "And for me being the first student transfer in a few centuries."
"Transfer?"

"I'm in Griffindor now, too."

With that, we entered the room and the he led a slow dance. Draco Malfoy, twelve years old. Angel Galis, for her defeat of Aeolus.

Wait a minute!

"If we destroyed Aeolus..." I whispered carefully, suddenly stilled by the realization as it hit me. "Then I'll never be able to go home."

"No," Draco shook his head sadly. "Never."

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???!!! What the heck?! We can't go home? WAHHHHHH!!!!!