Chapter One: A New Foe?
Remus led Harry down a small forest path. They had not gone far when the forest abruptly ended, opening on a beautiful landscape. It would have been beautiful, had it not been a graveyard. Silently, Remus led Harry to a small plot of ground, just next to where the rows of mausoleums began. Harry looked at the sky, almost as if he was refusing to see the small but delicate headstone inscribed, "Potter". Remus kneeled, and started speaking, as if to the late Potters.
"James, Lilly, I know you can't hear me, but I'd like to believe you could," he began, barely controlling sobs. Nearby, Harry still looked to the sky, tears streaming down his face. Remus continued, "I've brought Harry. Isn't he so handsome? I know you'd be proud. We brought three bouquets today. You see, Sirius was killed, and there's no body, and no funeral, and no grave, so we're putting his flowers in-between you."
Remus continued muttering to James and Lilly, as Harry knelt and set the flowers down, first on his mother's grave, then his fathers, and then one in the middle. Remus stood, casting his shadow down on the tiny figure of a weeping Harry. Remus walked silently away, letting Harry alone with his parents. He laid a hand down on his mother's grave, and cried. A shadow covered Harry again, but he took no notice, until a tall man bent down and set a single red rose on each grave. Harry looked up and reeled as he came face to face with Severus Snape.
"P-pp-profes-ss-sor!" cried Harry, startled. But Severus only smiled—a look that, strangely, didn't seem out of place. What was out of place was the single tear running down his cheek.
"Harry, I knew I'd run into you here one day," drawled Severus.
"Wh-wh-why are you here?" Harry cautiously asked.
"Let me show you something," said Severus, in his classroom lecture voice, extending a long fingered hand to help Harry up.
Harry wasn't sure why he suddenly felt so trusting. He grasped the proffered hand and rose to his feet, never thinking that this was the person he disliked most before crossing the line into hate. They walked silently to a stone mausoleum, bearing the inscription:
Kris Riddle: 4/20/1954 – 10/14/1981
Erin Riddle: 4/20/1954 – 10/14/1981
Maria Riddle: 8/17/1956 – 10/14/1981
Jessica Riddle: 11/21/1958 – 10/14/1981
Elizabeth Riddle: 6/3/1969 – 10/14/1981Severus pushed open the door, revealing a well-lit room with no source of light. The back wall bore a deep green tapestry with silver embroidered words. But what caught Harry's attention were the five glass casket-shaped boxes. Laying peacefully in each was a beautiful girl, so well preserved that they could have been sleeping. The one furthest from the door had a bouquet of red roses lying across her bosom. The girls all seemed to be perfect replicas of the others, in increasing age up to the last two, who were twins. Severus had walked to the far coffin, and was looking at the face of the girl, silently crying. Harry was still puzzled as he walked to the tapestry. He read the words, somehow knowing that this was not an epitaph.
Here lie the Riddle Sisters, though not truly dead. The sisters were struck by the Crystallis Curse by He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. It is still unknown how to remove the enchantment.
Harry walked up beside Severus, and looked at the frozen woman. A stone at the head of her coffin read, simply, "Kris".
"I still don't understand, Professor," ventured Harry after a moment's quiet.
"Kris was…very…very dear to me. That October, it was almost as if she knew. She told me that if something happened to her, I was to bring her a dozen red roses every time I came to visit her, and then take away a rose for every victim of the Dark Lord's, and take it to them."
It was then that Harry noticed the satin ribbon tied around the roses had been undone, and two flowers were missing.
"You take my parents flowers? I thought you hated them."
"It doesn't matter. Kris asked me to."
Severus continued to weep, and a single tear fell to the floor with a tiny, but audible splash.
"What's the Crystallis Curse?"
Instead of switching back to teacher mode, Severus just said, as if commenting on the weather, "It stops a person, in the most literal sense of it. No heartbeat, no breath, just…stopped. They don't age, but they're not dead, either. They're still pliable," he raised Kris' hand to his chest for a moment before replacing it, and then continued. "Even still warm."
Harry did not believe this, and reached out to touch Kris' cheek. As soon as their skin met, an almost electrical shock went up Harry's fingertips, and Kris' eyes fluttered open.
