Thanks to my reviewer! Love you sooooooooooooooooo much! Well, here's the next chapter to The Timeless Tale!

Disclaimer: I own nothing Harry Potter. NOTHING! It belongs to J.K. Rowling.

Chapter 26

Oneirogenic Mud

James kept glancing at Harry, scared he might blame him again for all the misery he had to face. James reminded himself, once again, that Harry had not said that.

Last night, many of them had to explain their boggarts to the rest. Ron's apparently, had changed from a giant spider to dead friends. Harry's had changed from a dementor to a victorious Voldemort who told Harry it was his fault his friends were dead. Ginny's had changed in to a dead Harry. What it had been, James didn't know. His boggart surprised him as well. He had to explain to Lily and Sirius why his had changed. Truthfully, he did not know. Sure, he was afraid of those things, but the last time he had encountered a boggart (in Defense Against the Dark Arts class), it had shown Lily hating him again, which gave everyone a good laugh. Now, it was Lily dead, Sirius dead, and Harry blaming him for his rotten life. He had no idea when he had become afraid of that. He just hoped he would never have another encounter with a boggart again.

His thoughts were interrupted when he ran into Sirius.

"Why'd we stop?" He looked around and it answered his question. It was a sphinx.

"Excuse me, but could you move? You're kind of in our way," Sirius said.

"No, I cannot. Not unless you can answer my riddle. Answer it correctly on your first guess, and I will let you pass. If you do not, I will attack. Remain silent, I will let you walk away from me unscathed."

Harry looked around at his companions. They looked a little nervous as they looked up at the creature with the body of a lion and head of a human. They then returned Harry's questioning eyes with the okay to ask for the riddle.

"Alright. You can give me the riddle."

"Soft as a petal that falls from a tree,

The more I dry, the wetter I'll be. What am I?"

"How can it dry and get wetter?" Draco asked.

"That's why they call it a riddle, Malfoy!" Ron said.

James remained silent. What's soft? What dries? What gets wet as it dries? Oh! It dries not itself, but something else! It gets wetter because it soaks up the moisture off the object and drying the object! It's…

"A towel," James said, though he wasn't the only one to say it. Lily had said it as well.

"You knew that?" Sirius asked.

The sphinx nodded and smiled. Suddenly, the ground opened underneath them and they fell down onto a stone floor.

"Is everyone alright?" Harry asked. There were several grunts in response.

"Where are we?" Sirius asked.

"Lumos," Harry said. They were in a square room with only one way out—the hole in the roof they had come through.

"I thought he said he'd let us go if we answered the riddle!" Draco said.

"He did. There's got to be some other way out of here," Harry said, searching the walls.

"What are you looking for?" Ginny asked, walking up behind Harry.

"Anything that will show us how to get out of here." He waved his wand along the wall. There was nothing anywhere that gave the smallest inkling that it could help them get out of this.

"So how long is this going to take?" Sirius asked, leaning against the wall. Suddenly, he screamed and fell backwards.

James turned to see what Sirius had done, and saw that a section of the wall had been moved to reveal a stone staircase. Harry walked toward it and looked down the steps.

"They're pretty steep and look really long."

"Are you sure we should step on them. What if it's a trap and something bad happens?" Lily said. Harry walked forward and placed his foot on the first step cautiously. Nothing happened. He moved further down the staircase and still nothing happened. "I think it's alright," Harry said. The others followed warily down the dark staircase. James was the last one to start down the long stairway. Just as he put his foot on the first step, the stairs flattened and formed a stone slide. The teenagers screamed as they slid down the flight at breakneck speed.

"What's going on?"

"What happened?"

"AAAAHHHH!" They were all screaming at the sudden disappearance of the stairs as they slid faster and faster down the chute towards what—no one knew.

James splashed down into a dark, gooey liquid that was so thick, it felt like he had landed on stone. As hard as he had hit it, he was only in it up to his knees.

"What is this?" James asked, trying to lift his foot out of the goo, but found he couldn't. He felt himself grow numb and his panic rose.

"I don't know, but I have a feeling if we don't get out of it soon, we won't be around for long," Harry said, trying to step out of it. He was the first person to fall into it and it was now up to his waist. James looked around. The goop was covering the ground as far as he could see.

"Are we sinking?" Ron asked.

"I think we…" Harry stopped. He looked around, his face growing fearful.

"Harry, what's wrong?" Hermione asked.

"Get away from me!" he screamed, his arms flailing as if he was struggling with an imaginary opponent.

"Harry!" Ginny screamed, as she desperately tried to get to her boyfriend, but her movements only made her sink farther under.

"What's ha… No! No! No! No! No! Get away from him! Leave him alone!" Sirius called, trying to run.

"Oh! I know what this is!" Hermione panicked. "It's Oneirogenic Mud! It makes you numb and causes you have your worst nightmares. When it's over, you pass out! That's why no one has ever survived before! They sink completely and suffocate before they return to consci…AAAAAHHHH! No! Ron!" Her screams began to mingle with those from Harry and Sirius. They were soon joined with Ron, Ginny, and Lily.

"Great! Just great!" Draco exclaimed. "I knew I should…No! Master, I'm sorry. I just couldn't do that…I'll do better next ti—AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!"

James stared in shock as his friends started twitching and sinking further and further into the muck. Suddenly, they didn't look normal. They started to melt away. His friends were replaced with Death Eaters. Voldemort was leading them toward James. He looked around for a way out, but saw none. He looked down at himself and noticed he looked a little older and he was in the center of a circle made up of Death Eaters

"What do you want?" James cried.

"You, your wife, and your son dead. That is what I want. I want every last Potter extinct so no one can destroy me!"

"You will not touch either Lily or Harry!"

"I highly doubt that. No one can last against me for long. No one is more powerful than me!" Voldemort bellowed. James raised his wand.

"You think you can fight me?" he laughed. "I don't. You wouldn't dare. Especially since I have possession of the two things that you care most about in the world." Voldemort waved his wand and Lily and baby Harry appeared in front of him, bound.

"Let them go!" James bellowed, panicking as he saw his infant son in the midst of such evil.

"Not a chance, Potter!" Two Death Eaters came up and restrained him as he moved towards Voldemort. "I am going to make you suffer! You will watch your sweet, beautiful wife die a slow, painful death, then, you will watch your young, innocent son perish. After that, I will kill you!" Voldemort raised his wand at Lily. James watched, horrified as his beloved wife was put under the Cruciatus Curse. He heard her piercing scream of agony and watched helplessly as rage boiled inside him. He wanted to kill this man before him. "Leave her alone!" he shouted. In response, Voldemort laughed. He stopped the curse and looked at James and smiled a cruel smile. He turned back to Lily and put the curse on her again.

"NO!" James cried, fighting with all his might against the Death Eaters keeping him from Lily. The curse stopped again. Lily didn't move. James' face fell as he looked at his motionless wife.

"Don't worry, Potter, she's not dead yet. "Crucio!" This time, Lily didn't scream; instead, she just twitched involuntarily with pain. Voldemort once again, lifted the curse. "Say goodbye, Potter. "Avada Kedavara!" With a flash of green light, the last bit of life left in Lily vanished. James could not breath as he stared at the body of the one he loved. He couldn't tear his eyes away from her. He felt the tears well up in his eyes as he looked at Lily. James hardly noticed Voldemort had turned to Harry and had picked him up. Harry started screaming and crying in terror, drawing his father from his daze.

"Put him down!" James cried hoarsely.

Voldemort walked towards James, his son in his hands. Voldemort held Harry right in front of James' face. James looked into the terror-filled emerald eyes and his heart broke. James violently jerked in an attempt to free himself from his captors' grasp, but to no avail. "Take a good look, James Andrew Potter, for this will be the last time you see the angelic face of your sweet Harry James Potter!" Voldemort cackled as he pulled Harry away once more and watched James' futile attempts to save his son's life. Voldemort raised Harry up in his left hand, drew his wand up in his right, aimed the wand at the baby's heart, and whispered, "Avada Kedavara!"

James let out an earsplitting scream as he watched his lifeless son hit the ground. "Now, you shall join them, James. Avada Kedavara!" James watched the green light speed toward him and he felt his body go limp and all went dark.

James opened his eyes blearily as he looked around. "Where am I?" he asked. He saw nothing but a table set up against the wall with nothing but a candleholder with three lit candles on top. He then, noticed a red haired girl with bright green eyes. "Lily!" he cried as he threw his arms around her. "James! It's all right! It was just a dream!" James pulled away as memories of what had just happened came to him. "How did we survive? Aren't we supposed to be dead?" he asked shakily, still upset over the nightmare.

"Yes, we should be dead, James," Hermione answered. "But there was no bottom to the pool of that mud so as we sunk lower, we just fell through. It really wasn't that deep."

"Why would Voldemort do something like that?" James asked, rubbing his throbbing head.

"I can't even imagine," Hermione said.

"Where's Harry?" James asked.

"He's over here," Sirius called, hearing the question. "He's alright," he added.

"What do we do now?" Ginny asked, standing up.

"We go down this tunnel," Harry said, walking toward the table.

"What tunnel? I see no tunnel!" Draco said. Harry continued to walk toward the table and grabbed the right arm on the candleholder. There was a large shaking feeling and the sound of stone scraping against stone as a section of the right wall disappeared.

"How did you know about that?" Lily asked in awe.

"I woke up first and couldn't get any of you awake. I looked around and discovered this. Come on. It's a ladder, not stairs. It won't turn into a slide."

"It could come off the wall," Draco said.

"Then, let's go one at a time," Harry said. "We have to keep going. I'll go first."

"Be careful, Harry," Ginny said.

"Don't worry," Harry said as he started down the ladder. Once he reached the bottom, he called up to them and Ginny started down. When they had all reached the bottom, they found that they were underneath the island. The walls were transparent and on the other side of the walls, they could see the water beneath the sea. They heard the water move around them as the current turned. James marveled at the sight as he turned around in a circle.

"This is not what I had envisioned for the place the Horcrux would be hidden," Harry breathed as he walked toward a transparent hallway. He followed the hallway for a few feet and found a smaller room with a golden table in the center. On top of the table, was a golden box. Harry cautiously walked up to it and opened it.

"Is that it?" James asked as he walked in. Harry nodded. "We did it. We found it."

"So how do we destroy it?" Ron asked. Harry raised his wand. "Reducto!" The spell left the wand and hit the cups. James watched as the cups blew up right in front of him.

A cold, drawling voice suddenly sounded from behind them, sending a chill down James' spine. "I would not have done that if I were you, Harry."

About the dream that James had...it was just a dream! Nothing else. It does not mean Harry is nonexistent, as you figured out. It was just a dream.