Disclaimer- I do not own Harry Potter, nor was I the one to screw up the sixth book. Don't blame me.

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"One last thing, Harry. We have taken the liberty of collecting several objects and tomes from both the Potter and Black vaults that we believe will come in handy on your journey. I suggest you take a close look at the contents and put them to good use." he said, while gesturing to large but plain trunk that was set next to the door.

Harry stood, pulling Nymphadora up with him. He once again bowed deeply, "Thank you very much Master Snottrag. May gold fill your coffers."

Snottrag also stood and bowed just as deeply to Harry, "It is my pleasure Mr. Potter. May gold fill your coffers."

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Harry gripped Nymohadora's hand and turned to to door, pulling her with along.

"Oh, Mr. Potter?"

Harry turned to Snottrag with a questioning look, "Yes?"

"You wouldn't happen to remember the Goblin that escorted you to your vault your first visit, would you?"

"Griphook?"

Snottrag gave Harry a feral grin, "Ah yes, Mr. Potter. You have just won me a great deal of money. Not many thought that you would remember. Thank you."

Harry just shrugged his shoulders, "Anytime." Once outside the office, Harry asked their escort if there was a spare office that they could use of a few minutes. The goblin replied in the positive and led them down a few corridors to an empty but well furnish office, closing the door and standing outside once Harry and Tonks entered. Harry turned to Tonks, looking slightly concerned. "How are you feeling Dora? Do you need a few minutes here?"

"Yeah, I'll be fine. Just need a few to pull myself together, you know." she said, closing her eyes and taking a few deep breaths to steady herself. "How can you do it? You didn't even blink when he brought up Sirius and your parents?"

"Dora, I hardly even knew Sirius. The first week I was devastated, I couldn't believe he was gone and that it was my fault. But when I was laying in that bed, I realized that I hardly even knew him. A few letters here and there, a conversation or two, but that's it. It felt like we were so close, like I had know him forever, but now I realize just know little I knew about him. I was just using him as the father figure I've lacked my entire life. It still hurts that he is gone, no amount of self analysis could take that away, but its manageable now. Besides, if I let each and every death get to me, we are going to be in a world of trouble. Many people that I am much closer to will die at Voldemorts hand before its my turn." Harry explained with a shrug. In an attempt to lighten the mood, he added "Besides, I was still in complete shock about the ridicules amount of money I was just handed." laughed Harry.

"Harry!"

"Yes?"

"I swore to you, I am not going to let him get you, and if you say that again, you will wish you had never been born!" she growled while raising her wand menacingly.

"Woah now, no need to get your knickers in a twist!" Laughed Harry while raising his hands to defend himself. "I'll stop, just put that thing away, ok?"

Nymphadora shot him a glare and slid the wand back to wherever she kept it hidden. "Good." As her mood seemed to have improved vastly, Harry decided that it was time to get down to the business at hand, mainly selecting their first refuge.

Dumping the file onto the rooms empty desk, Harry asked, "So, where do we go from here?"

"I want to hole up for a couple days while we work on your physical condition, which reminds me, you need to have another one of these." She tossed him another MRE and Harry groaned, he was still full from the last one. "So I think I want somewhere close, so I can get help if something goes wrong."

Harry agreed and they set to work looking through the properties listed in the folder. They ended up picking a property just outside of Diagon ally in muggle London, a small apartment just above a shop. They packed the folder in the truck and set off. The apartment was in obvious disuse, but with a little cleaning, some transfiguration, and a few well placed rodent repelling charms it was made livable, at least for a couple of days.

Nymphadora started Harry off on the nutrient potions that same day, explaining that the next morning he would be taking the aging potion, and then the muscle developing potion. Much to Harry's dismay, Tonks forced him to sit and sort the books the Goblins had packed for them. While he would not have minded normally, the potions he had taken gave him an incredible energy burst and he felt like running, jumping, and maybe even rolling around for a bit. Anything so long as it involved movement, lots of movement. Several hours later and with a lot of fidgeting, Harry had sorted out several books that he wanted to study in-depth. The first, "Rituals, Rites, and Sacrifices: A Guide" was mostly theory on the many different types of, you guessed it, rituals, rites, and sacrifices. Even during his brief look at the book, Harry had learned several concepts previously unknown to him. He learned that sacrifices always require something to be given: whether it be an object, an animal, or a piece of yourself. A piece of the sacrifice is given to the caster, granting certain characteristics or abilities. He also learned that all rituals have a "self cost," something that would be taken from him in order to power the magic of the ritual. As with sacrifices, the cost of the ritual could very immensely, and should be studied in depth before any attempt to cast them.

Harry also set aside a book on runic body modification. The addition of runes in the form of tattoos, or in some cases cuts, to certain body parts could have drastic effects on the body, and the book contained many such examples.

He wound up staying up through much of the night, studying the books he had set aside and taking notes on the different subjects, often writing down rituals and sacrifices that he wanted to study for possible use. He was a little wary of rituals, he wasn't sure he liked the idea of giving up a part of himself, especially since the actual 'cost' was rarely listed. He also took note of several 'runic modifications' as the book called them. As far as he could tell, these had very few negative aspects, and aside from a little pain it was a great way to gain physical power or magical focus. "I can handle pain, and how bad could it possibly be compared to a crucio anyways?" he thought. He could not for the life of him understand why the wizarding world had outlawed so many of the mostly harmless thing he came across in his studies.

Nymphadora also spent a better part of the night awake, working out his exact dosage of aging potion. She would occasionally come over and measure some random part of his body, and Harry had to wonder just why the exact weight of his pinky toe would matter in the slightest. He wondered because she had actually removed it in a rather rough fashion in order to get an accurate measurement, but she did reattach it after a few minutes. Finally, just a few hours before sunrise, the high he had from the nutrient potions wore off and he collapsed into bed, feeling completely exhausted. It seemed like he had just closed his eyes when he felt himself being shaken awake.

"Its time"

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The man lay naked upon the floor, feet together and arms held out at his side, palms up. He lay in the center of a circle carved into the floor, ruins scribed at pre-calculated positions on the outside. Four candles lit the room, one at his feet, one just past the tips of his extended fingers, and one above his head. His improved body was still strange to him. He was slightly taller had gained quite a bit of weight. Now, rather than simply being skinny, he had a lanky, wiry strength. He closed his eyes and took several deep breaths in preparation. A person, dressed in a black robe with the hood up, entered the room and began to chant, her soft, feminin voice seemed to fade in and out of his hearing. She pulled a rune engraved knife from the folds of the robe, and it glinted in the candle light as she lowered it to his chest, bring the tip to rest on his right breast. She continued her chant and the man's eyes snapped open and he sucked in a breath as she drug the blade a few inches down his chest. Rather than slicing its way through his skin, this blade seemed to burn, cauterizing the flesh as it cut. The acrid smell of burning flesh rose from his chest in small wisps of smoke. The man gritted his teeth and squeezed his eyes shut as she lifted the blade and repositioned it, adding to the rune being drawn on his chest. After several minutes of intricate carving, the woman repositioned the blade and began to carve on his left breast, uttering the chant all the while. After finishing his left breast, she moved to his inner biceps, the inner forearms, and then the palms of his hands, carving the same rune the entire time. It required all of mans will to keep from ripping his hand out from under the hot blade while she carved into his palm, his body began to shine in the candle light as his skin wept salty sweat. After the hands, she set to work on his stomach, cutting just below the navel and worked her way down. Thighs, shins, and the top of each foot received a rune.

By then, the room reeked of burnt flesh and light smoke hung in the air. When she finished the rune on his left foot, the man gathered what was left of his strength and shakily turned over, so that he was laying on his stomach with his arms extended out as before, palms down. Even moving that little bit was absolutely agonizing. His burnt flesh, taunt and dry, cracked and split with each movement. Small rivets of blood flowed from the freshly opened wounds. As soon as he settled himself, the woman resumed her chant and began carving again, starting on his right shoulder blade, then the left. She moved out to his arms, carving new runes opposite of the old, starting with his outer bicep. After the arms, she places a rune at the small of his back and then worked her way down his legs. The man let out a deep sigh of relief when she finished the pads of his feet, 'Just one more'. The day figure that was the woman moved up and sat on his back, causing the cuts on his chest an stomach to burn as they were pressed into the ground. She cut a small circle into the back of his neck, and around the circle placed four new runes. As she finished the last drawing, her chanting reached a forte, her voice cracked and dry from nearly an hour of continues talk. She placed the tip of the dagger in the center of the circle she had carved, and with a quick pull, cut a deep gash through the circle and lower rune. The man cried out as all the runes carved into his skin burned with an intensity he had never known was possible. After what seemed like an eternity, the pain stopped and his body was flooded with a cooling sensation. He sighed in relief, it was finally over.

With shaking hands, he turned himself over onto his back as raised a hand in front of his face to examine. There, carved into his palm was a black rune, to grant his body strength. It would harness some of his bodies emanating magic and channel it into his muscles. He was glad it was black too, unless someone looked closely it would just resemble a tattoo and, hopefully wouldn't notice that it was actually carved into his flesh. He was woken from his reverie by the sound of the woman, who had dropped the dagger after the last cut. She had apparently crawled away from him and was now on all fours, dry-heaving, with tears streaming down her face. He remembered how much she had protested doing this, and he could now see why. It had been far harder on her, mentally at least, to carve those lines into his skin with the burning hot blade than it had been on him. Not trusting his still shaky legs, the man pushed himself up and crawled over to her, gently placing a hand on her back. Vomit spattered the ground as she jumped slightly to his touch. He rubbed her back and spoke softly to her as she continued to vomit through her sobs. When it seemed as if she had finished, vomiting at least, he pulled her up against him spoke to her.

"Nymphadora, its all right, were fine now." he whispered. "Its all over. I'm sorry that I asked you to do that, if I had known it was going to be that bad for you, I would have never asked it of you. Thank you for finishing it, I know it must have been hard. It was hard for me too."

Nymphadora's only reply was to bury her head into his bare chest and continue sobbing, seemingly ignorant of the lingering smell of burnt flesh emanating from his cuts. Harry sighed, leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes, promptly falling asleep. Dora cried herself to sleep soon afterwards, it had been a long night for both of them.

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Ok everybody, sorry about the long wait on this chapter. I'm back at college and things have settled down. I had a very hard time writing this chapter, and I am not very happy with the way it turned out. I really wanted the addition of Harry's runes to be a powerful scene, but it didn't seem to want to come out that way, and I re-wrote the whole chapter several times. It wasn't getting any better, and its been over a month since my last update, so I said fuck it. However, my hand were not entirely idle this month. I did get one future chapter done, and another almost finished. I am very excited about those chapters and can't wait until the story reaches a point where I can post them. Anyways, here is the best I could do, let me know what you think.

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Edit: I keep forgeting to ask the readers for your thoughts on several ideas. I would love to hear from you on these.

Harry a metamorph? The potential is there, and it would help advance Harry and Dora's relationship, something that I am having a lot of trouble doing in a believable manner. On the other hand, I hate to do the same old crap that everyone else does. If I were to write Harry as a metamorph, he would have fairly limited ability, just hair, maybe some soft tissues. Stuff like that. Next!

Animagus abilities? If anyone says "HAHA, do a Dark Phenix!" I am going to find out where you live and break your figures so that you will never use a mouse again. Harry will not be a magical animal, he will not be a lion, he will not be an owl, he will not be any of that BS. As I cannot forsee him doing anything usefull with his abilities, it would be done souly for our entertainment. I am thinking maybe a duck.

Lastly, I have a terrible nagging feeling that I have started something in a previous chapter and forgot about it entirly. It wouldn't be anything huge (at least I hope not), and its probably due to my tendancy to give you the actual event, then explain what actualy lead up to and happened after that event at a later date. If anyone sees anything they think I may have forgotten about, please inform me.

Ok, I know I have forgotten to mention something, but fuck it! A little hint of thing to come. Things are going to get decidely worse for Harry in the next few chapters, and then we will get into the really exciting stuff (I told you it was little). I cant wait. The next chapter is well under way and should be up in a few days. Toodles!

PS- big thanks to marka for your many reviews. You should be getting an update on Egypt next chapter :)

Also, thank you Just Me Prime for the words of encouragement.