Hello- I come from the dark ranks of my mind to bring you the next chapter of "Sphinx." However, before I do so, I need to make a big Author's Note. You may want to read it, even if you are one of those people that don't like to read them. It may have a difference as to what your outlook is on certain parts of the story. A few commented in comments and in real life (yes, I have some friends that read my story) about the person Voldemort kills at the end of Chapter 23. Never assume anything. There are three people in that tent (well, technically four if you count Voldemort): McGonagall, Ron, and Snape. I never defined who died. There was no "'s eyes widened as he/she fell to the ground with a resounding thud." You guys all know the fun little saying about assuming, right? –Grins- Now before you ask, no. I'm not going to say right here who it is who died. It was one of the previously mentioned three. But don't immediately dismiss Snape since I am making this announcement. I have a rather large penchant for bluffing- I am excellent at playing Clue and poker. But I do promise, you will find out sometime soon. But until then, here is Chapter 24 of "Sphinx."

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"You can't relax and you can't rely on anyone for anything. So you make your complaints and all everyone's let you down. You just can't ever win. Convinced there's a war on, it's always someone versus you. Convinced that your critics are watching and you've always got something to prove."- "Sympathy for the Martyr," Straylight Run

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Hermione, with one last look at the paper, threw it into the silver colored flame Isadora held cupped in her hand. It had been decided that the potion should be memorized and destroyed, lest it fall into the wrong hands. The rest of the book was still contained inside Draco's necklace, but the cover of the book was changed to go along with the fly cover which read Hogwarts, A History.

As the last few embers of the page dissolved in the flames, a noise was heard by the opening of the tent. The tent's four occupants looked up; disgust and fear crossed their faces as they realized the man that stood before them was none other than the Dark Lord Voldemort.

"What do you need that fire for, Isadora," he asked with a small smile.

"You deny your hostages any of the comforts of home. We have to keep ourselves warm somehow," she said, extinguishing the flames by closing her palms together.

"Why? Are you cold?" With these words, a circle of flame leapt up around Isadora. None of the flames were close enough to hurt her, but were she to move several centimeters in any direction, she would certainly be burned.

"Now that you are in the hot seat," he said, laughing at his own joke, "perhaps you would like to inform me of the whereabouts of the Order of the Phoenix?"

"Lord, it doesn't exist. It hasn't for sixteen years; why are you still looking for it?"

"Because I do know it exists. Alijayson Mecre kindly informed me of that."

Isadora frowned. "Alijayson is a traitor to her own people. She has sold our secrets to enemy forces. How do you know this will not be reversed against you? How do you know this isn't false information?"

Voldemort's lips twisted into a sickly grin. "I highly doubt the Imperious Curse and Crutacious Curse would prove false. I also had some truth potion as well to help."

Isadora gave him a coy smile and moistened her index finger. She put it at the base of the flames that surrounded her, and dragged it in the circle, putting out the fire. Draco, from the side of the tent where he watched this occur, smiled slightly as he watched his cousin's modest black dress morph into one of silver and emerald green that accented her well-developed chest and the subtle curves of her waist. Draco looked closely at her hair, for he thought he saw something move, as though inside of it. Draco smiled inwardly as he realized he was right- a silver serpent crept down her neck and chest from behind her ear. 'Brilliant,' he thought. 'Appeal to his interests.' She stood and began to move towards Voldemort in a way Draco believed to be quite serpentine.

"My Lord, can't we forget this whole thing," she said, falling to her knees and kissing the hem of his robes. Harry glared at Isadora. 'My Lord?' Kissing the robes? Only Voldemort's followers did this. Could she be one of them? Harry opened his mouth to confront her, when Draco poked him hard in the ribs.

'Watch,' Draco mouthed silently.

Isadora was standing, her hands slowly rising on Voldemort's arms. She encircled them around his neck and began kissing him. Until now, Voldemort had kept a countenance of mild amusement. Now, he gripped her shoulders, gave her short kiss, and then threw her down to the ground.

"Your Veela charms do not have any effect on me, Isadora. I promise you, Cordelia has already tried that."

Isadora's smirk vanished. "What are you talking about?"

"They put up an excellent fight, both Cordelia and Mithle. But neither of them holds my concern anymore."

Isadora leapt to her feet, fury raging in her eyes. "You bastard!" she shouted. "Avada Kedavra!"

But as soon as "Avada" had crossed her lips, a black fire ignited around Voldemort. Hermione, Draco, Harry, and Isadora stared at the now diminishing black flames.

"How?" Isadora said, looking slightly pale. "You didn't move. Why aren't you dead?"

"The Order, which does exist, has found I had a new weapon, but they did not know what it is. You have just witnessed it: a shield to the Killing Curse. Quite handy, isn't it?" Isadora stared at Voldemort, for the first time her body trembled in fear. "Now," he said. "Where is, let's see, Hermione?" He scanned the three teenagers who huddled close to the back of the tent. "Ah, here she is."

He walked over to Hermione; he leaned down and grazed a cold finger down her cheek. She grimaced at his touch. "I found this tent arrangement to be quite amusing. There's a lot of sexual frustration in here. Take you, for example. Your fate has been decided for you; you're going to be a Veela and have children with the young Malfoy. After you reproduce, there's no telling what will happen. But my guess is that you will stay with him. After all, he is in love with you."

Hermione blinked. Draco, in love with her? She met his eyes who were staring intently at her. She closed her eyes and looked down. This was Voldemort who was talking, not Draco. Voldemort must be trying to throw her off her guard.

"But, little girl," Voldemort continued, "Do you know what passed between your love and his cousin?"

Isadora spoke up. "That is a dead issue. Let it rest in peace."

"Don't you think Hermione should know that you and Draco almost had sex?"

"What?" said Hermione.

"Hermione," said Isadora. "Do you remember how I said that I had to bribe Lucius to let him let me see Narcissa, how he had his uses for me? This was one of them. In Draco's fifth year, he," she gestured towards Voldemort, "decided he wanted an heir to continue his work since it would be impossible to recreate the philosopher's stone. I was placed under several charms that would ensure pregnancy. Draco thought it was only about proving his manhood and he decided he wanted to do it for the first time with someone special, who he cared about. He knew me, and cared about me, but not in the sense deemed necessary. He refused avidly, to the point where Lucius was raising his wand to perform the Imperious Curse behind Draco's back. Before he was able to, a letter was given to him. Bellatrix was pregnant with a son. Therefore, it was almost. We didn't."

Draco's eyebrows were furrowed in anger; he had not known about the heir. Hermione gathered her knees to her chest and hugged them to her.

Voldemort laughed, "Interesting how you are so often used for procreation, boy." Then he wheeled on Harry. "You've been quite, Potter. It's not like you. You're always so noisy, yelling things that you believe to be heroic."

Harry looked into Voldemort's snake-like eyes, keeping a stony silence.

"Tell me, boy," said Voldemort. "Have you ever been kissed?" Harry held his tongue. "Answer me!"

"I don't see how that's any of your business," said Harry coldly.

Voldemort raised his wand. "Alright, yes. Don't get so touchy about it," said Harry.

Voldemort leaned forward and touched Harry's scar briefly; Hermione saw him cringe in pain. "Was she beautiful?" he asked. "It would be nice if she was. They say those who kiss people they don't like will pretend they are kissing someone else. And tomorrow, Potter, at exactly eight o'clock in the morning, you will need a prettier face." Voldemort stood up and looked down and at the teenagers, then glanced at Isadora. Then, with a quick spin on his heel, he was gone. There was silence for a moment.

"What they hell was that all about?" said Draco, breaking the silence.

"Well," said Isadora, "he wanted to mock us all, prod and see if we were intimidated enough to give him the location of the Order, build up the tension, deliver a scoop of doom and destruction to Harry, and be his bitingly annoying self. I seriously wonder why all villains waste so much valuable time talking."

"That wasn't a scoop," said Harry quietly. "That was a triple fudge sundae. I'm due for the Dementor's Kiss tomorrow at eight o'clock."

"Well," said Isadora. "That means one thing. The Sphinx will have to awake tonight."

"We're doing it tonight?" said Hermione.

"No," said Isadora. "Tomorrow after Harry's received the Kiss. Of course we have to do it tonight."

"Okay," said Draco, standing up. "Should I go get the bowl and syringes?"

"No," said Hermione. "The potion takes a very short time to prepare and can only be administered an hour after brewed. If we wait too long, it won't have any effect. We should probably make it so that it is ready for six-thirty or seven o'clock. That way, we will have until seven-thirty or eight to take it."

"Then I suggest that we all are awake for four-thirty tomorrow. I will keep watch over you. You must get your sleep," said Isadora.

-

Hermione tossed and turned on the tent's grassy flooring. She really should be sleeping, but at this point, sleep was near impossible. She didn't know how Draco and Harry did it, for they were both fast asleep. Even Isadora had dozed off. Isadora wouldn't leave them in danger; she had put up wards that would awake them if anyone entered the tent.

In truth, it was Voldemort's words that kept her awake. She wished she could believe he was lying when he said Draco loved her, but the look in Draco's eyes convinced her that it wasn't, that it was real.

Hermione sat up and looked at his sleeping form. Whenever Draco was awake, he always had a sort of look, like he was covered and protected. But asleep, he lied as open and vulnerable as any of them. He groaned in his sleep and rolled over, facing her. In the moonlight, his silver hair spilled across his forehead and into the grass, giving the illusion of a creek of silver budding in the ground below him.

Hermione lied down beside him and propped her head up by her hand, and looked at him. She really needed to talk to him; however, she was not sure if he would listen or have the response she hoped for. Hermione had heard of people talking to someone while that person was asleep, how they listen to you even if they don't want to, and decided to do that. "It's funny," she began nervously. "We are a bunch of ordinary people. We're ordinary people, thrown into extraordinary circumstances. We don't know what's going to happen tomorrow, even if this potion is going to work, if it's going to save my best friend. All we have is our faith to hang on to, but that's all we ever really seem to have to cling to in this crazy world."

Hermione bit her bottom lip, and then continued. "My grandmother is very religious and there are three things that fit in somewhere, and it's faith, hope, and love. And I think that this is what the Sphinx is. We have faith that this will work, especially because of the prophesy. Not only that, we're hoping this will work. Hope- Harry is the wizarding world's hope. This Sphinx, I don't know if it will kill Voldemort, but I think it will be a strong enough blow that we can escape and defeat him with full force. But we're saddling this all on our damn hope that good does conquer evil in the end.

"So that leaves love. Yes, I love Harry and I don't want anything to happen to him. But I love him in the same way I loved Ron- and you know how that turned out. So it's strictly platonic and friendly. I love them and I don't want anything to happen to them. But you, you're different. You make me want to take it all away; lay your arms down so you can breathe while I fight the nightmares that constantly chase you. But at the same time, it is you I want to be with when I get scared and want to hide. To be completely frank, I love you. I don't know how you feel about me; all I have to go by is what Voldemort said, which is a risky thing to believe in. When it comes to power, I highly doubt he keeps his word about things. Well, to make a long story short..."

"Too late," said Draco, whose eyes were still closed.

Hermione, surprised, shocked, and slightly embarrassed, asked "Were you awake the entire time?"

"Basically, yes. I had just woken up from a rather disturbing dream where I went to St. Mungo's to visit someone, and the flowers I brought them turned my head into a gravy boat. But I felt you lying beside me, and I didn't want you to move, so I just kept still with my eyes closed so I could go back to sleep without disturbing you. But then you started talking, so I didn't go back to sleep."

Draco sat up, stretched, and yawned. Hermione lied back down on the ground and sighed.

"So did you mean it?"

"What?" said Hermione.

"What you said."

Hermione sat up. "Well, the beginning parts I was mainly trying to convince myself we would be alright, but the end- yes, all of it."

"You meant it?" he said, staring at her straight in the eye.

"Yes."

"Say it."

"I love you."

He put his hands on her shoulder and pulled her rather roughly towards him, crashing her lips against his. His arms wrapped tightly around her as deepened the kiss. Hermione sighed happily against him. After, he pulled away from her.

"I love you too," he said.

Hermione grinned and kissed him again.

"You know," a voice interrupted. "If I die tomorrow, I really don't want the last memory of my friends to be the two of you snogging each other's brains out."

"Harry?" said Hermione, blushing. "You're awake? How long have you been awake?"

"I just woke up. Remember how Isadora did that other spell- an internal alarm clock to wake us up? It's four-thirty," he said, squinting at his watch.

"Oh," said Hermione. Draco and she probably didn't feel it because they were already awake.

"I didn't know I was your friend," said Draco.

"Good morning to you too, Sunshine," said Harry. "Well, we aren't enemies anymore, are we? You still have your moments where you piss me off beyond belief, but I think you're a decent guy. I wouldn't call you my best friend and want to have slumber parties with you or anything, but you aren't a bad person. Plus, you're good to Hermione."

Isadora walked over to them. "This is all very touching," she said, "but we are on a time schedule. We need to inject the potion by seven-fifteen. If Harry is due to get the kiss promptly at eight o'clock, Voldemort is probably going to send for him at seven-thirty. He's going to want a large crowd to see this- and that will take time to gather. You can relax until five; then we need to get started."

"Wait," said Harry. "I thought this potion only took a half hour to make? If we start at five, the potion will be a dud by seven o'clock."

"The potion, yes, will take thirty minutes; however, I'm predicting the ingredients preparation will take about an hour to do. So in fifteen minutes now, we begin."

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Whew! Okay, a lot has been said in this chapter. For one, Voldemort got his big scene! As for the development of Voldemort in my mind, I'll tell you a few things about my outlook on him. I didn't want do describe too much about how Voldemort looked. I think everyone has their own mental picture of him, and I don't want yours to change to suit mine. Personally, I think of him as an older Tom Riddle. As for his attitude- to me, he's always been one of those villains that talks to you and annoys the hell out of you when you're fighting him with all these little catch phrases. Here's a perfect example- Jafar from Aladdin. He uses all those little phrases- "Get the point?" "I'm just getting warmed up!" "Things are unraveling fast now, boy." I guess that may have influenced me a little- it's where I got the idea for the circle of flame around Isadora.

Thanks for reading! Please review! I love comments- even the bad ones. They tell me what I need to work on. Feel free to ask any questions as well.

Dragonfires