Chapter 2: Shadows
Six Months after Fall of The Dark Lord
Mark Potter shot up in bed, his wand already in hand.
Something had woken him.
"What is it Mark?" his wife asked, stirring from her sleep.
"Nothing Holly, go back to sleep" Mark said gently and she laid back down, her silky brown hair falling over her eyes as her head hit the pillow.
Mark slipped out of bed silently.
"Muffliato" he whispered, pointing his wand at his bare feet.
Mark walked silently over the fluffy carpet of the bedroom of the house he and Holly shared with their daughter Erica who had just turned one a week ago.
Mark heard another thump downstairs and walked faster, his feet silenced by the spell.
He stopped by Erica's door, she was sound asleep in her bed, it was not her that was downstairs.
Mark walked towards the top of the stairs and silently stole down to the living room right off the foot of the stairs.
Someone was standing in front of the fireplace in the living room.
The figure just stood there, doing nothing.
Mark just stood there silently, watching, for over five minutes.
Suddenly the figure spoke, "If you're going to hex me you might as well do it, I haven't all night"
The voice sounded so familiar Mark could burst, "Dad? What are you doing here?" Mark asked.
With a wave of his hand Harry Potter started a fire in the grate, and now that Mark could see his fathers face properly he saw that Harry looked tired, and he looked like he hadn't ate or slept in days, his hair was a mess, and his eyes were drooping.
Upon closer inspection of Harry's eyes Mark saw that they were darker than they normally were, shadowy if you want to call it that.
"What's up Dad?" Mark asked quietly, so as not to wake Holly or Erica.
Harry merely gestured toward the sofa, "sit" he croaked.
Mark obeyed his father and Harry sat across from him on the other sofa at the other side of the oak coffee table.
Harry waved his hand again and the two big oak doors that led into the living room from the stairwell, closed and locked silently.
Mark waited patiently for his father to speak, and finally he did.
"Baal is on the move" he said simply.
This puzzled Mark, "What?" he asked quietly.
Harry buried his head in his hands, "Not what son, who, it's a long story" Harry told Mark a long story about three son's of the devil and their ancient magic (though not of the soulstone because obviously he doesn't know about that). He told Mark that Baal was father of war and darkness, he told his son of many things dark and ancient that many, even learned wizards such as Dumbledore, have never known.
"How do you know all this Dad?" Mark asked.
Harry looked up, "You know that I just returned from a long journey that I went on 4 months ago?" he asked.
"Yeah, you left without telling anyone where you were going" Mark replied.
Flashback
Four months previously
"But where are you going Harry?" Hermione asked impatiently, the family was sitting in the living room where Harry had just announced that he was leaving on a long journey.
"I don't know love, and I don't know when I'll be back, I just feel this overwhelming urge to go like someone planted it there." Harry said.
Hermione shook her head, "Sometimes I really don't know about you Harry Potter"
Harry spoke again, "I'm sorry Hermione but I have to go, it might be an important calling" he said, with that he kissed her and marched out the front door of their house, leaving Hermione, Holly, Mark, Lily, and baby Erica all quite confused.
"Always was a loony bin" Lily whispered quietly, getting dirty looks from everyone in the room.
End of flashback
"Well," said Harry, "I traveled all over Europe and Asia, I spent a month in Budapest and some time in a village in Bucharest, near the Carpathian mountains, there I read some ancient Celtic and Latin mythology about the three kin of Lucifer, apparently the mythology is very secret and secluded, it's been forgotten over millions of years, a manuscript I read was written by Merlin himself, in Bosnia I read more about the legend but part of Merlin's manuscript was torn off when it was talking about an object called "The Soulstone" apparently it contained such Dark Magic no one but Merlin dared write about it, but the part Merlin wrote disappeared"
Harry stopped and took a breath, Mark was captivated with the story and waited for his father to continue.
"The soulstone, I don't really know what it is or what it does, all I know is something I heard in Romania about it being hidden in Atlantis. No one ever found it and it's been forgotten over so many years that no one is even looking anymore, but I find a strange attraction to the legend, like it's calling to me. I don't know why, but I've lost many hours of sleep over the last six months researching it. I heard many different versions of the legend in different ancient libraries. The true chronicle is supposedly lost with the Library of Alexandria but that's a myth.
I'm sure if anyone found the soulstone the world would descend into another Dark Age or worse, utter chaos.
That's why the Council of the Horadrim Mages went through so much to protect the story, and the stone alike.
I found the ruins of an ancient Celtic city called "Zatria" and I found some ancient manuscripts in an ancient Celtic language, when translated they told a little about the Chronicles of the Demon Kin, I found few references to "The demon stone" and I suppose that was it. Anyway I have a feeling that someone is searching even harder than me to find the ancient stone and use it to bring about another Dark Age, and the demon kin are helping him."
Harry ended his story and Mark whistled through his teeth, "Wow, so that whole story was actually true?" he asked, Harry nodded and Mark whistled again, "But what's all this got to do with me?" he asked.
Jaylin hurried down the cold stone steps of the hidden building he'd just found in the ruins of an ancient Roman city.
He paused along the way to let his eyes rest on some of the ancient symbols carved into the wall, ones he had been searching for since he was a child who heard the legends at a gypsy camp in Romania.
He swept some of his shoulder length grey hair out of his face and inspected the symbols further.
"Elixo Eti Diatheke Acko Haima Paroiusa Eti Nikao Eschatos " he read,
"With the covenant of blood comes the victorious end" he translated aloud.
His eyes lit up, he knew he was getting closer to the treasure he sought.
"The covenant of blood" referred to was one of the powers he knew the soulstone to possess, the ability to bestow unimaginable power on the user, at the expense of the blood of another.
He hurried down more flights of stairs, breathing more translated words as his eyes darted from wall to wall, reading hurriedly as he flew down the stone steps.
When he reached two solid gold doors at the foot of the stairs he flung them open without a second thought to what they were made of, he strode into a huge circular room and looked around.
After 65 years of searching, Jaylin had finally found it, The great Lost Library of Alexandria.
"But is it true? Is the legend of the Demon Stone really here?"
Jaylin looked, he looked, and he looked, throwing many ancient scrolls to the floor in his quest.
Not caring about the immense wealth he had discovered, Jaylin only cared about a single book, not a scroll as was the custom then, but a real bounded book, written by Merlin himself.
Jaylin searched for three days without food or drink or sleep and searched through millions of ancient scrolls all of high value.
He sifted through piles of gold and jewels and there, finally, he found an indenture in the wall, a hole you may call it, with a circle of ancient Greek words around it.
"Anthropos Kurois Hamartia Ni Anastasis Acko Eti Haima Cor" was the Celtic.
"Mankind's greatest sin is resurrection of the blood stone" Jaylin read.
Laughing to himself, Jaylin thrust his hand into his robes and pulled out a piece of wood, shaped like a small bone, and placed it in the indenture in the wall.
After a moment of silence, the ground began to shake, and a door in the wall sunk into the ground, great light was emitting from the room behind the wall.
Jaylin shielded his eyes but walked forward anyway once his eyes had adjusted, what he saw in the room astounded him.
A stone table sat in the center of the otherwise empty room, runes were carved into the table that were so ancient that even Jaylin couldn't read them, yet he knew every ancient language of all, except, "Atlantian" he whispered, running his fingers over the carvings.
On the table was the source of the light, a plain, black book sat at the center of the table, lying open, completely clear of dust amazingly.
Jaylin touched the book cautiously, and gathering courage, he shut it slowly. As he shut the cover of the book the light faded quickly, and when he lifted it and placed it under his robes, the ground began to shake.
"So, you've got your job as Head of the MLE back and now you need my help?" Mark asked his father.
Harry nodded, "But only when the time comes, I'll call when I need you, you won't be able to find me, I'll find you.
I'm going back to Bucharest to do some more research, I've already visited your mother, I'll call on you when you are needed my son, goodbye" and with those last words to Mark, Harry Potter vanished with a sharp CRACK!
Mark walked to the back of the living room and pulled back the drapes, sunrise flooded into the room as Mark opened the sliding glass patio doors and walked out onto the veranda with a mug of coffee in his hands.
All this was confusing, interesting, yet confusing.
Mark had never in his life heard a tale of such magnitude, it had only taken a few hours to tell the story, but Mark felt that if he had a thousand years to spare speaking to Merlin himself, he would never know the whole story.
It was disturbing to Mark that his father was so delved into this work, never had Harry just up and left, gallivanting across Europe to explore Myths and Legends even if they were true, Harry Potter was a very grounded man and Mark was sure that this was larger than he could imagine if it could call Harry to up and leave.
Mark took a sip from his coffee and watched as the sun slowly peeked over the horizon.
His head was spinning, all the things his dad had told him were buzzing through his head, if this was all true Mark knew that the world was in for a greater danger than any living being had ever seen in millions of years.
After a while, the veranda door slid open, Holly's arms slipped around Mark's waist, and she kissed him on the cheek lightly.
"What's up honey?" she asked.
Mark shook his head, "Nothing you need to worry about" he replied, "let's go in, it's chilly out here."
So Mark and Holly, both still clad in their pajamas walked back into their beautiful home, their own little world of comfort and silence that was about to come crashing in around them.
Harry searched frantically through the library's records, looking for any sign of anything about this ancient language.
He'd traveled over 10,000 miles of Russian wilderness and snow to get to the library of Pevek.
Pevek was the smallest of small towns at the very corner of Russia, but they were famous for their
"Library of myths".
Harry had looked at over 100 manuscripts already, many of them written by Merlin but none of them had anything to do with the soulstone.
Finally, he found a manuscript labeled "Eti Haima Cor" he knew that was Greek for "The Blood Stone" which was one of the many names of the soulstone.
Harry quickly discovered that the document was very useful, because someone had scribbled something very minute in the corner.
Upon closer inspection Harry read, "Library of Alexandria, located on island 100 miles north of Vatican City"
That was all he needed, Harry flew to the library's main floor and found the cartography section.
"Q…R…S…T…U…V" Harry went through the drawers that held the maps until he found V.
He flipped through the V section, quickly realizing that there were over 90,000 cities in the world that started with V. He searched the cabinet front to back, top to bottom, but there was no Vatican City. "Damn" he muttered.
Harry ran to the computer and typed in a search for "Vatican City Map" it came up after 5 minutes of searching.
"Missing" Harry was ready to punch the computer screen in, but being rational, he quickly logged onto the internet.
"Vatican City" he whispered as he typed.
Just as the search finished though, the computer crashed.
"DAMN IT!" Harry screamed, forgetting he was in a library.
As he stalked out of the building, many people threw him dirty looks for his vulgar language.
Harry quickly apparated out of the small street and landed outside a richly decorated and warm looking house.
Harry banged on the door very loudly, he could see lights on inside the house.
After a few minutes, a young, blonde and thin woman answered the door.
"Harry, welcome back" she said, embracing him warmly.
"Hello Nicolina" Harry replied, "is Victor home?"
She shook her head, "Not at the moment, why?" she said.
"I need to use your library" Harry said, stepping into the house and striding through the large, lavish Krum home, he had stayed with them during his short stay in Bulgaria so he knew their house well.
He opened the large copper library doors and stepped in. The library was huge but Harry knew this room better than any other room in the house.
Soon he found what he was looking for, "Vatican City, Rome" He muttered, he pulled out a blank piece of parchment and muttered a short and simple spell, after a second the map magically copied onto the blank parchment.
Harry quickly thanked Nicolina and apparated to the small Bulgaria national airport, where he bought a first class ticket to Rome.
Ok, that chapter's done and I liked it but do you think I'm losin' my touch?
Sorry if it seems like I'm giving this a sort of religious/ demonic/ mythological touch, but I thought this idea out very carefully over the span of two months and I know what I'm doing and where I'm going.
Any readers of my previous stories, know that my story plot's are usually good if they can stick through the boring beginnings, I hope my veteran readers can stay loyal for the last story in my masterpiece trilogy.
I know Holly will at least, after all she's a main character in the story we can't have her leaving it would mess the whole plot up.
THREE CHEERS 4 HOLLY SHE'S A VERY LOYAL PERSON!