I own nothing, JK Rowling owns HP.

Row of "S.J." signifies a scene break

The Dog

Sentimental Joe

Chapter Three

A young boy, around ten or eleven years old ran a sweaty hand over his equally sweaty forehead, trying to wipe the wetness away as it was falling into his eyes and distracting him during his test. The Raven haired boy looked normal at first, but after really observing him closely you could see things in him that no other boy his age would ever have. He was about five feet tall and was mildly thin. His black hair was about an inch long all around, he had a set jaw and fierce green eyes. There was something in those eyes that could instil fear into anyone who looked into them, a glint that promised pain if you crossed him.

At this time he was gripping a wand that was maybe twelve inches long, he held it tightly and his knuckles were white with the lack of blood flow. He was standing in a dark room, it was impossible to guess its size as the walls could not be seen due to the lack of lighting. He stepped slowly forward, as if stalking something, hunting. His head was bowed a little, but he was still looking ahead of him, making him look even more dangerous, like a lion protecting its prey.

Its eyes were the first thing the boy saw, shining in the darkness, glaring at him. But that was all he needed, he raised the wand and without a word or motion a blast of red magic shaped like a lighting bolt struck at the eyes and the beast thudded to the cobblestone floor. The boy carried on, not even looking at the animal he had just killed, he didn't care what it was, he knew that hesitance like that could cost him more than he could afford.

He walked further into the darkness. He looked up to the right where a glass window could be seen, but only by his enhanced eyesight. He knew that up there behind that glass the Master was watching his every move, looking for any faults. The boy's faced darkened as he though of the Master, he hated that man, loathed. But he owed that man everything; he owed him his very life.

The boy remembered everything he had gone through for the Master. When he was about three years old the Master had told him how it was going to be. He remembered the words vividly.

"I took you in when you had nothing! You would have died if it weren't for me. So now you must begin to repay the debt. You will become what I want you to become, I see the fire in your eyes, the potential for hatred." Voldemort grinned, it really didn't suit him. "Yes, I see it even now at your young age. You will study Magic, and when you are older you shall practice it, mastering it! You will control magic absolutely, becoming the most powerful being, second to only myself. Sounds nice don't it?" The sick grin was back. The last thing you need is a name, after all "Harry" is hardly a good name to set fear into the hearts of the bravest light side warriors, now is it? You must have a fear inspiring title, as mine is. You shall become… 'The Dog, Fitting isn't it? Like a dog, you will never question your Master's Orders."

The Master had said the last part warningly. The boy though, even after being named "The Dog" had always referred to himself as "Harry" when he spoke, which was very little. Harry had learned that the less you spoke, the less trouble you could get into. Something many of the Master's servants had yet to discover.

For as long back as he could remember he was learning everything he could about magic, from Death Eaters, the Master and in his free time. With one goal in mind, he desperately wanted to leave this place. He hated it here, the darkness just didn't sit well with him; he needed some light in his life. He didn't realize how true that thought was.

He had been thinking too hard, he realized, and he almost paid for it when a large creature swept up to him, he knew it was a Dementor. These were his least favourite enemies, as he had far too many bad memories. Of course the fact that the Dark Lord had held him at wand point, telling him that if he didn't get at least four layers of occlumency shields he'd soon discover what it meant to be in severe pain, had helped in guarding his emotions. The main problem was that Harry didn't have many happy memories to use the patronus which was the best if not only effective way known to wizards of this time to get rid of Dementors with. Harry was resourceful though, and he had found a way to get rid of them. He concluded that Dementors hated three things above all: Heat, light and mostly happiness. While Harry couldn't use the last very well, he was excellent with the first and second.

"Fuoco Di Anima" The spell was simple but devastating. It was one of Harry's own inventions. He had kept a journal of spells he had created. The way he saw it was that if enemy didn't know what the spell did they couldn't defend against it very well.

The white fire from the spell spat at the Dementor, causing it to shriek in terror, Harry wasn't sure they could feel any pain. Its robes lit on fire and the extreme heat and light made Harry squint and turn his face away. When he looked back there wasn't even any ashes left of the foul jail guard.

Harry kept walking, what would be next? His face protested as he smashed it into something hard, the wall. Had he reached the end? He looked to his right and saw a door, light was coming out of a crack underneath it. This must be the end, he thought.

He slid his wand into his wand holster and stood before the door; remember what the Master told him about this test.

"This test will decide weather or not you are ready to set out on the mission I have for you. This mission will be the hardest thing you may have to do in your life. If you fail this test you will die. No one will be there to help you, they never will." The Master had said that with a far away look in his eye, as if he was recalling some long but not so forgotten memory. Soon enough his seemingly constantly furious gaze was back upon Harry, "Well, Dog, get in there."

Harry straightened; he wondered what the mission would be. He reached to the handle of the door, twisted the dirty brass knob and pushed the door open. He took one step in before his eyes shot open with fear, a rare thing. He dived as a massive stream of fire blasted into the door frame where he had stood; he rolled onto his feet and looked around the area. There were large rocks around him, tall and grey they seemed to stab into the blue sky above him. The most prominent thing in the area was what had shot fire at him; he wasn't even sure what it was. It was a massive snake, at least thirty feet long with foot long fangs, dripping with a green liquid he knew he didn't want to drink. The oddest part of the reptile was the feathered wings jutting out of its back, could this thing really fly? The animal's wing span was only twelve feet, small compared to the body, so physically flying seemed entirely impossible, but magic was at work here.

Harry pulled his wand out of his holster with amazing speed; he had practiced a great deal. He quickly went over what he knew about snake's weaknesses. Their smell was excellent, and their eyes never closed as they didn't have eyelids. He heard a scraping sound and knew the snake was coming closer. He didn't know what to do, for the first time in his life he was at an absolute loss in a life or death situation. He was almost ready to try and run when he remembered something, something he told himself he'd never do. The killing Curse, it would work he mused, it killed anything and everything, the Master had told him so many times. He remembered that the Master used it many times on people, so did the Death Eaters. He didn't want to be like them, but was it better to kill or be killed? He shook his head; it was just an animal anyway.

Harry heard the snake on his left side, so naturally he dove to the right, thinking he would just aim and fire the green light. Easier said than done, he would soon discover. As soon as he had fled the protection of the rock the giant reptile's tail whipped at him faster than he could have imagined, hitting him and slamming him up against the rock he had just come out from behind. The snake positioned itself in front of Harry, eye to eye with a hungry look in its eye. Harry thought about the Master who never let him leave this place, never let him meet people or talk to people other than his trainers. Hatred swelled up inside him and he raised his wand, pointing it straight at the forehead of the snake.

Lord Voldemort had been watching all The Dog's movements, and he had to admit he was almost impressed with how the boy had used his own invented spell to take out the Dementor. The winged snake, a Wadjet, had the Dog stumped, he knew it would, that's why he put it in there. He was curious as to what the boy would do, in such a compromising situation. The snake had him cornered and the boy could do nothing. The Dark Lord knew that most spells would not even affect the snake's thick skin, even his own modified cutting curse would only injure the beast, killing it eventually, but not quickly enough. He watched as the boy lifted his wand, a look of pure hatred marring his handsome features, even with the dirt and blood on his face he was handsome. The second Voldemort saw that look, he knew exactly what the boy was going to do, and he was almost proud of him. He grinned, he had been worried that the boy wasn't dark enough for what he had to become, a merciless killer, but now… he just might succeed.

"Avada Kedavra!" The curse brought a feeling of extreme pleasure, as if all his problems had just fled from his body in the form of a bright green flash of absolute power. That was what it felt like, absolute power. No wonder the Death Eater's love these unforgivable curses so much, Harry thought as he saw the giants snake's head fall to the ground, its eyes lifeless and rolled up. He stood up and started walking away, with one last look at the snake he saw something that changed his fate, he was always going to leave the Master at some point, but now he knew he would fight against him. On the center of the snake's forehead, right where he had hit it with the killing curse there was a lightening bolt shaped scar, just like his own. He made the conclusion quickly, he had survived.

With new ideas forming in his mind, he walked toward the door on the opposite side of the roofless, rocky cage. He had his wand at the ready this time, ready to spring into action. He walked through the door and saw exactly what he had expected to see, the Master and his most… snivelling servant, Peter Pettigrew. For some reason Harry had always hated Pettigrew and his whiny ways. Harry looked at him with disgust, the man made it so easy for anyone to use him as a stepping stone.

"Excellent, Dog," Spoke Voldemort, he seemed satisfied Harry noted with relief. "Although I am quite disappointed as to how you let you guard down before the last room, you took care of the Wadjet quite… skilfully." Harry begged to differ, he strongly disagreed with the Master when he said it took skill to cast a killing curse, hell, even Pettigrew can cast a killing curse, thought Harry.

"Thank you, Master," Harry replied in the monotone he always used when speaking with people, he never really learned how to speak with people properly, or how to express his emotions. He knew what a smile was of course, but his perception of it was far different than most peoples. The kind of smiles he was used to were cruel grins. Laughing was much the same to him; it was not the joyful sound it should have been. Harry hated calling Voldemort "Master" but he knew that the consequences were great; so he put all personal feelings aside when talking to him, much like he did in the presence of anyone. Voldemort had told Harry the emotions were signs of weakness, Harry agreed but thought Voldemort was hypocritical with all the hatred in him.

"You may return to your quarters for a while, I will have dinner brought up to you by a house elf, after all you need to rest." Both Harry and Peter were in shock at those words, the Dark Lord telling one of his servants they needed rest? Harry was suspicious but didn't question it.

Up in his bedroom Harry laid back on his large bed. The room was furnished moderately, nothing too fancy, just like Harry liked it. He didn't care for beautiful things or expensive things much. The bed was made of dark wood and had blankets of forest green resting on top perfectly, a house elf must have cleaned his room, Harry thought. The room included only a few other things than the bed, a small table beside the bed and two bookshelves, filled to bursting, each had two sides. Harry looked at the bookshelf, he smiled there wasn't much left to read, he'd been busy the past years. The closet was on the other side of the room, it was full of black hooded robes or green and silver ones. Harry grew to loathe those colours. With thoughts of how life could be outside of this place where his only comfort was the silence, Harry fell into a deep slumber.

Lord Voldemort sat in front of the fire in the living room of the Manor, staring into the magical flames. He had decided that the boy was good enough to go into enemy territory; he would make a good spy. He might even be able to kill his rival who had been alive far too long for his own good, Voldemort thought. He smiled a thin dangerous smile and closed his eyes. "Elf, go get the Dog, send him down here immediately." With that he heard the scamper of little feet and sneered in disgust.

There was a soft knock at the door and Harry woke up with a start, his hand shooting down to his wand holster and bringing up the wand, he held it under the sheets but pointed at the door.

"Come in," He said in his emotionless voice. The door opened with a squeak, Harry had made it so the door would make noise as it opened so he could not be snuck up on.

"Master, The Master wants to see you," The elf said in its high pitched voice, it grated on Harry's nerves but he just answered with an affirmative grunt and sat up. He swung his legs over the side of the bed he stood and walked over to the door, with his predatory stride, a force of habit. Voldemort himself found it amusing how the boy stalked down the halls, scaring Death Eaters and house elves with a single glance. Harry didn't try to scare the elves, but it seemed they were scared of anything and everything. The Death Eater's though, he amused himself by scaring.

Harry opened the door to the living room to see the Master sitting in a large comfortable looking arm chair, staring into the fire.

"What is it Master?" Harry asked through gritted teeth.

"It is now time to give you your mission, after all, its December first, nearing September." The Dark Lord said, referring to something that Harry wasn't sure of.

"What is the mission, Master?" Harry questioned, although with his tone it didn't sound like much of a question.

"I am getting to that, Dog, Now be patient." Voldemort growled. He was just about to speak some more but Pettigrew came barging in with a look of horror on his face.

"Milord!" he screamed, Harry glared at the man for making such a high pitched noise, and for once in his life Pettigrew didn't cower in front of Harry's gaze; he was already cowering.

"What is it, wormtail," Voldemort asked in a vicious voice, angered by being interrupted.

"The Order, Master, they've found us somehow!" For the first time in his life Harry saw a flicker of fear in the Master's red eyes, for a second they turned normal, then flashed back to red with more hatred in them then ever before, Harry was terrified of the Master at this point.

Voldemort ran out of the room with Pettigrew, to the great hall. Harry was forgotten for the time. Harry knew that there was trouble and the Master was summoning his followers, but since he never told Harry to leave the room, Harry just sat there. He heard voices shouting in the room, Voldemort giving orders no doubt. As he sat in the chair, staring at the fire like Voldemort had done, he thought. Staring at the fire was a good thinking aid he found. What was the Order? Obviously it was the Dark Lord's Enemies, and they must have some powerful wizards Harry thought, otherwise the Master would not have been fearful. He racked his brain for who it could be. Who could be the man or group of people that Voldemort feared? He searched his mind for the names of pure blooded wizards of this time, ones that weren't in league with the Master: Weasely's? No, he hadn't read anything important about them. Next he thought of the Diggory's, while mildly influential, he hadn't read of any great exploits from that family either. The Chang's maybe? They were an Asian wizarding family he knew, famous for their charms abilities, but once again, Harry knew they were nothing compared to the Master. There were two families left which he had read of. The Longbottoms, and the Potters. The Longbottoms had held off many Death Eater attacks before, and it was said they even held of the Dark Lord himself before. It could be them. The Potters were powerful he knew. People said that they may have been the heirs of Gryffindor, but no one knew for sure as the bloodlines mingled with muggles, much like the Ravenclaw line. But many of them had died off, were there any left? He wondered. His curiosity spiked so he looked around, judging by the loud sounds coming from the meeting room he figured that the Master would be a while so Harry ran off to his own personal little Library to look up the names of pure bloods. Surely no one less than a pure blood could put fear into the Master.

Voldemort had been rallying his troops, they were almost all their when the order burst in, headed by that Mudblood Dumbledore. Oh yes, he was a muggleborn but very few people knew that. Voldemort hated him even more for this fact.

Soon enough the battle had reached its climax, the Order had been picking off the newly arriving Death Eaters, and holding off the ones already there, they had the advantage in numbers. Voldemort knew that Dumbledore had asked the ministry for help in this battle, he knew his side could not win. He ordered a tactical retreat to his inner circle, the rest of the Death Eaters would just apparate away when they saw him leave with the inner circle. Voldemort ran into the living room to get the Dog, he burst through the door, he wasn't sitting in the chair. Voldemort screeched in rage, that bloody Dog would pay dearly for this! He heard the door open once more just before he was about to run to that blasted boy's room and there was Dumbledore standing in the door frame, his tall frame casting an ominous shadow in the fire lit room.

"Stop running Tom, just renounce your ways, I can get the ministry to help you!" Dumbledore pleaded with Voldemort, his wand at the ready though.

"The same old Dumbledore," Voldemort sneered, "Always believing there's hope for people, you're blind Dumbledore; some people don't change. In fact, most people never change from what they are, not completely. You can still feel the pleasure that coursed through your veins when you cast the Killing curse on Grindlwald can't you?" Voldemort laughed at the expression on Dumbledore's face, it was one of deepest regret and shame.

"Yes, Tom, I can. But you are so lost in your Dark ways that it doesn't even affect you anymore. It's a sad thing Tom, when a person becomes a monster." Dumbledore spoke, his tone made it seem like he was sorry, as if Tom becoming Voldemort was his own fault.

"There you go again with your 'light' and 'dark' nonsense," Voldemort looked at Dumbledore with a condescending gaze. "There is no such thing, Dumbledore, as light and dark. There is only Power."

"Your wrong Tom, I hope one day you see that," Dumbledore stared at Tom with pity.

"Well then Dumbledore, I suppose it's time I left, but if you keep him from me, I'll find him and kill him," This was said with so much venom Dumbledore thought that Tom really might have been a snake with an almost-human animagus form. But the most prominent thing in Dumbledore's mind was a simple question: what the hell Voldemort was talking about? Who is 'He'?

With that Voldemort apparated out of the manor, dodging Dumbledore's overpowered stunning spell at the same time. Dumbledore sighed and put out the fire, he began making his way back to the room where the main battle had taken place.

Harry had sat on the top of the stairs that led from the hallway into the living room, watching the confrontation between Dumbledore and Voldemort; he had drawn his own conclusions in his clever young mind. First, he thought that both of the men were flawed in their ideals, but he could tell that the old one called Dumbledore was at least trying to do the right thing.

Over the light and dark issue, Harry thought Voldemort, or Tom as Dumbledore called him (Harry was still confused over that) was on the right track. There was no light magic or dark magic; he believed that it was based upon the intent of the caster. Of course Rituals and the unforgivable curses were addictive and ate away at your soul and body, driving a person out of their mind. They could be considered dark, but Harry preferred to think of them as a really dark grey.

Dumbledore turned to the door he had come in, it was shut but he could hear the last parts of a battle going on, mostly just stunning the alive but armless Death Eaters that had not escaped, which was more than a few. Other than the inner circle only maybe ten or so had gotten away. The Order and Ministry had captured approximately sixty Death Eaters. As Albus Dumbledore was walking through that door and into the great hall, one Harry "The Dog" jolted out of his thoughts. If he just stayed here it was likely that Voldemort would come back for him and his punishment would be nearly fatal, he knew. He had to leave now, this was his chance. His problem was weather to go with this Dumbledore fellow and his followers or not. Would they be like the Death Eaters? From what he saw of their leader, he doubted it. Plus, they were allied with the Ministry, the very people who held up the laws and acted upon the constitution of wizarding kind.

"I won't get far by myself… Even if I am quite adept at magic I can't get along without an adult, without a guardian." Harry mused, using his limited knowledge of wizarding laws; it was never something he held a particular interest in.

Quickly as he could he ran upstairs and took only what he thought would be useful. He took his battle robes; they were not dragon hide, as he found dragon hide to cumbersome and constricting for the physical part of his style of fighting. Instead, they were just normal black robes with protective spells placed on them. He took his favourite book, "Magical Theories and Conspiracies" and also his wicked looking hunting knife.

The reason why he didn't just shrink all his books and put them in a bag was because he didn't want to look suspicious. How would it look if a ten year old boy walked in with over eighty dark arts books? The book he did take was a group of theories and the like about magic, what was possible and what was impossible according to the authors. Some of it was utter foolishness, like the part where it said there was some barmy wizard that flew around changing the weather, the author of this particular article guessed it was Merlin himself. But there were interesting theories. For example there was one that stated that one of the most influential magical laws was flawed. The law was this: Magic is neutral. The author, a man named something Lovegood, said that magic was alive, it was sentient and could choose sides if it wished to. Harry thought this over for many long hours of the night; he came up with no evidence for either side though.

The long wicked looking knife was the only gift he'd ever been given. He remembered that day well, it was branded into his memory.

Harry was walking down the hall, his usual glare in place sent a couple Death Eaters almost running down the hall. He saw something strange though, it was a young girl walking up the place. She looked entirely out of place, dressed in blue robes, staring at the pictures on the wall. The very ones that used to insult Harry until he blew one up with his first ever self-made spell, the spell now had a name. The name amused Harry. Harry called it "Fléau de tableau" French for "Painting Bane."

Harry drifted out of his thoughts when the spoke to him. She spoke to him! At first he was surprised and didn't say anything. Then she pinched him in the arm, saying something along the lines of: "Is anybody home." He didn't understand why she said that as she could obviously see him right there. He took a quick step backward and glared at her. Funnily enough, she didn't back down like the others. She just lifted one eyebrow and stood there.

"Who are you and what do you wish?" Harry spoke in a monotone, but with a slight snap to his words.

"I'm Blaise Zabini," She said, as if her very name should have made Harry gasp in astonishment. Harry had been taught that the Zabini's were wealthy benefactors to the Masters cause, so he didn't try to scare her as he did others. He just kept up his normal façade of the uncaring and emotionless "Dog.'

She looked at him finally lowering that bloody eyebrow, she stared at him a second and pulled something out of the bag she had been carrying over her shoulder.

"I got this for my birthday from an uncle but its stupid and useless, so you can have it," She spoke airily as she pulled out a largish, wicked looking knife, She pressed it into his hands and walked off. Harry stared after her, totally flabbergasted.

Harry took the knife and put it in the same bag he had shoved his combat robes and book in. He took off down the hallway at in incredible rate, fearful of being left behind. As he came up to the stairs he slid down the rail about halfway, after that point he just jumped off the rail, it was a good distance down, maybe fifteen feet, but he landed in a crouched position with his hands steadying him, a slight pain shot up his legs making him suck in a sharp breath. Ignoring the pain he ran off to the meeting room.

Albus Dumbledore was the last person to leave the great hall, the Ministry had ordered that this house be burned down, utterly destroyed lest He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named came back to tried and re-take his old base of operations. Just as Albus was leaving, he heard the great hall doors fly open and there stood the last noun he had expected, A Young boy, Albus guessed he was about the age of the First Years, stood in the doors, panting softly and he looked a little fearful. Luckily, Albus was almost an expert dealing with children.

The bearded man walked over to Harry, in slow steps, he smiled at him, a kind smile. Harry wondered what the hell the man was smiling about, he voiced his concerns.

"I'm smiling because I'm not angry!" Albus exclaimed. Harry looked at the man as if he was insane; it seemed the man was used to such looks because he just smiled wider. "Now, who are you? I'm Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry!" Albus said all the while smiling like, Harry thought, a fool.

"I'm Harry." He responded simply. Now, Albus would have recognized him as James Potter's son, but Harry was much different than James. He looked similar, and he had his mother's eyes, but he held himself differently. While James held himself with a carefree posture, Harry stood still, completely still and rigid, he walked as if he was hunting something. While Lilly smiled with her eyes, Harry used them to attack or just sit in his skull, giving nothing away.

"Well, Harry, It's certainly nice to meet you, but what are you doing here?" Albus asked with worry sketched onto his face. Harry decided to answer truthfully.

"I used to live here, but I'm leaving now, with you." The green eyed boy spoke with finality. Dumbledore was slightly unnerved by the way the boy had just seemingly commanded him, but he was more curious at the fact that Harry had lived here. He knew the boy wasn't lying due to his legilimency skills, which were among the best of this age, rivalled only by Voldemort and Flamel.

"You lived here?" Dumbledore said incredulously. He could hardly believe that Voldemort kept a child around.

"Yes." Harry answered, in a monotone similar to what he used before, he sounded quite bored with the Headmaster repeating what he had just said.

"Well, for now, come with me, I'll take you to a safer place and we'll discuss what to do with you there. Does that sound alright?"

"Yes." Harry answered; once again the boredom laced his tone.

With that Albus gripped the boy by the shoulder and apparated both of them back to Hogsmeade, the village near Dumbledore's school Hogwarts.

NOTE: some of the foreign languages used in this chapter may be inaccurate. Correct me if you would like to.

Please Review and tell me what you think.

S.J.