A Second Chance at Life Chapter 21, a harry potter fanfic

Disclaimer: all magical/mythical animals/creatures/people named in this story were gathered from years of scouring the internet for information. There is a list of websites (or soon will be) on my page that I have/might take information from to use in my story at some point. I only take a few ideas form these because I find such legends interesting, most of what is in here I made up myself, using only the names, basic description, and sometimes the origins of the creatures/beings found on these websites.

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Chapter 21

" I'm glad the owl reached you so quickly. Tea?"

"Yes please. Ah is that Black verbena? You have excellent taste in teas Mr. Fleming."

"Thank you, I find that most people are completely ignorant of the health benefit a daily dose of black verbena can give. I must admit I am surprised someone your age would know of it."

"My parents preferred the black verbena to anything else, and they always told me to care for my health when I was young." Rahkesh explained, keeping the lie simple.

"Very good of them. Better to build up a strong supply of healing magic before old age hits. Drink it daily for a decade when young and you might expand your lifetime by fifty years." Mr. Fleming said. Rahkesh nodded. Though his intention in building up a massive supply of healing magic had nothing to do with his life span. And everything to do with surviving the magical backlash that he could expect to encounter when destroying a Horcrux.

"I must say I am amazed at how fast the Yeck fur has been selling."

"Indeed, all these years there has been little demand for it."

"Tricky stuff, Yeck fur. Well, someone must have a massive research project going on. I just hope the interest continues, eh?"

Mr. Fleming chuckled and raised his tea cup in a toast. "Amen to that. Last time the man came in he bought all of the last shipment. Creepy fellow, all black robes and the greasiest hair I've ever laid eyes on. Looked like hadn't seen the sun in decades. You know it is possible to spend too much time in a lab."

Rahkesh nodded his agreement while turning that over. Severus Snape – if it was him, and it certainly sounded like the man – was buying massive amounts of Yeck fur. What on earth could he be doing with all of it? If Mr. Fleming was to believed, and Rahkesh trusted the old potions dealer, then Snape had bought enough of the stuff to fill a small truck. Not that Rahkesh was complaining, he was making quite a profit on it. But what would Snape, or more likely Voldemort, want with Yeck fur?

Rahkesh's own knowledge of potions was fairly limited, despite his extra of training in the Room of Requirement and with the Chachapoyaro. And in neither case had he used any Yeck fur. The person to ask of course would be the head potions master at Akren. Professor Strawlime. Rahkesh was rather frightened of the man, but if anyone would know what good Yeck fur was, he would. But that teacher was "out of town" for the next month. "Out of town" being the excuse given when the potions master went to track down rapists, murderers, or drug dealers to test his potions on. The man was as much psychopath as he was potions genius. With no regard for the horrible pain his experiments caused his muggle victims, though the muggles in question surely deserved everything they got. But no one had ever brought charges against him. Professor Strawlime had been correct when he said that no one minded a few child rapists being melted or dissolved by experimental potions gone wrong.

Rahkesh knew that Strawlime, despite his cruelty, was a genius and a very good teacher. Much better than Snape had ever been. Under his teaching Rahkesh had made considerable progress, making up for the years of learning nothing in Snape's lab. Strawlime was also probably more knowledgeable in potions than even Snape, and if anyone would know all the uses of Yeck fur, he would.

Rahkesh left Mr. Fleming's potion ingredients shop and apparated to just outside the Ottawa branch of Gringotts. There he deposited most of the gems and gold he had brought back from his time with the Chachapoyaro. He then went into Harry Potter's vault (changing his appearance) left several of the living plants and animals, which would be too much trouble to keep at Akren, into the out of time cages. The then apparated again, this time to the trailhead that led into Akren. Silas was already there waiting with their two hell's Steeds, the massive fire horses were stamping and whistling impatiently.

"All right, all right, we're going, demanding equine." Rahkesh muttered the big black stallion he preferred. The creature snorted and took off up the trail at the slightest touch of his heels. Rahkesh let him go, stretching out into a run for the journey back.

Students were permitted to come and go from the valley whenever they wished, though the teachers did keep of record of who left and when. If you went away for too long without an explanation and missed classes you were likely to find alumni or current staff at your door. Which was why running away didn't work. Someone had tried it once, several years before. Not able to take the ruthless competition one male mortal human had tried to flee, going all the way to another continent. The alumni had tracked him down and killed him within three weeks. A quick clean execution of him and every single person he had spoken to in those three weeks. It was this incident that had caused the non/altered-human students to turn on the mortal human students. It would likely be a generation before the stain of that failure was forgotten. Which really ticked Rahkesh off, just because one human couldn't handle it didn't mean they all couldn't.

"Werewolves are splitting up again, there're two packs forming." Rianae said as she greeted them at the stables. She was clipping the tips of a hippogriffs tail hairs while Ally was trying to convince one of the fire horses to give up some of its saliva. The two girls had drawn the short straws and gotten the task of gathering the potions ingredients for their next class.

"Two packs? There can't be more than twenty-three or twenty-four werewolf students in the school, and that's including the older students here doing research with the teachers. How can they possibly be forming two whole packs?" Rahkesh asked incredulously. Didn't werewolf packs usually contain twenty to thirty or so werewolves each? Rianae shrugged.

"No clue, but it'll be dark in a few hours and it's the full moon. There'll be dominance fights tonight, and not all of them will be coming back tomorrow." She warned. Ally shrugged, not particularly caring either way. She claimed that what the other species did amongst themselves didn't matter so long as it didn't get her involved. This meant that Ally was probably a lot wiser than he was. Rahkesh thought about that, the werewolves would leave the valley to battle, and dominance fights were occasionally fatal. With the type of werewolves that ended up at Akren he would not be surprised if they were almost always fatal. This was probably the aspect of werewolf life that had driven Remus to keep away from others of his kind. He was probably frightened of the whole pack structure.

Silas and Ally left for the school, leaving Rahkesh and Rianae to get the fire horses settled for the night.

"Are you going?" Rahkesh asked. Rianae nodded and raised a questioning eyebrow. "Yeah I'll come." Rahkesh answered, he had never seen a werewolf battle. It would be educational.

"Daray is coming too, and I think that fae, Justin, is as well. Possibly a few others." Rianae said, "We'll be leaving just after moonrise."

XXX

The sound of the young man's breathing was harsh in the still silent forest. His gasps and pants as he fled sounded far too noisy. He tripped, yelping as his kneecap hit a rock hard, and rolled to his feet to stumble on.

It was cold out, and the trail obscured by freshly fallen snow. He stumbled and hissed in pain a tree branch struck him across the face. He didn't know where he was going, had lost the trail an hour before. Now he fled as quickly as he could, trying to keep a straight line, desperate to get away. Away to where to didn't matter, just away from the ones hunting him.

Hic clothes were tattered and bloody, and his face and body bore the strain and shaking signs that told of recent exposure to the cruciatus curse. His wrists were rubbed raw where ropes of chains had cut into him, and the side his face bore a bruise in the shape of a boot print.

Behind him the howl of a werewolf echoed in the night. The full moon was up in the cloudless black sky. His already pale skin went paler with fear. They hadn't just sent people after him, they'd sent a werewolf. A beast that could track him down through the deep snow faster than he could run away.

His gasps grew harsher with fear, a slight whimper to them. His tears from the cold and from terror glinted down his cheeks. He didn't have his wand anymore, they had taken it the first time they'd captured him, before he'd escaped. He hadn't seen that wand in months. He had no way to defend himself. He could only run. And werewolves run much faster than humans.

He fell again, and rolled over to see the werewolf come, bounded through the deep snow. He turned and rose to flee again.

A shape dropped out of the night sky, cloaked in layers of dark robes. The wolf stopped so fast it nearly fell over. The newcomer grabbed the young man and pulled him close, throwing a knife at the wolf. The werewolf dodged, and then was hit in the face with the spell that followed. The strange being rose into the air, taking the young man with him, leaving the frustrated werewolf below, howling in rage, bleeding heavily from its ripped nose.

Shaking and gasping the young man turned to look at the one who had saved him. The being threw back her hood to show dark skin and hundreds of long dark braids. The young man went to say something, only to see the woman open her mouth, and a pair of glinting fangs.

The terrified young man lost it completely. This was just thing needed to send him over the edge. He screamed in terror, thrashing wildly in a complete panic. He shrieked and screamed and pushed against the vampire, trying to get away, the vampire ignored his struggles and held him still as she bit into his neck.

XXX

"Damn it, the bastard got past us." Mad Eye Moody's gravelly voice growled out from the glowing orb on Rahkesh's desk.

"He's got a sense of humor. And he doesn't mind us knowing it." Rahkesh responded. Before him on an enchanted sheet of woven hippocampus hair was an image of a yellow rubber duck. The duck that was blocking the camera he had installed at Grimmauld Place. He had used muggle cameras, hoping that a witch or wizard might not know what they were. Someone had entered the house, placing a yellow rubber duck in front of the camera so they couldn't see his or her face. Very amusing.

"A god damned duck!" Moody snarled. "Sure sounds like Black humor to me." Rahkesh had to agree, if Sirius had had to choose something to put in front of the camera he might well have used a bath toy.

"You never met Regulus?"

"What?" Moody stopped his tirade about muggle cameras. Rahkesh repeated the question.

"Oh yeah I met him once or twice. Kinda quiet. Smart. Sly, always watching everyone, knew a hell of a lot more than he let on. Didn't much like anyone really. Well maybe not. He and Snape got along pretty well." Moody said.

"AAAHHHH!" The sudden female scream of terror from Moody's end of the connection startled Rahkesh. "OH MY GOD!" Rahkesh waited, listening, and wondering what on earth was going on. "IT'S DEAD IT'S DEAD IT'S DEAD!"

"Moody what the hell is going on?" Rahkesh finally asked. It was a moment before Moody answered.

"Umbridge. I'm talking to you from Shacklebolt's office. Don't worry it's secure. But they just brought Umbridge back. She keeps going after the centaurs, this is the third time they've had to fetch her back. Damn woman is completely insane."

"KILL IT KILL IT KILL IT! IT'S TRYING TO EAT ME! KILL IT!" Okay, so maybe it wasn't dead then.

"What?" Rahkesh asked, trying hard not to laugh. Suddenly the sounds of many people laughing filled the air, then the sound of a door shutting, the noise dimmed.

"Sorry 'bout that." Shacklebolt's voice came over the link. "It's a hinkypunk someone sent in the mail as a joke." Moody began to sputter audibly and Rahkesh finally started laughing as Umbridge's wails went on and on. "That you Harry?" Shacklebolt asked.

"Yeah it's me. Sorry about the uproar, I couldn't resist." He admitted. There was a second's pause from the other end.

"You sent the hinkypunk to Umbridge's mail box?" Shacklebolt asked.

HEEELLLPPP! SOMEBODY HELP ME! Umbridge certainly had a voice on her. Rahkesh had sharpened the hinkypunk's teeth before sending it along. And used a memory spell to give it an inclination to go for the feet and lower legs.

"Well a certain pair of twins sent it to me as a Christmas present, and I couldn't very well keep it. And it kept trying to eat me. There's something mentally wrong with it." Rahkesh said, trying to justify it. The Weasely twins had captured it after it had been found by a muggle. The memory charm had missed the muggle and hit the hinkypunk instead. Apparently hinkypunks and memory charms don't mix. Shacklebolt and Moody were laughing again.

"I let him on your theory about Gimmauld Place; we needed someone in the Ministry to keep an ear open in case someone thought they should investigate the Black house." Moody told him.

"That's fine. Listen have you handled the rubber ducky any?"

"What?"

"Did you attempt to retrieve it from the house?"

"No."

"Good."

"Why?" Moody asked.

"I'll get it. And I'm going to fingerprint it. I bet whoever left it didn't think to wear gloves. If I can get fingerprints from that maybe I can figure out who it is." Rahkesh explained. He'd have to look into how fingerprinting was done by muggles. If he could prove that Regulus was actually alive then his theory of Sirius brother having gotten the Horcrux held a lot more credit.

"Fingerprinting, very clever." Shacklebolt said approvingly. "I've been trying to get the Ministry to use that, but the purebloods won't have it. Muggle technology and all."

"Fools." Rahkesh said in reply. "I'll go to the house, and no I don't need backup and no neither of you should be there." He answered before they could ask. "I'll be fine."

"Very well. Do you want pictures of this?" Moody asked, meaning of course Umbridge.

"Yes please. The Daily Prophet would probably like them too." Rahkesh said, and heard two sets of diabolical laughter before the link was cut.

He rose and walked out onto his balcony. He had conjured glass around it, and turned it into a greenhouse. In hereh is Animus bacca plant and Dyalnos (blood tree) were growing well. Rahkesh sat down and slowly drew blood from his arm with a spell. Part of it he put into a massive watering can, the rest he poured into the massive pot of soil the small tree was growing in. The watering can was what was used when he wasn't here; it had nearly been emptied over the break and needed to be refilled.

A Dyalnos tree, the rarest tree in the world, when raised on only blood, became magically attached to its blood donor. Rahkesh had every intention of raising it for many decades, the more years it spent living on his blood the stronger the attachment and power would be. Since the tree stored the magic in his blood in its wood many decades of blood would make it highly magically charged. The perfect wood to make a wand or staff from. Usable only by him. Priceless. And the seeds were each worth thousands of galleons.

XXX

That evening Rahkesh waited in the stables, but no one came. The werewolves had all left but there was no sign of the others. Getting annoyed he went inside and headed down to the sparring room, knowing that it was the right time of day to find Daray and Rianae there.

Rahkesh stepped into the sparring room and was immediately confronted with a crowd of nearly thirty students, all of them watching standing silently. Guessing by the disproportionate number of vampires in the crowd that some vampire duel must be going on he slipped through the crowd over to where he could see Nuri lying on the floor.

There was something odd going on, as he moved Rahkesh could feel, with his mind, waves of anger wafting through the magical currents that wrapped around the students. There was an awful lot of anger building here. And it seemed to be emanating from the fae students. Pushing through the crowd he saw the combatants and rolled his eyes. Daray and another vampire, maybe two years older. And Daray was winning.

They were fighting vampire-style: no weapons. Telekinesis and brute strength, mixed with telepathy. And while the addition of the demon's presence had given Daray some difficulty in using his telekinesis (demons had no such power naturally and it was taking a long time adjust) he was benefiting from the additional strength, physical and telepathic.

Both of them were fairly well ripped apart. Vampire telekinesis could create a lot of damage. And while the wounds had healed the ripped clothing and bloodstains on them and the floor gave evidence to the injuries both had sustained during the battle. The unknown vampire was also currently missing an eye, though that would regrow in time. The front and back of Daray's shirt were dripping blood everywhere and both of them bore burns and scorch marks from forcing the other's skin to burn (one of the more common forms of battle telekinesis). Rahkesh 'watched' with his mind. Noticing that the telepathic battle was much more intense than the physical one, with both vampire' minds locked together trying to use telepathy to overpower the other physically.

Daray flipped the other vampire and pounced, slamming him into the floor. Realizing that this might take a while Rahkesh sat down on one of the benches that ran along the walls and watched with interest as Daray broke both of the other vampire's arms to go with his broken legs. The sound of his snapping bones was unnaturally loud in the silent room. Crouched over the body of the other vampire Daray slid a hand under his neck and lifted, exposing his opponent's throat fully. The defeated vampire lay still and didn't struggle as Daray bit into his neck and began to drink his blood.

Rahkesh waited patiently until he judged that his friend was almost finished, then he began to clap, slowly. Daray could certainly hear him, but he ignored Rahkesh and took his time, finally removing his fangs from the other vampire's neck and raising his head a little to look at Rahkesh and the rest of the audience the battling vampires had drawn. And growled softly, an almost inaudible rumble. His eyes were nearly glowing, he had cleaned his fangs so that they showed glaringly white, and a few drops of blood dripped from his lower lip. Rahkesh, who knew Daray to be a very neat feeder, knew that this was entirely for show. But most of the people in the room would not know that the glowing eyes, snarl, dripping blood, and white fangs were just for display. And that was the point; most people wouldn't know it for aggressive posturing. But Rahkesh could tell the difference. When a vampire drank their fangs got covered in blood, Daray had licked his fangs clean before facing the crowd, so that the bright white of the fang teeth showed.

The bite mark faded from the other vampire's neck, but he stayed still, not even breathing, not wanting to draw Daray's attention again. Daray looked down at the exposed throat, and dropped him, ignoring the thud the other vampire's head made when he hit the floor. Daray rose and walked over to his friends, cleaning and repairing his tattered clothes wandlessly, just to prove that he could, more showing off. Vampires were so concerned with appearance, Rahkesh held back a chuckle.

Daray's eyes were still glowing, just a little bit, and he was still growling softly, Rahkesh abruptly realized that the vampire was struggling to hold back the demon, trying not to transform. A quick glance at Silas confirmed this; Nuri was on his feet, his short fur standing on end, his whiskers out, ears back, looking ready to attack. The panther did not like demons.

"Hang on until we're out of here." Rakesh hissed softly as he tossed Daray his weapons and cloak and sent Silas a glance telling him to get between Daray and the other students. Silas moved around to block everyone from view. Rahkesh had his wand hidden up his sleeve and used it to conjure a tiny illusion around them, enough to keep anyone from taking note of Daray's eyes or his skin texture, which was starting to change as the transformation struggled to break free. Ally, who had been let in on what had happened, moved around behind Silas and cast a charm to block the other students from noticing anything amiss. Rahkesh opened the door wandlessly and they hurried out of the sparring room.

Outside Rahkesh looked over to Ally; she knew the hidden places in the school better than anyone. Ally picked out a hidden passageway that led to a long hollow shaft that ran up through the mountain. A place Rahkesh had never seen before, and based upon the dust, no one but Ally had been here in a long time. The night sky was visible a thousand feet above, a tiny speck of dark blue night.

Daray sighed in relief and transformed immediately. The change took less than a second and in an instant the massive dark demon was standing beside them. A moment later he was airborne, blocking the light and flying up the shaft to the top of the mountain.

Nuri glared up at the demon and spat and hissed until Silas knelt down and reached out telepathically to calm him. Then Nuri quieted, settling for growling continuously.

"That vampire challenge him?" Rahkesh asked.

"Yeah, Daray took off the scent concealing spells today, and I can tell you the vampires are freaking out." Ally said.

"This is the first time he's taken another vampire's blood since we returned. I don't think we even thought about the effect that would have on his demon form. That's going to be a problem if he can't learn to control it." Silas said, "He's coming back." Daray had folded his wings before he flew out of the mountain and was plummeting towards them. He opened his wings just in time to slow himself before he hit the floor, the massive claws raking great gouges into the rock.

"Easy Nuri." He purred as the big cat began to hiss again.

"You still coming with us to watch the werewolves?" Rahkesh asked.

"I don't suppose I could just go like this?" Daray asked, "never mind, it wasn't a question." He transformed again, back into vampire form.

"Next time you guys go on vacation, I'm coming too." Ally decided, "I missed all the fun." Silas laughed as the other two rolled their eyes.

"Are you two coming with us?" Rahkesh asked.

"Nah, no need to, it doesn't really matter does it?' Ally pointed out, watching the werewolves kill each other didn't really get any of them anywhere.

"You're going to have to practice drinking vampire blood and not transforming." Rahkesh told Daray as they went to the stables. Rianae and three fae met them there.

"You've put everyone in a right state." Rianae told Daray, "You should hear the rumors!"

"Are you really half werewolf?" One of the fae asked, and the others began snickering. "I'm Justin, these are Valerie and Yara." Of course, Rahkesh reminded himself, those were not their real names. Fae never told anyone who wasn't of their type of fae what their real name was. They had tow names, and one of them was used for most of the world, the other kept secret.

"Half werewolf? Who said that?" Daray asked.

"Some idiot mortal," Rahkesh began to growl audibly, "no offense or anything but your fellow mortals can be a bit stupid." Valerie quickly said, Rahkesh stopped growling and shrugged, and nodded. Some of them were.

"Either that or you did some piece of bloodmagic that went wrong." Yara offered, "can't wait till professor Namach hears that one. He'll be in a huff for weeks about how that isn't possible."

"Especially since it was Saul who said that." Valerie added.

"And there's some real genius going around saying you're part Naga, he says you smell scaly." Justin added dryly. Even Daray had to laugh at that. The Naga, part water serpent, part human, could not be turned into vampires and were entirely herbivorous.

"Why are the fae so angry?" Rahkesh asked, remembering the feeling of great rage he'd gotten in the sparring room. The three started to scowl immediately.

"Nothing to do with you. Some jackass vampire tried to kidnap some Laminas children. The city master of Vitoria interfered and is trying to stop our kin from killing him." Justin replied. Rahkesh blinked, and decided that he was probably right; it had nothing to do with him. There were twenty-two known types of fae, not including the elves, who would kill you for calling them fae anyway, and Rahkesh hadn't had the time to learn about all of them and identify what group all of his fellow students belonged to.

"I'm guessing that city master will not be around much longer." Daray said, implying that he at least would approve if the vampire was killed. Though some of the other vampire students might take offense. Tensions between the various species at Akren usually ran high, with every offense committed by any member of any species remembered and fought over.

"No he won't." Justin agreed. "And neither will the kidnapper, actually I think he's already dead." That was another thing, everyone kept up to date on what was happening between the magical species. The last time a war had broken out between two types of fae the students within the school had had to be physically and magically restrained from killing each other within the valley.

The six fire horses raced out of the stables (Ally and Silas had decided to remain behind). Their flaming manes and tails bright against the black sky and white snow. They used magic to levitate up to the entrance to the valley, since traveling even on horseback would take hours. Outside the valley there were no protective spells, and the werewolves would be gathering somewhere in the mountains to do battle. It was Yara who picked out the tracks and led them on a wild cross country ride through the snow to find the wolves.

They found them down in a valley, in a large clearing. Silenced and hidden by spells the six chose a rocky ledge high above. Leaving the horses (also concealed magically) a good distance away they approached on foot and lay down on their stomachs to look over the ledge.

Five sleek wolves and one scruffy gob-wolf sat in a silent circle, yellow eyes watching the two wolves in the middle. One of these was circling the other, looking for an opportunity to attack. The one in the center was pivoting around on his hind legs snapping and darting, also trying to find a time to attack.

Out of the dark another wolf appeared and joined the circle, soon followed by two more. Rahkesh pulled out his Ominoculars and searched, with only half the werewolf population of Akren present he was wondering where the others were.

Finally the circling wolf struck, only to be met jaw to jaw by the other one. The second wolf dropped low at the last moment and twisted away, sinking its fangs into the right hind leg of the first. The first wolf bit into the thigh of the second and both sprang apart, bleeding. But the first wolf didn't jump away so much as jump sideways, and therefore was in apposition to attack again quicker than the second. The second wolf was knocked off its feet and a second later a scream ripped through the air. The first wolf bounded away, leaving the second on the ground, one eye missing.

Now the watching wolves were on their feet, growling and yapping, eager for one of the two to fall. The wolf with the missing eye rolled upright, but was toppled over again as the first wolf struck, ramming their shoulders together and sending the injured one sprawling, then the first wolf went for the throat.

Moments later every wolf in the clearing was up and attacking, the group of the cliff top watch as the pack ripped the dying wolf to shreds. They could hear screaming and thrashing, below the snarls and growls of the pack, then silence. When the wolves drew back the defeated wolf had been ripped apart. There was little left but blood, guts, patches of fur, and snapped bones.

The first wolf, who had stood silently outside the circle as its new pack shredded the loser, licked at its bitten leg, then raised its head and began to howl. Minutes later the other nine wolves joined in. Then the new leader nudged some of the others towards the slope down into a small valley, and then leaped over them and raced off. In an instant the whole pack was on the move, howling and bounding through the snow, the remains of the dead wolf left strewn about the clearing.

Sitting up and settling Rahkesh decided that this was probably what Remus didn't like. Remus's wolf form was quite a bit larger than any of the werewolves he had seen that night, and he had little doubt that Remus could easily start his own pack, should he wish to. But Remus didn't seem the sort to approve of such wild wasteful killing.

"Shall we find the others?" Valerie asked after a moment.

"Yeah, in a minute." Rahkesh said. Getting up he jumped off the ledge, catching himself with a levitation spell. He went over to the tattered body and began to examine it, the sight of the ripped open intestines making him feel queasy. Daray and Yara joined him a second later while Rianae picked up her Ominoculars to keep watch for returning wolves. Justin and Valerie looked disgusted, and didn't seem to want to approach the body.

Rahkesh and Yara took samples of the dead wolf's fur, bones, bone marrow, fangs, tongue, remaining eye, and brain. Technically this was illegal and the pack could well take offense, but a bit of transfiguration and scent disguise (done by Yara) ensured that they would never know, not that they were likely to return. Daray magicked their footprints, smell, and magical signature away so that if the wolves did return they couldn't track them down. Then he collected a few liters of wolf blood, giving half to Rianae. They climbed back up to the ledge and went to the horses.

"The two packs will probably be avoiding each other. No alpha wolf will want to fight more than once in one night, so if there is any super-leader emerging they'll wait a month before another challenge." Justin said as they mounted the horses and went around the valley on the mountainside, looking for tracks.

"And they have to be back by dawn, so they can't have gone much farther, there'd be no way an injured wolf would make it back in time, and we have class tomorrow." Rahkesh added. "Wish Silas had come, Nuri could scent them out for us." He had left Sygra behind as well, the cold-blooded serpent didn't like the cold, and it was very cold at night in the mountains.

Though they searched for most of the remainder of the night they could not find any tracks, not a hint of the werewolves presence. They could hear their howls, but sound echoes in the mountains and they couldn't pinpoint the location.

Finally Rahkesh gave up and left the group to go for a ride, supposedly. In fact he went a harvested some more Yeck fur from the combs he had placed near the entrance to their caves. Like the combs used to collect rabbit fur these collected Yeck fur when the animals brushed past. And he came by about every three weeks to find the combs nearly full of it. There were a lot of Yecks here and the comb teeth were too small to hurt, and he had a lot of them set up. Either the Yecks hadn't noticed or they didn't care. Collecting the fur he returned to the others, who were still searching.

They searched fruitlessly for several more hours. Then, frustrated and tired, they returned to Akren an hour or so before dawn. There Rianae and Justin decided to wait to watch the werewolves come in and count how many were missing, while the others went to sleep.

XXX

The man rubbed at his batter nose, a new shiny scar showing after the healer moved his wand away. Behind them anther man with a flat nose and scaly snake-ish look paced the room.

"You imbecile! Can't you do anything right?" The tired werewolf touched his nose again and didn't answer. "It was a child! A half untrained, terrified, wandless, child! Crucio! Damn you Wormtail would have done better!"

But the werewolf didn't hear the last insult. He had flopped to the floor, twitching, and after a second or two, he began to scream. The red slit eyes gleamed as Voldemort observed the werewolf. Finally he lifted the spell.

"He did not escape!" The man lying on the floor spoke immediately.

"What?"

"He was grabbed up by a hunting vampire!" Fenrir Greyback said quickly. Voldemort stared, then spun away, robes flying about him.

"A vampire. A vampire just swooped down and took him?"

"Yes. Master I –"

"Shut up." Voldemort snarled. "A vampire. Are they involved, no, they wouldn't be. Just a chance event? Or did they not want him bitten?" He wondered aloud, neither of his servants answered. Werewolves and vampires might not get along all that well but they were not really enemies, and they respected each other. They were very different, werewolves being mostly human, but the vampires appreciated their added strength and senses. And the taste of their blood.

"Master I have not offended any vampires recently." Fenrir said when Voldemort suddenly turned around, guessing what Voldemort would ask. Voldemort's eyes narrowed, then he turned and left the room, leaving the two behind breathing a sigh of relief. That could have been a lot worse.

XXX

With the yellow rubber duck in a plastic bag Rahkesh went through the house checking cameras. None of them had recorded anything, but only the first had been blocked. Grimmauld Place was dark and quiet. Too quiet. The house felt old and dark, magically dark, as if the intentions of those who had been there were cruel and twisted, which they had been. He didn't like it.

The electric blue pebble in his left hand began to turn orange; there was another living creature in the house. The obsidian pebble had been doused with a potion and magically charged to indicate human magical signatures. He wasn't alone.

Rahkesh knew that casting any spells would give away that he knew there was someone there. And he couldn't use the magic of the house to keep them in, since if it was Regulus the house would respond to him as well. Rahkesh went about as if he was looking for something, while setting a chair upright, cleaning some stuff left in the kitchen that was growing mold, banishing a pixie from behind the drapes, small things. While he did so he moved so that he could speak to Sygra, hidden in his sleeve, without being noticed.

Sygra, do you smell anything living in this house?

The pixies, too many of them. Can we bring one or two back? The adults are too big but the pixies smell like young pixies might be good to eat.

Very well. Anything else?

An animal, warm blooded, not so big as Nuri, but bigger than a house cat. It has an interesting scent, it smells very strongly, but I do not recognize it. It walks on four legs. Sygra offered, Rahkesh thanked her and began trying to think of mammals in that size range. Only there were a lot of them. What sort of animagus creature would Regulus be? If, indeed, it was Regulus?

Finally an idea came to him, Rahkesh held out his wand and concentrated on summoning Regulus, if and only if, he was in fact in the house. The summoning spell silently was something he had only just really mastered, and when he sent out the magic he felt the spell hit something.

Feeling an invisible searching spell impact and object or person was something Ally had taught him, in exchange for some occlumency lessons. You simply had to follow the magic as it went seeking its target. Doing this also strengthened the spell because you were driving it all the way, providing exactly the power it needed to do the task set to the magic.

There was a scuffling noise, Rahkesh eyes snapped open just in time feel the spell break and see a bushy black tail disappear out the door. He raced after it, seeing the creature vanish out the final door and around the side of the house seconds before he got there.

The night was silent, and Regulus was gone.

Rahkesh looked back into the house, and grinned, Regulus Black was alive, and Rahkesh knew what his animagus form was.

Regulus Black was a large black fox.

Please check my page for preview of the next chapter.

End of chapter. Please review. The next one might take a while; I have two major lab reports (twenty-five percent of my grade in two classes) due next week. I'm sure any college students (particularly other science majors) can sympathize. What the hell was I thinking taking three lab classes? (Rhetorical question)

I'll give you three guesses as to who that young man nabbed by the vampire was, and the first two don't count.

I've made a decision to continue this story after Voldemort gets killed. I have a lot of ideas for future plots and not all of them involve Voldemort. It'll be a while before Voldemort dies but after he does I think I'll continue Rahkesh/Harry's story. Any opinions?

There is a list of websites about magical creatures/ mythical beings on my page if anyone wants to take a look.