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An Old and New World
by Lens of Sanity
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Chapter Five: Answering Riddles is for Chumps
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Coming to in his much occupied bed in Hogwarts Hospital Wing Harry cracked an eye open and blurrily looked out of the window. He couldn't actually see much of the view without his glasses but he had spent so much time in this exact same bed that he could imagine with perfect clarity the branches of the tree. Sighing he then noticed something far more unusual, he seemed to be tied to the bed and worse, had an extremely rare magic limiting choker around his neck.
Oh, now I remember. I'm Voldemort. Who knew?
The school healer's attention was brought over by his gurgling groan and Madam Pomfrey began her professional bustling and fussing around him, a well disguised look of fear flitting behind her eyes.
As he finished the dreadful potion being fed to him through a straw he got out an important question, "Did Albus survive those infectious barbs? Snape too I suppose..."
Looking down on him for a long moment Madam Pomfrey replied, "Yes. They are both fine, the Headmaster's arm was reattached quite easily also." It was said in a neutral tone, as though unsure as to how the news would be received.
"That's good. And you can relax, I'm Harry again."
"You will forgive us if we will remain sceptical until testing, I am sure." The grandfatherly man injected as he strode into the room.
"Of course," Harry stated from his uncomfortable position. "I am becoming quite the accomplished Occlumens though, so I would probably be capable of resisting Veritaserum." The man looked unhurt, which was a good sign. Harry didn't really want the old coot to break a hip or anything.
"I am going to administer three drops anyway, and I would like you to drop your mental defences. I believe that I am suitably skilled at the art of Legilimency for such circumstances to overcome even Tom's mastery of Occlumency."
The boy nodded his assent and found a pale wand pointed directly between his eyes. A whispered 'Legilimens' and Harry allowed his defences to fall at the surprisingly gentle onslaught of mind magic.
Twenty long minutes later the Headmaster agreed to let him out of his restraints, and the teenager stated, "You owe me dinner."
"What was that my boy?" Dumbledore asked, though he'd heard the Harry's words precisely.
"That one experience was more emotionally significant than a full year's worth of sex. You owe me dinner, at a very fancy restaurant." It was stated directly, as something that will happen, regardless of the circumstances. "Now, do you know what happened?"
The sudden change in direction actually caught the man off guard, "Yes, I have a very detailed theory Harry, one which furthers my suppositions as to the immortality of your parent's murderer."
"Care to share?"
An incredibly frustrated frown knitted the man's brows together.
"I cannot. The magic preventing me from giving you direct aid in the tournament appears also to be preventing me..." there was a heavy pause, "I find myself incapable of even thinking about these things in your presence, currently I have an overwhelming desire to converse with you about my socks once again. It is most trying."
"We will speak following the completion of this stupid tournament then." The boy said this far more firmly than any fourteen year old had any right to, and that was not counting the man he was talking to was considered by many to be the most powerful wizard in the world.
"Yes we shall. I would have done so following your release from Azkaban Prison had I not wished to give you a term to recuperate from the ordeal." What frustrated the old man was that he could not even advise against using too much magic, as that would be helpful advice when it came to competing in the Triwizard Tournament.
Perhaps if I repeatedly inform Sirius Black as to how tiring using magic can be, and then keep telling him that I always find it best to avoid such exhaustion whenever possible.
"I require your Pensieve. I will need to figure out a few things on my own."
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"Avada Kedavra!" A jet of green flashed out in the Room of Requirement and the baby panda dropped dead to the ground without theatrics.
"If the world at large gets wind of you doing this, they are going to be even more convinced you're about to turn into a Dark Lord." Sirius really didn't like this new aspect to his godson's training sessions.
"At this point I'm actually amazed you can think their opinions matter to me even a little bit." Seeing that the older man was going to make yet another comment about how magic can be inherently evil Harry went on, "I didn't just jump into this either, I went to visit Bella again and she told me to be careful with some of the stuff which was used that night, and she suggested I work on the Unforgivables first because they are the safest to learn without a teacher."
"You are going to end up back in your cell you know, and this time you are not going to be innocent."
"They aren't even that bad Sirius, if I killed someone with a 'Reducto' to the face they'd be just as dead, and let's be honest, it'd likely be in a far more painful fashion. Just think of it as a slightly more permanent stunner for people you do not wish to see again, for instance your old friend Wormtail would make a good example of a human being you might aspire to 'stun' in such a way."
It was a very strange, not to mention painful experience going through the second task of the Triwizard Tournament. Following his taking down of the Totem obstacles it was as though he were looking through his own eyes, but being unable to move his body, or even capable of thought itself. Yet he saw, and even felt himself commanding magic at a level far superior to anything he had been able to imagine before.
The downside far outweighed the benefits of course, but the experience itself was still very valuable.
It was not as though Harry suddenly got the knowledge in all of its omneity, which was unfortunate as he really wanted to be able to create a magical construct in the shape of a hydra without having to practice. Nevertheless, exhaustive use of Albus' Pensieve had allowed them to puzzle out the parselchant Harrymort had been using. It was essentially calling forth ancient power and so on and so forth, using overly flowery language, but with Bellatrix's warning he had decided not to actually attempt to make one himself without a competent instructor present.
Postponing the learning of that awesome twisted mass of purple energy was also a reluctant decision he came to, as well as most of the Dark Curses he had been using in what Sirius pretty much interchangeably named a spell‑chain, or spell‑string.
Basically Harry was now certain he was capable of casting two of the Unforgivables, and for the time being had resolved to learn those as a beginning. This certainty was due to the very vivid memory of which emotion was necessary to power them; the Killing Curse required him to really wish the target dies, and the Torture Curse required the caster to actually desire the target feel pain and suffering.
Pretty simple, and Luna was very interested in learning to properly cast 'Avada Kedavra' for basically the same reason as Harry; namely that it was clearly a very useful spell to know.
"I still don't think you should be learning this Harry, they are called Unforgivable for a good reason." His oldest friend chipped in her opinion once more. Unlike Luna, Hermione really didn't want anything to do with this, and had been putting forth considerable effort to 'bring him to his senses' so to speak.
"I'm only learning a couple of new things, what's the big deal, you liked 'Zbax' the Shield Buster didn't you?" he said, ignoring her concerns.
Hermione immediately protested this, "Breaking someone's shield is not even the same as killing them and you know it Harry!"
Other than the two Unforgivables, they had found a pretty nifty Blanket Banisher, a way to palm Snape's famous 'Sectumsempra' that even Sirius had never seen before, and Hermione's favourite, the Shield Buster.
Using his last new trick, not even dragged from the Pensieve, Harry wandlessly turned the irises of his eyes a deep malevolent scarlet. "Ah child, I believe you are beginning to outlive your usefulness‑ss," he hissed, again trailing off into Parseltongue.
"I wish you wouldn't do that Harry, it's creepy."
"Sirius liked it, and even you admit the look on Snape's face in Potions was funny." What Harry found kind of disturbing was that Voldepotter, or whatever the hell they are going to end up naming him... he seemed to imply that Hermione was actual the reason Viktor Krum won the second task. This should be amusing, but really it was kind of... weird, and he sort of just decided not to mention it to his bushy haired friend.
Smiling, his godfather ordered, "Stick the Snivellus memory in the Pensieve, I'd like to watch it again." Shaking his head Harry complied while demanding conjured animals to mercilessly slay...
"Fine Sirius, but I want more baby pandas!"
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Harry had been putting this off for too long already, but he had promised to buy his blonde friend a cup of tea at what he later found out to be the monstrosity that was Madam Puddifoot's. The tea shop off the main street of Hogsmeade had a reputation far more horrifying to the average student than an Unforgivable Curse, and even when it was not in fact Valentine's Day the place was still steeped in enough sugary sweetness to instantly strike down the unwary with diabetes.
At least the weather wasn't too bad, he would have preferred downpours of rain and a good old fashioned thunderstorm. Still, dry and blowy beat a soaking, and for Scotland in March it was not too cold. Things, at least the weather, could seriously have been worse.
"Cheer up Harry this is going to be fun," insisted the demonic blonde joyfully.
If he'd not hacked off most of the Hogsmeade weekend in January saying he needed to train for the second task, this would be over with by now, and so with a despondent cheerfulness Harry forced himself to smile.
"I'm going to buy you the most expensive tea there is Luna, just let's keep this brief okay. Maybe we can go say hello to Albus' brother when we're done?"
He was not hopeful though.
Crossing into the side street toward the dreaded building his companion started, "Oops, silly me. I forgot the surprise," while pulling out a potion which Harry could make a decent guess as to its purpose.
Yep, polyjuice again. Damn woman, who are you going to change into this time?
"Draco Malfoy," he managed to squeeze out in disbelief, "I have to sit in an overly romantic setting and buy tea for somebody everyone will think is Draco Malfoy."
"Harry you weren't complaining the last time I used polyjuice potion," Luna said with a meaningful look, sort of challenging him to deny it.
That had been completely different, where the hell did she even get so much of the blasted stuff, it wasn't like it is a simple potion to brew?
Deciding it would not be a good idea to begin crying in the middle of the street, he confidently pushed the door holding it open for his blonde date, and her, now no longer suspicious unisex robes.
Things went downhill from there. Although Rita Skeeter herself was nowhere to be seen, Harry did spy a man he believed to be Bozo. Where the former Slytherin's photographer was, she would be soon to follow.
Fuck it!
"Draco, have I ever told you your eyes look..." he choked back bile and refused to turn green, "beautiful in the," ... come on Harry you can do it ... "spring sunshine?"
Yay, score one for the ex-convict, he didn't hurl.
Luna immediately began playing along.
Harry decided that the article in the Daily Prophet was going to be worth it.
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"...and Sirius was telling me there is this troll running for the position of Brazilian Minister of Magic."
After he had gotten over the absurdity of the situation Harry found he was quite enjoying his date. Even when she was someone else, she was still Luna, it's just that the quirky girl looked different that was all.
"Really? I didn't think many of the ICW constituent nations were all that big on creature rights."
"For the most part you would be right, they are not. Apparently the Hack Administration is really doing some good things, going in new directions and all that."
"Hack? You mean that was true? Daddy didn't run the story because he thought the guy who wrote it was just making the whole thing up."
"I never knew your father ran a newspaper," Harry said surprised.
"Oh yes, the Quibbler is the only accurate source of free journalism in Britain, besides Breezy Beekeeping of course."
"Of course." Strolling arm in arm with the blonde girl/boy Harry noticed a man crossing the street he vaguely remembered sitting next to at the Yule Ball. "Hold on, I might have a picture of him in the newspaper Sirius gave me."
Luna took it and reading the title 'Hack: International Troll of Mystery' she made the exact same comment Harry made when he saw it; "Nice shades."
"Yeah, I want a pair."
A man with an extremely severe moustache, Crouch, that was the man's name if he remembered right, Percy Weasley idolised him, he tossed what appeared to be a Knut in the dark haired boy's direction.
The disc tumbled through the air and smacked him on the arm hastily defending his head.
There was an unfamiliar tug somewhere behind his navel and Harry vanished from sight.
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He hit the floor heavily in a room with no light, no windows, and one thick metal door. He still had his wand which was good, there were negation wards preventing its use, which was not good.
About ten minutes later the door cracked open and a shadowy figure was lit from behind by painfully bright white light, obscuring the person's features entirely. Not that it mattered what he looked like, by simple virtue of kidnapping him meant that he was an enemy.
Harry took a moment and focused all of his magic into a sole desire; 'Heat, I want heat NOW!'
A column of raw fire churned from both the green eyed man's hands, wave after wave building and lessening in intensity with the ebb and flow of his magic. For more than a solid minute he kept up the scorching flames before the eerie tickling of a headache began to break out, signalling a changeover was about to occur.
He cut the wandless fire short to prevent the obvious problems associated with becoming Voldemort, and took in the figure.
"Impressive."
There was a bright flash of red and everything went black.
Fighting back to consciousness an indeterminate length of time later, Harry felt groggy and out of it, his thoughts slow and fleeting, as if they were water and he was attempting to drink from a cup riddled with holes.
"A drink of water. That would be nice." He may or may not have said it out loud.
Drinking the tasty water he slipped back into oblivion.
Clawing his way back to wakefulness what must have been a long time later, Harry noticed that thinking was difficult, like... like, something strange or unusual was happening. Maybe. He wasn't sure because it was hard to remember things.
A bright red light flashed in his vision and everything went dark.
It had been a long time, of that Harry was sure. Being sure, that was a good sign. Harry was confident that he was certain about something. He's not entirely sure why being confident about it having been a long time was a good sign, but it was… definitely.
He took note of his location, a bare room. No windows, no light.
Yes! Of course, I remember now. The door will open and I will fight. Not heat, not fire. Come on think damn it, you, you're Harry, Harry Potter. Heat is bad, no work, will no work, not work, heat bad.
He didn't recall why fire would not work but he knew it wouldn't, and he knew that someone, something, would open the door. He would fight. He always did.
The door cracked open after what may have been hours, it was hard to tell in pitch darkness with only the intermittent sound of rats to mark time, a figure backlit by painful light was greeted by a bolt of jagged electricity. A shock of static powerful enough that muggles once thought a wizard named Zeus must have been the most powerful god in creation.
There was the metallic taste of ozone floating strongly in the air as the lightning cleared.
Then a bright flash of red knocked the boy unconscious.
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"Wakey, wakey Harry Potter, how have you enjoyed our hospitality?" Clarity, sweet clarity. For the first time in what felt like years Harry's mind was his own. Looking left and right he found himself tied to a gravestone and from the dim light, the day had either just fallen to dusk, or was about to dawn anew. "You have been with us for eighteen days Harry Potter. Surely we have made some impression on you by now?"
"Well, if it's feedback your organisation desires I'd be inclined to say that, while the accommodations were first rate the room service was terrible."
Had the dark haired boy not been facing bigger problems he would have noticed the ragged, singed, and torn nature of his clothing, and the fact that he stank to high heaven. His pretty red haired captor clearly didn't hold Harry's personal hygiene or appearance in high regard.
"Amusing... as always Harry."
Then she stabbed him.
"Ouch... so anyway, what have you been doing with yourself Ginny? Personally I've been spending most of my time trying to get into a gorgeous French woman's panties."
Whatever she had him tied to the gravestone with was tough, and he didn't have his wand. Harry noticed a man with dirty blonde hair and watched as he sliced off his own arm and threw it into a cauldron.
Riiight, that was totally gross.
Soon after this view of horrifying self mutilation, the girl moved over to the one‑armed man, being careful not to lose any of Harry's blood from the tip of her knife.
"I have been quite well Harry, studying up on my history for the most part," the teenaged girl turned to face him as she answered the question, "and of course, spending time with my disembodied Lord and Master."
"Sounds like a blast. Any chance of me getting my holly wand back, it kind of has sentimental value to me?" A dazzling smile from the well developed thirteen year old was accompanied by a shaking of her head which signalled the negative. "Shame... Soooo, we're resurrecting Voldemort then? I've always wanted to take the Dark Mark, really get a chance to make a difference in evil y'know?"
Finally allowing Harry's blood to drip from the knife's blade into some kind of massive cauldron, the girl didn't reply, and a short time later the potion was finished and the smoke cleared. Harry found himself treated to a full frontal of the re‑bodied Dark Lord. A little more than he really wanted to see, and a little less than he'd actually expected to see…
"Not a fan of the ladies I'm guessing?"
The Dark Lord ignored this and started on the brief history of Tom Riddle. Ah monologuing, it's a classic. Hell who am I kidding? I'd totally be doing the same thing if I was a Dark Lord. Voldemort stopped short, his snake's eyes and Harry's snapping together. "That thought got through my Occlumency didn't it?"
"Indeed."
"Would you by any chance like to explain all of your plans to me?" Harry asked hopefully. "Y'know, since I'm about to die anyway, you may as well tell me the whole thing?"
The two stared at one another for a long time, Harry's skill at mind magics at this point was well up to the task of defending against a Legilimency attack without an incantation. "I think it is best I kill you now, rather than make sport of the occasion."
The redhead looked up at this confused and Harry countered, "Probably for the best, I'm way more powerful than you anyway."
The last was said right when Lord Voldemort's Inner Circle apparated in to the graveyard. They heard that Flighty, what are you gonna do? Harry allowed the taunt to broadcast through his defences.
"Untie him and give him back his wand."
You're going to lose. Harry thought in a sing songy voice. "You know, if you'd let me cruciate and then murder Lucius Malfoy I would have probably joined you guys."
The Inner Circle found this statement uncomfortable and began shifting their collective weight as Harry was handed the Horntail wand once used by Sirius' grandfather.
"Avada Kedavra! ... Bumblebee!"
The onrushing death magic which spewed out from twelve and a quarter inches of elm was used solely as a distraction. A wandlessly summoned gravestone impacted brutally with the back of Voldemort's head, viciously stoving in the man's newly physical brains. With a whispered activation phrase to his wrist, Harry portkeyed to the office of Hogwart's Headmaster.
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Giggling madly Harry was helped to his feet by a surprised and relieved Albus Dumbledore. "Harry my boy are you alright, please do your best to calm yourself."
In between giggles he got out that he was in fact fine for the most part, and that he was laughing because something had happened that was just too damn funny for words.
Of course the Headmaster gave me a portkey Voldemort you stupid prick, he's a good man and he is not stupid.
Four hours, a much needed shower, an incredibly powerful and dangerous purging potion later, and Harry was most of the way toward recovery. With no broken bones and nothing but a little malnutrition, the strange potions his captors had been using on him were the only major problem about which Poppy Pomfrey was worried. So using Snape's borderline purging potion pretty much solved their biggest concern.
Harry stuck his memory of events into the well travelled Pensieve of Albus Dumbledore, and the group were looking over the events.
"You have got to be the craziest bastard in the world to just stand there taunting them and exchanging witty banter like you don't even care." Sirius actually sounded more proud of this one fact than he ever had been of anything else in his life.
"Were you not scared at all Harry?" Hermione voiced it, but Luna looked just as bad. The two girls must have been worrying about him a lot over the past… not quite three weeks.
"Of course not, what's the big deal it's just a Dark Lord?"
He conspicuously didn't scream, Are you fucking kidding me, I was shitting myself the entire time! Being really good at Occlumency means I know how to hide it, but Albus probably picked up on that omission.
"Besides, I did look fucking badass didn't I?" The collective refusal to admit this underscored in Harry's mind that he did totally look badass. "What I want to know is, why was I held for so long? I mean I might have been rescued in the time between then and now. Any ideas about what's so special about today?"
After a bit of arguing the only fact that the group came up with was that today was three days before the vernal equinox, and overall it was kind of concluded that this must be in some way significant.
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"So the blonde 'arm chopping off' guy from the rebirth ritual turned out to be an escaped Azkaban prisoner named Bartemius Crouch Junior, the son of that straitlaced guy who is in charge of International Magical Cooperation at the Minisrty. And that Bartemius Crouch Senior has been under the Imperius Curse for months, and he is the one who put my name in the Goblet of Fire. Furthermore, we assume that at least some of the time Junior has spent being polyjuiced to look like Senior, so that they can get important things done, and a loyal Death Eater can be on Hogwarts grounds when it's important too. Following?"
Luna appeared to be, and Hermione was frowning slightly but took up Harry's train of thought. "Plus Ginny Weasley was the real Heir of Slytherin all along, and is still being possessed by a sixteen year old version of Tom Riddle from when he attended Hogwarts, before he became Lord Voldemort. Is that right?"
Harry suddenly realised he must not have told her that they'd known it was Ginny who had been releasing the Basilisk ever since events in Chamber. He quickly decided he'd better not mention that fact. "Yeah, that was a shock all round, I'll tell you that for free," said Harry, his tone of voice which probably way too cheerful to be natural.
The brunette continued her train of thought, either ignoring him or not noticing, Harry wasn't sure, "And if what Professor Snape said is true, you successfully killed Voldemort again by smacking him in the back of the head with a gravestone. And Crouch Junior is walking around with two silver hands now, so we assume that some of your blood remained on the knife for the Inner Circe to resurrect him again."
"Yep," Harry agreed. "He also said the Death Eaters seem scared of me. Or at least wary, which is a good thing either way."
After a while in confused silence Sirius broke in, "This isn't preparing you for the third task, get off your arse and get some training done."
"Three months and we can finally get the Headmasters help, I for one am looking forward to some more overarching answers."
Padfoot nodded and hurled the first curse.
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Excluding a real date with Fleur Delacour, one which didn't involve any kidnapping or bizarre hijinks on Harry's part, things settled back to the normal routine. Of course nobody believed Voldemort was actually back, but Harry just accepted that as par for the course. He'd shown the Pensieve memory to a bunch of people and the Rita Skeeter article for the Quibbler was what landed him the Veela date.
The French had been interested in hearing the story from the horse's mouth so to speak, but even Fleur would admit it had been a pleasant evening regardless.
Now it was the twenty‑fourth day of June, three sunrises following the summer solstice, which led credence to the theory the date really was significant to the ritual, and Harry was about to enter the third task; a maze with all kinds of obstacles and scary monsters. Sexy dragon leather boots in place Harry adopted a slouch of relaxed competence which his competition now accepted as genuine.
"Good luck you guys," seeing three uncertain looks from the others he went on, "I actually mean it this time by the way, because you are the real school champions and I was only suckered into this thing as a fucked‑up assassination attempt."
First allowed into the maze Harry didn't even bother looking like he was in a hurry. He simply walked into the darkness with lazy grace followed by an eager Spyfly.
Strolling through the task Harry added many more kills to his name, guessing with displeasure that this was what the public wanted.
At least I get to stock up on awesome potions ingredients, maybe an acromantula carapace wand holster or something.
"Come on Fleur my dear let's get on with this foolishness."
"'Arry, I-," the French champion trailed off. Then something else apparently sprang into her mind. "Did you incapacitate 'ze Sphinx?"
He sniffed a laugh. "Yeah, blunt force trauma, and Hoarfrost works well against them."
"I think you were supposed to answer 'ze riddle and eet would 'ave let you past."
Harry thought it over. "Oh, that's what she was talking about. It makes so much more sense now."
Arriving at the Triwizard Trophy he just looked expectantly at the shorter girl. It was strange, the teenager always imagined her towering over him like she was a giant and he a helpless firstie.
"What?" she asked confused.
"You took down that acromantula, you could have just left me and you would have won."
"I want to win 'zis tournament but I never would 'ave stood by an' allowed you to be eaten."
"Hoarfrost, unconscious Sphinx, remember? I'd have been fine. Besides I don't need the money, nor do I care about the fame. And I didn't even enter the bloody competition, now take the cup before I attempt an Imperius Curse on you and make you do it anyway."
She got a mulish look on her face at this, and in a sudden flash of insight Harry just knew she'd have been a bloody stubborn Griffindor, so after a moment Fleur countered his offer of an easy win. "We share 'ze victory 'zen. 'Ogwarts an' Beauxbatons both win."
Rolling his eyes Harry just agreed with the girl's foolishness.
There was a tug behind the navel.
...
"Kill the spare."