I own nothing. Least of all this.
3) WHY IS A MOUSE WHEN IT SPINS?
Cygnus Black reeled back in shock. Never, in all his years of life, would he have expected that. That a Yaxley would ever dare to harm a Black, a family so far above their own it was laughable…it spoke volumes to the true attitude of the Knights. And to that of their leader. True, the fight (if it could be called that) held its own revelations about the true state of their society, but to a politician like Cygnus, it was the scene that came after the massacre that contained the most damning evidence.
His daughter's voice pulled him from his thoughts. "Well Father? What do you think? Of them…and of him?"
Hmm. How best to put this.
He began slowly. "…I must confess, the first thing that I thought…the first thing I truly noticed was…that this Zarathos was, without a doubt, a Potter."
Bellatrix blinked. "A Potter? You're sure?"
He nodded. "No question about it. The hair of a Potter is very distinctive, and it will always be so. At least until a certain curse I know if is lifted. But it was his eyes that told me something much more important. Tell me, Bella. Have you ever seen a Potter with eyes like that?"
She shook her head.
"I thought not. Green eyes are a rarity among wizarding bloodlines, which leads me to believe that this Zarathos is, in all probability…a half-blood."
The words he had been reluctant to voice aloud visually seemed to sink into her mind. "A half-blood. Perhaps a bastard. It would explain why we have yet to hear of him, as well as why he gave himself another name. It could be his family doesn't even know he exists; the Potters tend not to turn their backs on their own, and they would most assuredly have sent him to Hogwarts if he had been raised by them. No wand that I could see, so either self-taught or more likely trained in a different school of magic for more…advanced students. All of which means…"
He finished her thought. "…That a half-blood has somehow managed to unearth secrets of magic we would never have dreamed of today, and what's more, learned to use them to great effect with both deadly force and precision. Imagine what he could have done, how much better he could have been, with an actual wand."
Her murmur seemed to echo throughout the room. "I wouldn't have survived."
"No, Bellatrix. He would have let you live anyway; I think. For one very important reason: you were the only one I saw in that memory that didn't attack him. And you were able to dodge his first onslaught, as well as shield from any further ones. He obviously knew you, or knew of you. Perhaps it was his version of a test; not just of your abilities, but of your…loyalties."
Her face turned up in confusion. "But he said…"
"I know what he said, my dear. But by giving you that message to take to this…Tom Riddle, a man presumably high up in the ranks of the Knights, if not responsible for this entire war…he has deliberately placed you into their line of fire. And their response has forced you to re-evaluate your choices. And," he sighed, "for me to re-evaluate mine as well."
He was silent, lost in thought, for some time.
Finally, he stirred once more. "I shall get your Uncle Orion to call a meeting of the House. Of all of us. Perhaps it may be for the best if we were to…withdraw from the coming conflict. And, after all, more can be done from the shadows of neutrality than it can from open war."
Bellatrix's eyes shone. "And if I can draw him to our side…our position with both the Light and the Dark would be much improved."
Cygnus snorted. "Our side, my dear? I think what you mean is yours."
Her right eyebrow arched imperiously. "Is it not the same, with the House of Black?"
He laughed. "Well-spoken, daughter. Well-spoken. But in order to entice him to…our side, first, we must find him. And if anyone can do that, it would be the Potters. I believe it is time to meet with your Uncle Charlus. His reaction to learning there is yet another Potter capable of causing a massive uproar within the wizarding world is not one I am looking forward to."
Ironically, this was the first time Harry Potter had ever been able to sit on a swing-set.
There hadn't really been that many playgrounds in the Last City, and when your cousin growing up is one Dudley Dursley, you don't have time to do much sitting at all. Thousand years later, and Harry was just now discovering the peaceful effects of simple, solo, back-and-forth motion. Shame it wouldn't last long.
At first, he had considered a campaign waged from the shadows. Guerilla warfare, as the Muggles had done in places like Vietnam, or like the Eliksni had done in the Cosmodrome. But at the end of the day, he was a Gryffindor first, and a Guardian second. He had already made a statement to the Wizarding World as a whole, even if most of them would never know of it. Now, it was time to underline that statement.
He stretched, and leaned sideways on one of the swing's chains. To think, he had been to other planets, other dimensions, and there were still things back here on Earth he had yet to see. When he had begun his quest to return here, all those years ago, he had never even considered what he would do once he actually got back. What his purpose would be afterwards. It had been another who had forced him to sit down and look at it from a logical perspective. His brother in all but name.
When he had finally stumbled out of the Vault of Glass into the lush ruins of the Ishtar Sink, the first thing he had noticed was that there was definitely something wrong with the Sun. He had interrogated the ghost of the…Cyclops, Mind, whatever…quite thoroughly about what the world looked like now, but the one thing he had forgotten to ask was exactly where the exit to the Vault let out. Funny, that. He had just assumed that it would naturally be somewhere on Earth, considering it was where the Vex had snatched him from. But no, that's not how Harry Potter's luck worked. Instead, he had been stuck on the frickin' planet VENUS, with absolutely no clue how to get back home. So, he had immediately done the first thing that came to mind.
He tried to walk back into the Vault.
Imagine his surprise to learn it had been quite thoroughly locked behind him.
Imagine his further surprise to learn there were quite a lot more things that looked a lot like that Cyclops had, and they were all most anxious to keep him from getting back in.
Ever.
Five times he died and came back before he was finally able to outrun the platinum blighters. He had just been considering sneaking back under invisibility when yet another mechanical being decided to appear right in front of him. He had been so startled that he had immediately cast a Stupefy at it, only for the brilliant bolt of red light to have absolutely no effect whatsoever.
The being had then proceeded to dismantle him bit by bit in an exceedingly efficient and painful manner (most of his skills in torture of organic beings were derived from his experiences that day). When at last she (no doubt about that particular detail) had finally let him die, he had come back to life royally pissed off, and had expressed his frustration the only way he knew how: with copious amounts of violence.
When at last the dust settled, Venus had gained yet another crater of spectacular size, and Harry Potter was able to count the Exo Stranger as one of his closest friends. After all, what else were you supposed to call a person who just handed you a free ship, rifle, sparrow, and clothes?
She had explained quite thoroughly that something like him had no business existing in this timeline, and that any effort he put forth to returning to his appropriate time she would gladly assist. When he had inquired as to exactly how she knew what he was, she had merely replied that she didn't have the time to explain. And then rudely disappeared right in front of him.
His response had been very mature: he had flipped a certain finger at the place she had been standing, and then boarded his (relatively) brand-new ship for the trip to Earth. First things first: he needed to find out what exactly the Deathly Hallows had done to him…and if there was any way to reverse it. And when it came to wizarding lore, there was no better source of information than Hogwarts' library.
Only Hogwarts wasn't there anymore.
Oh, the building itself was still standing. Hogsmeade too, for that matter. But as far as anything or anyone magical? Nothing. Not a sight, not a sound, not a scrap left. All empty. And from the looks of things, it had been so for some time. Even Harry could sense that if there was anything magical about this place, the effect had long since dissipated. True, it had been a couple of thousand years, and there had been one or two apocalypses (or so he had been told), but somehow, the odds of…everything, just…ending, hadn't really hit him until then.
After a good deal of poking around, he had reluctantly turned to the one place he had been hesitant to go: the Chamber of Secrets. A dead Basilisk could still kill, as a certain dead Dark Lord could have attested to. And Basilisk venom could, conceivably, be used to bypass a certain locked door he was very much anxious to reopen.
But that too had apparently been subject to the ravages of time. All that remained of the great beast that he had once fought for his very life was a scattering of bones across the Chamber floor. Odd; it had almost looked like someone had deliberately stripped the skeleton for anything useful. He had gone over the remains very carefully, looking for anything that might have been of value. All that he had discovered was that the bones seemed predisposed to whisper to him; Parseltongue, obviously, but still, the effect was…disconcerting. He had taken them anyway; he would bet money on there being a way to grant a horrible death using just the skin of a Basilisk, much less the innards.
After reemerging from the Chamber, he had sat for quite a while and considered his options. If Hogwarts had been stripped deliberately, perhaps what it had once contained had been stored someplace else. Perhaps at the Ministry of Magic; or perhaps at one of the other wizarding schools. There was just one problem: travel south to London was, apparently, forbidden. Nuclear fallout, or some such nonsense. He snorted. As if radiation could ever kill a wizard. Hermione had explained that fact to him quite thoroughly, once upon a time. Now, he was beginning to doubt he would ever hear another lecture from his best friend.
It was on his long sparrow ride south to London he discovered yet another ability granted by the Elder Wand: he could now override Gamp's Law at will. Treacle tart had never tasted so good.
After trying for four hours to locate a workable entrance to the Ministry (telephone booths weren't exactly kept in the best shape, nowadays), he had finally given up and just Apparated straight down. True, the whole thing could have been collapsed under tons of rubble, but what was the worst that could've happened? Death? Expulsion?
All for naught. The Ministry had been just as empty as Hogwarts. Well, except for one Department.
The Veil of Death seemed just the same as it had been in fifth year. In fact, if anything, its whispers seemed to be even more insistent. Whether that was due to the bones in his pockets, or the changes in himself, he could only speculate.
In the end, there had been nothing worth staying for. He had given one last look backwards at the statue in the Atrium, sighed, and Apparated away.
Diagon Alley was more of the same, but worse. Here, there were signs of actual damage, and not just the sort that came with the passing of time. Flourish and Blotts? Crumbling. Eyelops? Demolished. Even Borgin and Burkes had lost its entire front. Blown out buildings, collapsed roofs, sinkholes in the street. Not even Ollivander's had escaped; the one thing in the Alley age had seemed unable to touch, now reduced to rubble.
Well, that was one avenue of exploration dead. The only other one that he could see was to investigate the other wizarding schools, Beauxbatons and Durmstrang. If worst came to worst, he could try America. He recalled hearing of an academy near Salem, and of a castle similar to Hogwarts called Ilvermorny. Hopefully, he could find at least something in one of those places. The only problem was, he had no idea exactly where those places were.
He had always assumed that Beauxbatons was in France, and Durmstrang either somewhere in Bulgaria or Scandinavia. It made sense to start with the one closest to him, so he had pulled up his ship's map of Europe to begin looking for possible locations, when his plans in that direction had immediately been cut short. Apparently, all travel south of London and west of something called the "European Dead Zone" was not only expressly forbidden, but monitored closely by a group called the Pilgrim's Guard. Not good. And while he may have been able to turn himself invisible, he had absolutely no idea how to do it to either a sparrow or a ship. Disillusioned objects could still be detected, especially while moving. And seeing as how a group the ship's computer referred to as the Fallen also had access to cloaking technology, he was positive either the Pilgrim Guard or someone else equally dangerous possessed a way to see past it. And then to blast the intruder to smithereens.
Durmstrang it was!
Scandinavia was a very big place to search, but seeing as how their delegation in his fourth year had arrived dressed for extremely cold weather, he would venture so say it was the northern half he should concentrate on. The half that was controlled almost entirely by what the ship only referred to as "Warlords". Greaaaaaaat. Anyone that willingly put "Lord" in their title was sure to be bad news.
But nonetheless, his curiosity was aroused when he learned some of the Warlords also belonged to a group collectively known as the "Risen": people resurrected from the dead and granted mystical powers by things known as "Ghosts". If that wasn't magic, then you might as well call him a codfish. And the fact that these "Risen" mostly seemed to congregate around the Ural Mountains…well, that was just adding wood to the fire.
So he had set course for Eastern Russia, and strapped himself in for a very, very long ride.
Ah, here they came. The pop of Apparition was unmistakable to anyone who had heard it even once, and an entire group doing it at once was impossible to miss.
Which meant the Anti-Apparition and Portkey wards should be going up right about…now.
Slowly he stood, and cracked his neck. At first he had intended to do this somewhere with as few bystanders as possible, but he didn't want to give Tom any ideas for future run-ins, should they occur. And if the entirety of Privet Drive were to suffer some unfortunate collateral damage, well, what was the harm?
His radar lit up. Idiots. Disillusionment and invisibility cloaks only worked on him when their users were actually trying to be sneaky. Walking straight at your enemy was the exact opposite of subtlety. Oh, wait a mo…they were spreading out. Forming a circle around him. They had him surrounded. He rubbed his hands together. Excellent. Now he could fire in any direction.
Orrrrr…now that was an idea. If his helmet hadn't already been lowered, he was quite sure his grin would've been compared to the Grinch's. Yes, that would work wonderfully.
One of his soon-to-be victims stepped forward, and dropped his Disillusionment. Hmm. Tom wasn't here, then. No one else would have dared to be the center of attention if he were. So, this group was here to talk first, kill if necessary. Good. He could work with this.
The figure stopped about twenty meters from Harry, and gave a slight bow. "Zarathos, I presume."
"Got it in one, my dear fellow. And from your voice, I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you would be Yaxley?"
A nod of the mask. "Correct. And since we so obviously know each other, would it not be better if we were to have this discussion face to face? I'll remove my mask, you remove your helmet, and then we'll…"
"Try and kill each other like civilized people?"
Yaxley chuckled. "Something like that. Words have slain giants where violence has failed, after all."
"And when a man puts on a mask, he reveals who he truly is. Very well, Mister Yaxley. Face to face it is."
A flick of Harry's hand, and both his helmet and Yaxley's mask disappeared. Back into his storage system, of course. Convincing disguises were always handy to have.
Yaxley jerked slightly at the feel of air on his face, and then grinned. "Impressive. Most impressive. But I must admit to being somewhat attached to that visage."
"If things proceed satisfactorily, I'll see what I can do about reattaching it."
"I am much obliged. Now, seeing as how this place is practically a beacon to all those marked by our Lord, and yet out in the open and unprotected, am I correct in assuming you wished to…negotiate, with the Knights of Walpurgis?"
"Oh, is that what you're called? Hmm. Better than Death Eaters, I suppose. And to answer your question: yes, in a manner of speaking."
"Oh?"
"It's really quite simple: forsake your Lord, publicly decry blood-purity in any form, and I will ensure that society as a whole forgets whatever terrible acts you may have committed for your cause."
"And how would you propose to do that?"
He smiled. "Because pretty soon they're gonna have a whole lot bigger things to worry about."
Yaxley considered it. "Hmm. I'm afraid I'm going to have to go with…no. Sorry, Zarathos. But you have not only slaughtered some of the best and brightest of our age, you have also cost the Knights the support of the Black family."
Harry frowned. "How's that?"
Yaxley snorted. "As if you didn't know exactly what you were doing, leaving only the Black daughter alive to tell the tale. You cut down her betrothed right in front of her, and in doing so let the Blacks know in no uncertain terms what would come should they continue to ally with our cause. And to share with her the name of Tom Riddle? If our Lord had been the one awaiting her return, she would have died, and the Blacks would be as much our enemy as you. I have no doubt that by now the House of Black is scrabbling for any leverage on you as possible, hoping to sway you to their side, and to protect their neutrality. All of that, from one seeming act of mercy. Well-played, sir."
Harry sighed, and ran his hands through his hair. Merlin, but he hated politics. He always had, ever since Osiris…but that was neither here nor there. Here, was an entire hornet's nest he had accidentally kicked, and then somehow miraculously pointed in the right direction. Oh well. Considering the Potter luck, it was probably best to wait for the other shoe to drop before he did anything about it. Right now, there were about fifty witches and wizards standing ready around him, all intending to do him serious hurt. Might as well give peace one last shot.
"Are you sure you won't reconsider?"
"Our Lord's mercy would be practically nonexistent, should we betray him to you. His cause is one we support whole-heartedly, no matter the origins of one Tom Riddle. And no matter what else, I know that if we fail to kill you as our Lord has instructed, at least death by your hands will be considerably less painful than it would be coming from our Master."
"True enough. Very well. I presume you'll be wanting your mask back?"
"That would be much appreciated, yes."
A flash of silver, and Yaxley's face was once more hidden. "Ah. Much better. Now, then. Let us begin. En guarde, Zarathos."
"Hasta la vista, Yaxley."
The first spell flew from the Knight's wand…and hit a spherical wall of purple light.
Harry waved from inside his Ward of Dawn. "Handy trick, this. Picked it up from a pretty tough Russian chap. But I wonder…can you bring it down before I do something a little more…violent?"
The wave of spell-fire from his attackers seemed to indicate they were more than willing to try.
Curse after curse impacted the bubble, creating an absolute maelstrom of light in the middle of the circle. On and on and on it went, until finally…
"HALT!"
Yaxley's command stopped everyone dead in their tracks. The purple light was gone, giant craters blasted into the ground around what had once been its circumference. But in the center…nothing.
Harry Potter had vanished.
"Wards!"
One of the Knights gave a half-turn on the spot. "Still up, boss!"
"Check for Disillusionment, now!"
It was too late.
The Knight that had spoken gave a great gasp as a blade made out of the same indigo light as before skewered through his chest. A gurgle came from his throat as blood dripped out of his mouth. A flash. The body vanished.
In Harry Potter's hands twirled a pair of spectral swords, practically screaming in their hunger for Death. "So. Less painful. Still sure about that?"
"KILL HIM!"
The blades became a shield, absorbing the hail of curses. The shield became a staff, reflecting those same curses back into their casters. The staff became a maul, burning and blazing a path through the Knights, seemingly heedless of any damage sent its way. And finally, rising into the air, the maul became a fist, crackling with lightning.
And when the fist fell…
It brought the sky with it.
Voldemort sat on his throne, awaiting the return of Yaxley and his men. Fifty Knights was more than double the amount Zarathos had faced the first time; and none of them fresh recruits, as so many of the first had been.
And yet, somehow, he was still worried.
He had dug deep to find any mention at all of a Zarathos in history, either wizarding or Muggle. The wizarding section had been complete waste of time, but the Muggle…
In Muggle literature, there were a few scattered mentions of the being, all inevitably referring to him as a "demon" or "spirit of vengeance". There even seemed to be a group that believed he was a fallen angel, sentenced to be forever bound to the Devil as a servant…and to a mortal as a weapon. This…Ghost Rider…was an intriguing concept (perhaps he should look into creating one of his own, if only for intimidation), but while there were some similarities to the Zarathos Voldemort had seen, the differences far outweighed them.
Still, it added a great deal of credence to the belief that the man was either a half-blood of Muggleborn wizard, one who felt that his vengeance upon Tom Riddle was well deserved. Perhaps Voldemort had slaughtered his family; perhaps Tom Riddle had been his tormentor in some form, either at Hogwarts or in the orphanage. Regardless, he knew far too much to be allowed to live. For his interference with the Black family alone, he deserved a slow, painful death. Yaxley would see it done; the man had never failed him yet. A brute, he may be, but an effective one.
A single body appeared in mid-air, and then collapsed lifelessly to the floor.
…Perhaps not as effective as he had thought.
Voldemort rose, and made his way over to the corpse. Why had Zarathos seen fit to send back the body of one of the failures? If it had been him, he would have sent the man back alive, just to see him punished by his superiors. It was what Zarathos had attempted with the Black scion; why not with this one?
A gasp of breath from what he had thought a dead man seemed to answer the question for him. So, he was alive. Good. Voldemort would see he would suffer for what he had failed to accomplish.
His wand came up to summon the man's mask off, to reveal who it was that Zarathos had sent back…
Only for the man's head to rise into the air along with the mask.
Voldemort tuned out the wizard's horrible screams and simply stared in appreciation. Truly, this Zarathos had just as much flair for the dramatic as he himself did. He could see it now; how on earth could he miss it?
The man's face had been cut clean off, and his mask…the mask had been nailed into the man's head in its place. Even the very nails seemed to reek of Dark Magic, and the more Voldemort stared at them, the more they took on the appearance of great, twisted thorns. If he had seen them from afar, he would have said the blood that ran around them was the roses on their stalks.
With a final gurgle, the man's form went still. Voldemort sighed. He couldn't even bring himself to be disappointed; Zarathos had tortured the man almost as well as he would have. He began to turn and call for someone to dispose of the body when a glimpse of something white caught his eye.
He summoned the object, and a crisp, paper note dropped into his hand. And written on it, in the very blood of the one who had carried it, was a message.
YAXLEY SAID HE WAS ATTACHED TO THE MASK. IT SEEMED RIGHT TO KEEP ANYONE ELSE FROM TAKING IT AWAY FROM HIM. SORRY NOT SORRY FOR SPOILING YOUR FUN. OH, AND ONE MORE THING: SINCE YOU'LL BE GETTING TO HELL WELL BEFORE I DO, PLEASE GIVE THE DEVIL MY REGARDS. – ZARATHOS
Voldemort began to shake in rage. Fifty Knights, some of his most well-trained fighters and assassins…
All dead.
And this…this…demon…dared to rub his nose in the fact that his own violent pleasures had been denied.
The room did not survive the Dark Lord's anger. Very few things could, after all.
But no matter how strong it grew, no matter how much destruction it wrought, there was one thing that it couldn't quite completely kill:
His fear.
