Blowing Sand

Chapter 5: Bad karma

Written (mostly) by Lady Inari
Beta-ed (a little) by Anime–Luney

Inari- Hmm…. Pairings are decided! They'll be HarryxOC, GinxSas, GaaxKag, KurxYus

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Unknown POV ((dun, dun, duhn…))

"Mister Potter, wake up! This is an NEWT class, not naptime!" Unfortunately for me, I wasn't awake to hear Professor McGonagall or her threats. Also unfortunately, I had a book thrown at my head, and then bounced off between my shoulder blades, whacking one of my leathery bat wings.

Startled, confused, half asleep, and hurting, I jumped up, shouting, "I'm not a bat!" and I consequentlyturned red with embarrassment as the whole class, with a few students from the other houses, sniggered.

"I think we all know that, Potter. Why don't you take off your cloak, you must be steaming."

I sat down, a bit ruffled. "No."

"What did you say?"

"You heard me. I-said-no!" I promptly laid my head down on the desk and almost fell asleep.

"Detention and fifty points from Gryffindor." An eye cracked open, then shut. I ignored the gasps and mutterings of my fellow Gryffindor students.

"Another detention, Mister Potter. Now take off your cloak." Finally, my patience breaking, I stood up.

"You want me to take off my cloak? Fine!" I moved a newly clawed hand to the fastening of my new blackish-purple cloak.

Ron grabbed my hand, "Harry…"

"It's fine, Ron. I know what I'm doing."

"I do know what you're doing--"

"Great, that's fine, then!"

"You don't get what I'm saying!"

I whispered down into Ron's ear, "Look." I lifted up an edge of the cloak long enough for him to see under it; then flicked it back down. Rolling my eyes, I unfastened the tie holding it shut, and twisted it off my shoulders. Smirking, I turned around and showed my wingless back to the class, then hooked my cloak back on and sat down, closing my eyes, and falling asleep to the end of the class, ignoring everybody.

But my rest was once again interrupted when the bell rang, signaling the end of the last class on Friday. I stood up, yawning and stretching, but having to force my once again visible wings to stay folded on my back.

I picked up my bag and slouched out of the room last. I yawned and muttered, "Man, I'm tired."

Hermione, who was up ahead, called out to me, "C'mon Harry, let's go out into the grounds."

I focused my unglassed eyes on her, "No thanks. I'm gonna go to bed and crash." I walked up the main staircase to the seventh floor, gave the password to the Fat lady and walked up to bed.

Dreamingdreaming

Harry was in a forest at midnight, except somehow it was different. His senses told him that something was wrong. The leaves in the tree rustled behind him and he turned; but there was nothing there, slowly, he turned back around, his wings flared slightly.

He jumped as he saw a man about ten feet away. The man was leaning up against a tree, one foot on the trunk and his arms crossed over his chest. He was wearing a black vest and pants, a ridiculously tattered black bucket hat sat on top of his long ebony hair. Strangely, his look was completed with a pair of purple-black bat wings.

"Ah, you must be Harry." His voice was smooth and deep.

"W-who are you?" Harry stiffened as the man moved closer.

"Don't bristle at me like that. My name is Kuroune. I am a bat demon like you are, but I'm full demon." He moved behind Harry in a second, and grabbed a wing with one arm, and his neck with the crook of his arm. "Calm down, Harry-kun. I'm not going to hurt you." Harry relaxed slightly, but Kuroune didn't release his wing.

"Hold out your left wing, please. I don't want to have to force it open." Glancing at him from the corner of his eye, Harry opened his wing. Slowly, almost sensually, Kuroune ran a hand over the back of the black wing, tracing the sharp spike on the main bone of the wing. "Your wings, are beautiful, Harry-kun, but they will get much larger and soon you won't be able to hide them with a simple cloak, and it will take enormous energy to hide them all hours of the day. So, what will you do, Harry-kun?"

Shivering, Harry responded, "I was going to quit school soon, anyways. I just may have to sooner than later. Maybe in the next week?"

"Yes, that would be good, but first, before I must leave you, one last thing." Kuroune reached into a pocket and pulled out a purple earring with a chain and bell on it. He also pulled out a metal band, this one silver. With one sharp motion, Kuroune cut a slit in the membrane of his wing along the bone close to the wing joint, and fastened the band over the wing bone; then he licked up the blood and the wound, sealing it shut. The pain disappeared almost before it came.

Then he moved his head and pierced Harry's right ear near the top, at a newly formed point of the ear in a second. In another second, the purple earring was in place. Another swipe of Kuroune's tongue and the blood was gone.

"The things that I have given to you will not appear before Sunday at midnight. After that, you will start changing drastically. You will get much taller, longer hair and ears; your wings will probably triple in size, which is why the band is extra big. Your new name will be Maboroshi, illusion. " Harry could feel that he was waking up, and Kuroune was fading. Endofdreamendofdream

Harry sat up, and looked out the window. The sun was starting to set. 'Man, can't I even sleep through a night! I guess Kuroune said that I was a bat, and don't bats sleep during the day?' He went to window and opened it, letting in a breeze; which rustled his wings, wanting to get free themselves from underneath the cloak.

Sighing, Harry unhooked the cloak and climbed onto the windowsill. On a second thought, Harry walked back to his trunk and got out a muggle outfit. He pulled on the black jeans, but left off his shoes. He cut two large slits in the back of his newest ((purple and amazingly fitting (seeing as it was once Dudley's))) longish-sleeved shirt for his wings, and then he pulled that on, too.

He stuffed his schoolbag with extra sets of clothes, his invisibility cloak and his other cloak.

Harry scrawled out two notes-- one to Ron, telling him to give the other to Dumbledore and saying goodbye.

Finally, he hefted his pack onto his back. Satisfied that it wouldn't bother his wings, Harry walked back to the window.

He was actually perched on the sill, with his wings opened slightly, when the door opened and Ron walked in. "Harry? Where are you going?"

Harry's POV

Not even looking back, I answered in a whisper, "Away."

"Away?"

"I'm leaving, Ron. Gone." I looked back at him, one tear-filled eye hidden by my hair, "For good."

I jumped out of the window, a single teardrop staining the wood. I spun around in the air, my wings flapping. Hovering, I looked back into the room I had just left. Ron was there, sitting on his bed, looking thunderstruck.

"I'm sorry, Ron." I whispered; then flew towards the forest, scanning the treetops. I didn't want to be ambushed again by centaurs.

I saw a flash of silver and red heading toward the school through the forest, but I forgot about it. How wrong I was not to investigate.

I flew so far over the forest I couldn't even see the castle anymore, when my nose hit the smell of seawater. I could see whitecaps outlined on the darkness.

Gently, I landed on a bluff overlooking the sea. I stood there, wings floating lazily on the wind, looking up at the moon.

Soon, the sun started to rise in the east; suddenly, I was starting to get tired. I fluttered down to the beach, where there were a number of large caves.

I stopped in front of a fairly large looking cave, but spun around as I heard footsteps behind me. There weretwo bat people standing there. Their wings wereeach adifferent color—red, tealand navy blue. Their eyes, hair, and clothes were the same color as their wings.

The red-winged man stepped forward. His hair was tied up in a tight samurai's topknot. A red katana in a red sheath tied to his belt completed the image. He spoke out angrily, "Who the hell are you?"

The teal-haired girl with a long braid grabbed ahold of the man's shoulders and toppled him over so she was sitting on top of his back.

"Korosu-kun should be nice to Akari-chan" Akari jabbed herself proudly in the chest. The other woman sweatdropped.

"My name's Kakatte-iru. Akari, you obviously know," she gestured to the teal-braided girl. "What's your name?" Kakatte-iru was curious. Her voice rose and dropped like a spring melody.

I almost answered 'Harry,' but stopped and remembered what Kuroune had said to me. "My name's Maboroshi. Nice to meet all three of you." Korosu looked up sharply from his position still lying on the ground with Akari on his back.

"Maboroshi. It's you!" Korosu stared up at me in awe. It was like he was a muggle child meeting his idol, me, for the first time. He looked at the other two, who looked at him weirdly. "Remember Kuroune? Remember how he had a son and named him Maboroshi? And doesn't this one," Korosu moved a hand and pointed at me, "doesn't this one look a lot like Kuroune when he was younger?"

Kakatte-iru stepped around me, inspecting my wings and back and ears. "Your wings are the same, but a little smaller; your ears are… longer and come to a finer point." She traced the edge of an ear, making me shiver with pleasure.

I bit back a moan. "My wings and ears are going to get bigger, you know." Akari gasped, jumped up and hugged me tightly. I had to hold onto them to keep them from tipping me over, as Kakatte-iru also clung on.

Yawning, Korosu stood up and shook the sand out of his clothes. "C'mon, guys, let's get to bed. I'm tired." He walked over to me, where I was acting like a coat hanger, except with two girls who had wings, and tried to pry them off of me.

Finally, after ten minutes, I was free. That day was probably the best sleep I had had all my life. It might have been because I was finally among what I could honestly call my equals, my friends.

We all woke up at the same time as the sun set. I ran out first to the sea and jumped in, swimming deep, using my wings to speed up and grab several fish by the tail, and dragging them up onto the beach.

I shook off the water, then jumped up into the air next to Korosu who was floating lazily on the sea breeze, said, "Hey, Korosu?"

"Hm?"

"I was wondering if you had any weapons that I could use?" I was curious, and wanted to defend myself because I no longer had a wand.

"Weapons? Yeah, I have something you might be able to use." Korosu banked and flew to a cave hidden in the cliffs. There was a small ledge that we landed on. "Come in, just don't touch anything."

I followed him inside, where it was surprisingly large and warm; torches were flickering in brackets on the walls. In racks on the walls, there were countless daggers, swords, spears and other weapons that I had never seen before.

I was inspecting a black spear with a long silver spearhead, when Korosu took down the spear and pushed it into my chest. In his arms were weapons that looked like bigger versions of the blades on ice skates. "What are those?" I nodded at the blades.

"They're wing blades. They strap onto your outer wing bone and they're deadly. I'll help you put them on for now, but you'll have to learn how to do it yourself."

I held out my wings and watched as Korosu clamped the padded metal piece around a wing, then hooked on the sharp blade, and repeated the action on the other. "Good, they'll still fit." Korosu nodded in approval.

"Okay, now bring your wings straight out." I did, and was surprised at how light the metal was. "Cross them a bit, good. Now all we need is an enemy." Together, we took off my wing blades and stored them in a special sheath that now hung over my back.

Later, when everyone was starting to get to sleep, I told them about a party that was going to happen on Halloween night. Kakatte-iru wanted to go, and Korosu decided to go along to accompany me. Akari had wanted to stay for some reason known only to her.

As we were sleeping, Kakatte-iru had snuggled up to me, and I had wrapped my arms and wings and around her.

Back at the castle

It had been two days since Harry Potter had disappeared, and the school was in uproar. There were rumors flying that he had been kidnapped by Death Eaters, or that he had simply run off ((Which was true)), or there were the more obscure ones, like he had been eaten by a werewolf. One first year said that he had been turned into a pumpkin, but that's beside the point.

The point that I was trying to make was that nobody knew the truth except two people—Ronald Weasley and Albus Dumbledore. Hermione was confused because she couldn't get Ron to even look at her, and Professor Dumbledore had spent the last few days shut up in his office.

Kurama, Hiei, and Yusuke didn't seem too disturbed, but Kagome and the other ninja had been scouring Hogsmead and the Forbidden forest. They had found nothing, of course. After all, they couldn't follow a trail in the air.

Finally, after about six weeks, they gave up the search. Ron had starting to get back to normal, but he didn't talk as much and had soon quit the Quidditch team, although Professor McGonagall wanted to make him Captain. Instead, Ginny was made Captain, whose team promptly lost all their matches, because she was becoming interested in a certain raven-haired ninja guy, and they spent their nights in dark, abandoned corridors doing stuff I aught not to mention around the children.

Yuki had to start sleeping with Hiei because Gaara and Kagome, and Kurama and Yusuke were touching each other a bit too much for him to be comfortable in the room.

'Yep,' Yuki thought, curled up at the foot of Hiei's bed, 'life officially sucks.'

Back to the sea cave

Korosu's POV

It was the day before the Halloween party that Maboroshi, Kakatte-iru and I were going to go to across the forest at the castle. At Maboroshi's suggestion, we agreed to go armed, just in case. I carried my katana, and Kakatte-iru had her chain swords.

Maboroshi himself had grown, taller and in other ways. He was now almost six and a half feet tall. His wings had probably quadrupled in size, far outstripping mine by at least a few feet; his hair had also grown, reaching the small of his back. He wore his wing blades and carried his staff. Purple eyes now adorned his face, replacing the green ones that he had when he first came to us.

"C'mon," I said, "Let's go." Maboroshi nodded, and sprang up, hovering, and blowing back all of our hair in the wind he was creating, the metal on his wings flashing. Kakatte-iru also jumped up and grabbed Maboroshi's free hand.

"Korosu! We need to leave, otherwise we'll be late!" Rolling my eyes, I took a running start and flew west over the forest.

We had left fairly early in the afternoon, so we arrived at the castle as twilight fell, and several students were walking inside, probably late getting to the party. One, a girl with bushy brown looked to the sky and saw them; then she nudged her red-haired companion, who turned.

Kakatte-iru squeezed Maboroshi's hand —he had gone as white as a sheet. "Mabo, dear, what's wrong?"

Maboroshi shook his head, "Nothing. Let's land."

The students jumped and scrambled back as the three of us landed on the grass. Seeing as I was the silently elected spokesperson, I stepped forward, and asked, "Is this Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry?" I was careful to speak softly, and not present my normal attitude 'problem,' as Demo had so beautifully put it once before.

The boy nodded yes. "What do you want?"

Maboroshi stepped forward, "We're here to see the Headmaster; for business, y'know."

The girl nodded this time, "Okay, but who are you?"

I looked at Kakatte-iru for an answer. She bounded forward eagerly, and shook the girl's hand. "My name's Kakatte-iru! Mister hottie over there," She pointed a thumb over her shoulder at Maboroshi, "is Maboroshi, and the other guy is Korosu."

I propped my fists on my hips in mock anger and said sarcastically, "Oh, thanks, I'm 'other guy,' while lucky Maboroshi is 'Mister hottie.'"

Kakatte-iru turned angrily to me, 'Well, I'm sorry if you're not hot!"

Sighing at his girlfriend's stupidity, Maboroshi pulled Kakatte-iru around by her shoulders and planted a rough and passionate kiss on her lips. Kakatte-iru immediately forgot our argument and began to kiss back, pulling Maboroshi's ears forward to deepen the kiss further.

I clucked my tongue and rolled my eyes at them. "Well, what are you two's names?" I asked the two flaming red blushing students. I started to walk to the castle, sweeping the teens in front of me with my wings, blocking out their view of the navy blue and black-purple bat demons.

They looked up at me, because I was taller than them, "I'm Ron, and this is Hermione."

"Ron and Hermione, nice names. Want to know what my name means?" I grinned down at them. They had no idea. I crouched down, flipping my wings onto my back. "My name means 'kill.'" Their eyes widened. I chuckled as I watched as their expressions to curiosity, to surprise, to horror.

I bent back down and whispered to them, "Why, don't you go inside for now? I'll separate the two lovebirds back there." I grinned as they looked over my winged shoulder. They nodded, and I pushed them into the castle.

I turned and almost cackled with glee. I immediately began plotting on how to separate Maboroshi and Kakatte-iru that would irritate them the most. Smirking, I jumped on Maboroshi, throwing him to the ground, and, ignoring his and Kakatte-iru's protests, sat on Maboroshi's hips; pulled him up by the front of his shirt with one hand, tearing the fabric with needle-sharp claws.

I looked smugly at Kakatte-iru; then turned my attention back to the man under me. I traced a free claw on Maboroshi's chest, following the curves of his well-defined muscles.

My claw was now following Maboroshi's cheekbone, then around his ear and ear tip. I fingered the tip, making Maboroshi have to hold in a moan. I brought my claw around to the rounded back softly, making him screech in held-in pleasure. My lips hovered near his, but didn't touch. "Just give in, 'Roshi-kun."

He stared back at me in rebellion. "Don't call me 'Roshi-kun!"

"Mm-hm. Yeah, sure, whatever you say 'Roshi-kun." And, before his lips could protest, mine crashed down onto his. It had been intended as a second-long kiss, but I found that Maboroshi wouldn't let me break it. I fought for air, eventually opened my mouth, his tongue slipped in-between my lips, and moved over my teeth.

Gently, ever so gently, I bit Maboroshi's tongue, and it retreated. I rolled off of Maboroshi's body. Disgruntled, I stood and ruffled my wings. "We'd better go, you guys. We're late as it is."

Kakatte-iru gave Maboroshi a hand up and together we jogged into the castle to meet the Headmaster, following Ron and Hermione.

As fate would have it, we ran into another boy and girl. The boy had spiky red hair and a tattoo on his forehead that said, 'ai', meaning love, and the girl had long raven hair. Her clothing was reminiscent of a warrior. Her face had certain elegance about it, however, that made me think of a princess, despite her stance and the clothes. She wore a gold tunic and a deep blue knee-length skirt with a slit in it up to mid-thigh.

She smirked as she watched me look her up and down; then leaned into the guy next to her as he wrapped an arm around her waist. "The password is bat wings." She was looking directly at Maboroshi as she said this, looking at him as if she knew him.

Hermione nodded. "Okay, thanks," He motioned us to follow her, and we did.

No POV

Kagome put a hand on Maboroshi's shoulder as he went to brush by her. She hissed into his ear-ringed ear, "Why are you back here?"

Maboroshi hissed back at her, "That's not really any of your business, now is it? Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll be going with my friends." He tried to pull away, but Kagome held onto his upper arm.

"Which ones?"

"The ones with wings! My only friends!" Maboroshi moved a wing up to her neck and pressed a wing blade against it. He brought across the sharp metal and drew a shallow line of red. Then he walked away, grabbing Kakatte-iru's hand and thumping his spear butt on the stone.

Kagome, pressed a hand up to her neck, turned, and walked away, hand in hand with Gaara, kissing him on the cheek. "Let's go to your room and feel each other up." Gaara smirked down at her, a lustful look in his eyes. "Ooh, I like that look you're giving me, tanuki."

Kakatte-iru and Maboroshi over heard Gaara and Kagome just before they were out of earshot. "Sounds like a good idea, eh, 'Roshi-kun?"

"As soon as we can get away," Maboroshi's hand moved to stroke his hopefully potential mate's thigh.

Korosu rolled his eyes and sped up to walk next to Ron and Hermione. They were talking about somebody named 'Harry Potter.'

Suddenly, they stopped. Maboroshi ran into Korosu's back, who collided with Hermione, and Korosu sprawled, his wings bringing down Ron, too. Maboroshi rolled forward over Korosu's back, and he, too, landed in a heap.

"Oops," he muttered from his tumbled position. He looked up into Professor Dumbledore's face. Then, almost as if he realized who it was and the position he was in, Maboroshi scrabbled around, before ending up crouching on the ground, claws, well, clawing into the solid stone.

Dumbledore smiled gently at Kakatte-iru, the only one who had managed to stay upright, "Well, I see we have some guests." Kakatte-iru blushed.

Maboroshi spun around and helped Korosu up, and both of them helping Ron and Hermione.

Maboroshi glared into Dumbledore's eyes hatefully. "We're not staying long, or in the castle. We just came to tell you that we were staying on the school grounds for a while." He spun his spear around once, silver blade flashing.

Kakatte-iru bowed slightly to Dumbledore, "I apologize for my friend's rudeness. He is usually not this way. He has been… tense… since we entered the school grounds." She grabbed Korosu's wrist and pulled him after her, wings colliding.

Maboroshi stormed ahead, glaring at the occasional student that stood in the hall, Kakatte-iru and Korosu panting along after him.

"Maboroshi!" Kakatte-iru called out to him. His purple eyes reflected like a cat's in the darkness of the grounds. The eyes tilted as Maboroshi tilted his head to the side, beckoning them to follow him into the air. Korosu shrugged at Kakatte-iru, who shrugged back at him. In a dulled flurry of red and dark blue, Korosu and Kakatte-iru took off, spiraling up to the top of the Astronomy tower, the highest tower the castle.

A flash of the steel that was on his wings and the moonlight was all that signaled to his position. He was sitting, arms around his legs, wings stretched out wide, basking in the moon.

"Maboroshi, what's wrong?"

"There's something that I haven't told you guys." Maboroshi sighed, and rested his forehead on his knees. "Before I came to you guys, I was a student here at the school. I was a wizard, and a had a fairly normal life, unless you included the fact that the evilest wizard in the history of all the worlds have known is after me.

"My name was Harry Potter, the 'Chosen one,' the 'boy who lived.'" Harry laughed. "Imagine the irony... I must have really bad karma"

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Inari- this is like fourteen pages on word! But now I'm out of ideas... sighs that's what I get for updating so quick.

luney- still, fourteen pages! Sweet.