Summary: Harry makes up his mind to do anything to destroy Voldemort, with no idea it'll include werewolves, elves, the Veil, the Chamber of Secrets, Azkaban, exotic new powers, and… a secret identity? Will he be able to keep his secrets without losing everything else?
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.
I have changed my penname. I hope it didn't cause any difficulties.
That was the last thing Harry heard before Aberforth pushed both him and Lupin into the Veil before leaping in himself, Mananaconal rope in hand.
And after that, all he knew was darkness.
Chapter 10: Diamonds in the Veil
The first thing Harry noticed was the pure blackness. Everything was swirling black and it made him dizzy. The world was spinning and all there was, was nothing. Nothing. Nothingness. But he could see himself. There it was, a hand. Whose hand? His hand. Bright as day, there it was. But where was Lupin? Aberforth? He saw them; they looked fuzzy. Lupin took a step closer. He was paler then usual. Hey, he could see him fine now. Aberforth took a step closer. Unlike Lupin, he looked perfectly calm and collected.
Brushing off his robes as if he normally visited portals between worlds, Aberforth said, "Next time I do this, I may bring a stepladder. Or perhaps not. Falling is quite enjoyable in my opinion."
Harry felt anger boil inside of him again. He had just been pushed into an unknown portal by a total lunatic, and he was not happy about it.
"WHAT IN THE WORLD DID YOU DO THAT FOR!" He yelled at Dumbledore's younger brother.
"Alas," was Aberforth's reply, "You ask why in your world. Yet you are not in your world. When you are with me, you are in my world, and in my world even the most impossible can be deemed true. You have been warned. Here, not everything is as it seems. Now stop paying so much attention to what you see in here, and start paying attention to what you feel."
"I can sense him," Harry nearly jumped at the discovery, "Sirius is that way."
"I can sense him too," Lupin responded, a hint of awe in his voice.
"Ah yes," Aberforth said as if he had not a care in the world, "You can sense magical auras in here. Of course, you have to have met the person to sense their aura. That is good. We do not want to get separated in here. Now Mr. Potter, if you would lead on…"
"Lead on," Harry growled at the other man, "you want me to lead on? Well if you're so keen on me being the leader, do what I say and give me that rope so Professor Lupin and I can climb up it. Then, if you still feel like doing what I say I may let you come on up too so you can go get the Headmaster down here!"
Even as the words left Harry's mouth he regretted them. But they did need Dumbledore, the more sane brother that is, to help them out with this. The last time Harry had tried to take control of a situation Sirius had ended up stuck in here; he didn't want to risk that happening again.
"My brother," Aberforth replied, "Will not be done for a while, I think. And it will be most beneficial to the fate of the world if we continue."
Harry fought for control, "Every little thing I do, will not affect the fate of the world."
Aberforth only gazed at him as if he were assessing his spirit, "I wouldn't be too sure of that Mr. Potter. Everything in life eventually connects to something else. Like a pattern on a quilt, one thread put out of place may impinge on rest of the weave, no matter how small it may seem. And you, I have conviction, are not a small filament in this world, no matter how hard you pretend to be."
Lupin glanced from Harry to Aberforth, obviously wondering when to step in.
"I am not a piece of thread to be woven about into some quilt," Harry shot back at Aberforth.
"Then why," came the offset, "do you wish to allow my brother to have his way with you when you have the perfect excuse to do whatever you want and take control? Is your self-esteem really that low Mr. Potter?" Aberforth then gave a sigh that truly sounded affectionate, "Ah, Albus. He always did like gaining control, and I trust him with it… most of the time. He had to fight for it at first, but once Albus gains and inch he'll go a mile and not let go of what he's gained, obdurate as nargles he is! But see, Albus is good with clay, shaping it how he pleases for causes of what he believes as the greater good. In dealing with diamonds however, he has a failing. Now, now, I do believe we are wasting time. Something marvelous is going to happen soon, but if we don't hurry it may turn deadly."
So he went from a piece of wool to a diamond did he? Harry closed his eyes tight then opened them again.
"Fine. Let's go," was all he could bring himself to say.
"Harry…" Lupin began, but he was cut off.
"I'm really sorry to do this Professor," Harry said, "But I'm going to go anyway and you have two choices. One is to stay and complete the mission. The other is to go for help and leave me with this maniac in an unknown portal that has who-knows-what living in it."
The werewolf just shook his head, "Please reconsider Harry. This cannot be safe."
Harry just shook his head. He was going to go on no matter how stupid and immature his decision might appear. This place didn't seem so dangerous, what could possibly happen that he and Lupin couldn't handle themselves?
"Alrighty then," Aberforth said gleefully, "Let's be off then! I don't know young Sirius so I can't feel him. Lead on you two."
Harry took a deep breath and started walking cautiously in the direction he felt Sirius was, Lupin right beside him. He understood what his father meant about how to find them. 'Follow your hearts' he had said. But, Harry decided, if he was ever to explain what he was doing now, he'd explain it as 'tracing the aura of others'. That way, he supposed, it would sound less like a Disney movie. He was, after all, a teenage boy for goodness sake, not some pathetic little kid.
Harry looked to see Aberforth skipping along, actually skipping, while basketball-sized balls of blue light spouted out of his wand and stationed themselves about eight feet in the air. Harry looked up. He could see no ceiling, but he could feel walls. The walls were black stone and smooth. Even with light you could barely tell the wall from the rest of the place without touching it. It had been less than five minutes when Harry fell into something.
"Ooh," Aberforth commented holding one of those balls of light over it, "See this? A nest dug out of the floor!"
"A nest?" Harry asked skeptically, "What kind of strange creatures live in this hell-hole?"
"Hell-hole? No, no. The real hell-hole is most likely somewhere that-a-way."
Aberforth pointed in what seemed to be a very random direction; at least Harry thought it was a very random one. But arbitrary or not he still took a step back from where the man was pointing just in case; so did Remus.
Aberforth just continued talking, "I do believe we should remember this spot. I'll just put one of these lights two steps away from it. Remember that, the nest is two steps away from the light further to the left than all the others. Or to the right, depends on what direction you're walking in."
"Um… is it necessary to use up anymore of your magical energy on marking random places in this thing?" Harry asked Aberforth skeptically.
The man just turned to him and said, "Is it necessary for me to closely inspect my armpit every morning?"
"Er…"
"Of course it is! You just can't see why, so you automatically assume it is not." He then glanced towards Remus who was quite a while ahead of them inspecting the area for whatever he thought may have dug that hole in the rock and lowered his voice, "You should know the feeling Mr. Potter. Some may find it very unnecessary indeed to work day and night for someone you hate without pay. And is it really essential to cover certain parts of your body in notice-me-not charms…"
Harry couldn't help the sudden surge of anger that welled up inside of him, pushing Aberforth against the wall he whispered in an angry, threatening voice, "How did you find out?"
Before Aberforth even had time to open his mouth, though he did give Harry an extremely amused look, they heard hurried footsteps coming towards them. It was Remus.
"There's something out there," he said in the lowest voice possible, "it's not going to like the idea of strangers, I can sense it." Remus then did something Harry believed he would never see him do, he raised his nose to the air and sniffed, "Whatever it is," his voice seemed to growl a bit, "it had a run in with Sirius. I smell his blood on the creature."
Harry felt his eyes widen. This could not be his calm and civilized ex-professor. He knew in his heart that this was Remus though; this was Remus unguarded, angry, and without the mask. He was letting 'the wolf' inside him surface. And a good thing too; who knew werewolf senses could be so darn handy? Well, maybe he'd known all along, but if someone ever told the Ministry that, they'd be in St. Mungo's undergoing shock treatments for the rest of their life.
Harry heard sniffing again, but looking over his shoulder, he saw that it wasn't Professor Lupin this time, but something else; and it was coming their way… they all stood still for a moment before the sniffing turned into a guttural roar that seemed to shake the cave… portal... whatever the hell they were in. And out of the darkness, barely discernible in the darkness, came an enormous shape of a four-legged beast Harry that had never seen before. It was mostly black with bright slashes of yellow all over it and a it had a bright yellow horn that highly resembled a crumpled party hat, a very sharp crumpled party hat, adorned its head. The creature highly resembled a disfigured rhinoceros with a long spiked tail… and razor-sharp teeth.
"Don't move," Aberforth said quickly before saying at what happened to be the perfect moment, "JUMP!"
And boy, did they jump, barely missing getting: (1) trampled, (2) stabbed, or the ever popular (3) getting perforated by a dangerous looking spiked tail.
"Amazing!" Aberforth beamed, "A crumple-horned snorkack!"
As all three of them started to back away from the animal that was now shaking its head after bumping into a wall.
"Amazing? That thing is not amazing. It almost killed us!" Harry whispered angrily to Aberforth, they all started backing up at a faster pace now, "And it was probably your fault he…"
"She," interrupted Aberforth.
"What?"
"It's a 'she', not a 'he'."
"Whatever. You probably led her here with all your stupid lights…"
"No," it was Lupin who spoke this time, "the… crumple-horned snorkack, doesn't have any eyes, and I don't think she can hear either. But she does happen to have a very keen sense of smell."
"Indeed Mr. Lupin," Aberforth smiled cheerily as the crumple-horned snorkack prepared to charge again, "On the count of three, stun her. One… two… THREE!"
Once again Aberforth managed to give an order at the perfect moment. Harry suspected that if he hadn't listened to Aberforth last time and successfully dodged the beast, he would have said something along the lines of 'screw three' and the results may have come out differently. Then, Aberforth grabbed something out of his pocket and threw it behind them. This time they didn't need to jump out of the way as the crumple-horned snorkack ran right past them and after whatever Aberforth had thrown. The three of them glanced down the portal at where the snorkack had run, glanced at each other, and made a mutual decision to run as fast as they could towards where Sirius was. A few minutes later they stopped.
Harry barely had time to catch his breath before he heard a voice call out in the distance. At least it seemed distant. He looked around but saw nothing but Lupin and Aberforth. He listened harder.
"Do you here that?" Lupin asked him.
Harry knew he wasn't imagining things now. His former Professor could always hear so much further then everyone else. He took a few quick but cautious steps closer, and closer still.
"Harry, Remus, Dumbledore, over here!"
He and Lupin took off at a dead run. Aberforth just continued behind like he had not a care in the world. Perhaps he didn't. But then again, Harry remembered, Aberforth's world was very different from everything else. By the light of his wand Harry began to see three fuzzy black shapes appear ahead of him. The shapes slowly began to form into bodies and distinct features began to show. Heads, eyes, fingers… before he knew it Harry had stopped less then a meter away from his parents. They all stared at each other not quite knowing what to say.
"This is a tad awkward, huh?" James finally grinned, running a hand through his already mussed up hair.
His father was wearing blue robes that were a bit mussed like his hair and his mother was in a Muggle sundress covered with lilies. At the same time they all tried to hug each other but it didn't really work as his parents were, apparently, transparent.
"Hello there!" Aberforth came bounding up, "I see you been dressed for this journey in the clothes that fit your character. Or does your outfit automatically change in here to fit you?"
Aberforth seemed to ponder this for a moment before his shabby robes turned into a silk kimono covered with eyes that actually blinked, his grubby boots turned to owl slippers, and he suddenly had a gold embroidered turban atop his head that was covered with sparkling jewels.
"I thought this place was too spiritual to be able to have something as material as clothes be of any importance but to express the inner soul." Aberforth mused, not at all surprised by his abrupt change in attire.
"You," James said, "are not Dumbledore."
"Yes I am." Aberforth responded.
"No you're not!"
"He's Professor Dumbledore's younger brother." Harry cut in quickly.
Kneeling down to Sirius's level, Harry put a hand on his godfather's forehead. The thought that he too was picking up a few of Mrs. Weasley's mothering habits barely registered to him. He was doing the only thing he knew how to do to help, even though he knew that a simple touch couldn't revive an unconscious person. Sirius felt like ice, and his breath, though steady, was ragged.
"I did this," Harry whispered softly to no one in particular.
Feelings of guilt began to wash over him again and he felt an enormous urge to feel as much pain as Sirius was feeling know, or would feel when he woke up. He wanted to…
"Got any paper in there?" James was pointing to Harry's backpack.
"Er… yeah," Harry reached inside, ripped out a piece of paper from a notebook, grabbed a ballpoint pen, and handed it all to his father.
Not that it did much good.
"Damn," James muttered as everything Harry tried to give him fell through his hands, which were markedly transparent.
He then screwed up his face and managed to somehow levitate the pen and force it to write whatever he wanted it to write on the piece of paper before tucking it back into the backpack.
"Did you just do wandless magic?" Harry asked, stunned.
"Wandless… hell no! I'm just dead and have a bit of control in this place. Now, we don't have time to discuss what I wrote down at the moment, so I want you to read it with Sirius and Remus when you get back." James then went on to mutter something about getting them to talk sense into each other.
Harry looked over to Sirius. Aberforth and Lupin were healing him in places Lily and James hadn't been able to in their current state of, well, wandless-ness and transparency. Harry looked at his parents who were both looking at him, concerned.
"Listen, Harry," James attempted to put his hands on his son's shoulders and failed as he went right through him, "There are some extremely important matters we must discuss now. I don't think we'll ever get another chance to do so. I told you before that there is something you're going through besides puberty, something bigger than us all. Well, I don't know all the facts myself, but I do know one thing for certain: there is someone that can help you, not that they'll think much of it, but they'll give you enough knowledge that you can figure some things out for yourself. And… Merlin, where do I start? This is going to involve empires and danger and beings even Dumbledore knows nothing about!"
"You could start with telling me what you know about a certain mysterious book Voldemort's looking for." Harry supplied helpfully.
"That is an excellent idea. I'm not sure if Voldemort has the key to finding it yet or not. Last I saw of earth, you were just mastering the stunning spell with wandless magic. Good job, by the way. I have to talk to you about that too…"
At his father's mention of wandless magic, Harry spun around quickly to see if Lupin had heard. His trepidation was in vain, however, as his ex-professor was too busy concentrating on helping Aberforth heal Sirius to notice anything but his wand-work. Lily, on the other hand, was dividing her time between watching Harry and James and trying to help with Sirius. Harry, deciding time was too short to waste worrying, turned back to his dad.
"Forget the key to finding the book. Do you know where it…"
"Harry," James interrupted suddenly in a way-too-casual voice that had a definite edge to it, "You didn't, perchance, happen to say anything along the lines of 'it's not like this mission is going to involve Death Eaters or Voldemort' did you?"
Harry didn't even bother to look behind him, his scar was starting to tingle menacingly and the look on his fathers face was informative enough. He had just had to jinx himself…
"Voldemort's right behind me, isn't he?" Harry said before turning around to come face to face with the most feared wizard of the age, and his mortal enemy.
The Dark Lord's face was contorted into a sneer, "Exactly."
Voldemort's red eyes narrowed into a shape not unlike a cat's, a cat who's about to pounce on a hapless mouse. That Professor Dumbledore was right, (the calmer you said something, and the smaller quantity of words it took you to say it, was very effective indeed) was just one of the many thoughts that ran chaotically through Harry's mind.
Not my best chapter I know, but bear with me.
Reasons I didn't update sooner: Play tryouts (I made it!), singing lessons, karate, school, my inability to like this chapter (which I have gone over about a million times and have continually come to the conclusion that… well… it sucks), and (please don't kill me)… I re-wrote chapter 1 again.
Coming Soon: Harry finds something shiny, hates his life, and is ready to kill Voldemort (and himself) over the fact he had very little time with his parents.
Questions/Comments?(Threatening statements?): Email me: (link on my author page)