Chapter 7 - Coiled Springs
"Nature does nothing uselessly."
Aristotle
Weeks passed. Summer changed to fall. September gave way to October. And word of Voldemort attempting to start a World Muggle War reached the Order.
These were really such comforting thoughts.
They lay in wait in the darkness, the silence thick.
Unfortunately for Remus there was something worse than this preternatural quiet, and that was his partner'ssilence.
Tonks was quiet, and Tonks was never quiet. So when she was…
It was unnerving.
Remus never knew what she could be plotting.
Silently he congratulated himself. He officially spent most of his free time with a woman who legitimately scared him. She'd driven him to the brinks of paranoia, and now had him questioning her every move.
Somewhere in hell Sirius was laughing.
More unnerving than the concept of Tonks' losing her literal tongue - the only possible explanation for her having ceased her never ending come ons – or Sirius roasting marshmallows alongside Satan himself, was the metamorphmagus' appearance.
She had all but disappeared, blending into the rooftop.
Remus could vaguely make out her silhouette. Her hair and skin had been shifted into an inky grey-black. The lines of her baggy, dark sweatshirt were barely discernable, the fabric clinging to her stiff shoulders.
The fact that it was on inside out, was the only thing keeping her from looking all too serious.
Apparently, the Muggle rock band logo on the outside had been too "bright" for their mission, and upon Snape pointing this out to her, she had stripped it off, right in the middle of a full fledged Order meeting, telling the gasping members to sod off because her bra revealed nothing less than the bikini clad witches they all drooled over in Wizard Mating Weekly.
He shook his head, clearing the thought of a bikini clad Tonks from his mind, and resumed scanning the expanse of green grass below him.
Constant vigilance was needed, for the Dark Lord's patience had grown thin, and he had decided to take a more active role in exterminating Muggles.
Starting with the Irish President.
A shrewd Death Eater, familiar with Muggle politics, had alerted him of an easy way to do that.
They could simply arrange a World War.
Muggles were trigger happy. Every young witch and wizard understood that. So what better way to eliminate Muggles then to turn them against each other.
Besides, Magical Folk had ways of protecting themselves against Muggle warfare, and if the Muggles were busy killing each other then Voldemort would be free to pursue his war against the Ministry unhindered.
All that was needed was a catalyst.
And that was precisely how he and Tonks found themselves perched atop the roof of the Aras an Uachtarain, the Irish President's home, overlooking Dublin's Phoenix Park, searching for any sign of apparating Death Eaters.
There was to be a summit of world leaders hosted in the Aras an Uachtarain's State Reception Room the following day, and the Dark Lord had decided to attack Kenneth Bothan, the current Irish President, and his family.
And the Dark Lord's servants were hell bent on making it appear to be Great Britain's doing.
The shaky alliances between the two countries would be broken, and terrorist attacks would ensue upon Great Britain, the United States, Australia, and several other, yet to be specified countries.
The usual nations would be blamed with a little guidance from some magically enhanced, false, evidence, and the use of the Imperious curse would assure that the bombs would fly.
Even if the Magical World alerted Muggle leaders to this plot, and even if these leaders were to understand that it was a third party causing these attacks and not other nations, that knowledge would be limited to the leaders ears alone.
By Ministry decrees, Muggle leaders would be forbidden to inform their citizens of the magical world's existence, for fear of wide spread retaliation against the wizarding world.
In short, if the attacks began, there would be nothing they could do to assuage each nations collective fury.
The damnable Ministry of Magic would rather let nations kill each other than risk trusting Muggles with the knowledge that witches and wizards indeed existed, and there was nothing they could do about that.
The Orders only chance was stopping the chain of events before it began.
They had to stop the attack at all costs.
ECOTS
Harry had never been especially grateful to be the Boy-Who-Lived. Hell, he wasn't exactly happy to be Harry, even just Harry.
But there were times when he was particularly pissed off about it.
Like now.
I know you hear me Potterrrrr...
The dreams had been getting increasingly lucid, surreal. And fuck if they didn't hurt. Really, he didn't recall signing on for nightly mind violations, but clearly someone had decided to add them to his extracurricular activities, because he'd been signed up anyway.
Probably Snape. Bastard.
Harry's mind gave several dark, sharp throbs. The encompassing darkness was suffocating, pressing down on him from all sides as he searched, for what he knew not, yet he peered into it because on nights like these there was literally nothing else to do.
He was stuck, and if Voldemort was going to invade his head, he was going to push the fuck back.
He really did wish for his wand though. Too bad wands were next to worthless in Voldemort-induced nightmares.
The hypnotic, serpent-like voice grew louder, pressing in around him from all sides.
Young fool, do you not realizzzze the power I could givvvvve you? The power you possesssssss?
Pain invaded his mind like shards of shrapnel, forcefully flung, his barriers weakening.
I would nevvver keep anything from you Harrrrry. You could be like a sssson to me, part of our family...
Like Voldemort knew what family was. Dots swum across his blackened vision, the pressure increasing...
He kept thingssss from you didn't he Harrrry? Kept thingsssss you sssssshould have known. Thingsssss affecting thossse you lovvvve, thingssssss from birth.
Like Harry wasn't already fucking aware.
Pain erupted in his skull, as if Voldemort took personal offense to the acknowledgement. The pain exploded, sharp and raw, as if he'd been flung against a wall repeatedly by Hagrid's brother, assuming Grawp had gotten hyped up on some type of drug.
Really, he half hoped the giant could do him that solid. At least he'd enter sweet oblivion quicker and stop prolonging the inevitable.
In his dream Harry slid bonelessly down the wall. It towered above him in the darkness, brick and mortar cemented together. On it was the dark mark in lime green graffiti, the snake slithering in and out of the skulls mouth with a sick and twisted smile.
Well…that was new.
His skull exploded in a fresh round of pain and everything went fuzzy.
I would never lie to you Harrrrry. Not to one posssessssing power ssssuch as myssssself. You and I are different than thosssse other foolssss, running in the Minisssstry, hiding your propheccccccy, MY propheccccy, until it took all thosssse you loved away.
Prophecy... he racked his mind, searching for meaning to grasp onto the word. He knew it. Something about it was important. It'd be so much easier to think if he could just get his skull to strop throbbing.
The graffiti snake slithered off the wall, hovering like a sadistic caricature in front of him, baring its fangs.
Yesssss, jusssst sssssshare witttth me. Join me, I sssssshall ssseeee to it that none you love are everrrr hurrrrrrt again. I would neverrrrrr hurrrt my own ssssson...one to sssssucccceed me...
The snake bobbed its head up and down, the fiery tongue flicking out to taste the air on its forked prongs. Being a son? That sounded rather nice. Then again he wouldn't know. He'd never been one.
Yessss. I sssshall lovvvve you, teach you. I will sssshow you how to hurrrrt thosssse who ssssssseek to ussssse you Harrrrry. One sssssuch as yoursssssself dessssserves sssssuch power.
Green mist wafted through cracks in the wall, curling like tendrils around his slumped body. They only desired to be let in, to cloak him in their embrace.
That didn't sound too bad. It sounded warm.
Tendrils slithered around him, hissing like a sinister serpent. They beckoned, Harry lolling his head back to look up, seeing them pouring over the top of the bricks like a neon green waterfall.
Green, green, green. Bright, acid green.
There was something about that color he should be remembering.
All you havvvve to do is ssssay yesss Harry, and everything you ever wanted. Everything you ever dreamed sssshall be yourssss...
The greenish hues grew stronger until it was all he could see. With a hiss he struggled, getting up on his disembodied feet, letting them carry him forward, towards the light.
Jussst sssay yesssss. Let me in...
His hand reached the mist as it thickened, coiling around his arm like another constrictor, slithering its way straight up his forearm, bicep, coiling around his neck.
Slithering.
Slithering.
Slithering.
A flash of green lit up his mind, his father screaming for Lilly to take him and run.
Within him the hypnotic cord of deceit snapped and he let out an angry snarl.
Voldemort.
"Get out of my head!" He thrust his hands towards the crumbling wall in front of him and fought off the coils. Shards of rubble tumbled down upon him, an angry hiss filling the air.
The thick green mist swirled, no longer cooling his skin, but bonding his disembodied legs. He threw himself forward, reaching for the wall-
He hit it head first, colors dancing before his eyes, obscuring the crumbling bricks from him. Blindly, he braced his body against the ground, pushing with all his strength as the mist squeezed ever tighter.
"I'd never be a son to you, you bastard! Love is a meaningless word to you, not something a deranged, power hungry murderer like you could ever understand!" he yelled into the dark night, the mist slowly evaporating from his body as images filled his head. Images of those he loved. Had loved.
"You killed Sirius!" he screamed, using his new legs to prop the lightening wall up.
"The Longbottoms!" His body was now shaking with exertion, blood and salty sweat dripping down his face. His lips tasted salty, and he screamed louder.
"AND MY PARENTS!"
The air around him gave a literal snap, the mist disappearing as another hiss filled the air.
And this time it hissed like a snake.
The damage Voldemort had done to his slumbering mind had been rectified. His Occlumency barriers, always imagined as a towering brick wall, stood firm. A glimpse of sun filtered in through the darkness as his skull pounded, screamed.
Harry Potter woke with a start.
The Seeker's chest heaved, ragged breaths racking his body, and he peered into the surprised blue eyes of none other than Ron Weasley, whom had just had Harry's wand vigorously shoved into his face.
"Calm down mate! It's me!" Ron hollered.
Harry did not relax. He remained rigid as he took in his friend's face, analyzing him, the dim moonlight reflecting the steely glint of battle deep within his own eyes.
Harry flexed his fingers about his wand, but he sure as hell didn't lower it from where he had it leveled directly between his best friend's eyes.
"What's Hermione's favorite color?" he demanded, jabbing the wand deeper into Ron's already marked forehead.
Ron jerked away, a look of bewilderment crossing his face. "Harry wha-"
"Answer. The. Question."
His dorm mates stared at him with jaws agape, but he didn't care. Past experience with Death Eaters and polyjuice potion had left him with something that ran far deeper than paranoia, and after a mental assault like the one he had just experienced he sure as fuck wasn't taking any chances.
"Red. Her favorite color is red. Okay? You happy now mate?" Ron asked, taking a tone ordinarily reserved for dealing with wild and recently caged animals. "Now," he reached out carefully, as if he was about to grab an asp behind the neck, "let's relax and put the wand down."
Harry hesitated, racking his brain for the right answer.
It took him several long, adrenaline fueled seconds to realize he had no idea. He had literally no idea what Hermione's favorite color was.
Well, if this didn't summarize 'world's shittiest friend' he didn't know what did.
In reality he'd just picked a question he hadn't known, because the answer would never be found at the forefront of his mind. It's what Dumbledore had taught him, because anything in his mind…well Voldemort could grab it.
At least until he got better at erecting mental walls.
Shit.
The weight of what that meant pressed down, and suddenly Harry felt like he couldn't breathe.
Shit.
Until he got a handle on this, unless he figured out how to keep Voldemort out, he needed to keep Ron and Hermione away. He needed to keep them all away.
For their own safety, so no one else would die.
Fuck if he knew how to though.
Harry heaved a labored breath, his brow creasing deep over his eyes. "Hermione's favorite color is fucking red?" He lowered his wand, glancing at the bright red bed hangings suspiciously. "Reckon she could have branched out a bit more."
"Yeah…" Ron was looking at him as if he'd recently gone daft. "Now care to explain why you practically took my eye out there mate? You were screaming in your sleep. Woke up half the dorm."
His stomach vaulted unpleasantly.
"Voldemort," he replied stiffly.
"Shit. They're getting worse then, I take it?"
Harry sniffed, the sound damn dour. "Understatement of the fucking year."
Ron grimaced, and without needing to be asked his best mate looked around at their other dorm mates, muttering, "Mind your own will ya? Shows over?"
Everyone still stared.
Harry threw a harsh glare of his own. "You heard him."
"Harry," Neville said with a frown, "we're just-"
"No offense," he cut across him, "but I'm not in the mood."
"Harry..." Ron started hesitantly.
"Sod off," he hissed, sounding serpentine as fuck himself. Without another word he untangled himself from the blankets, shoving between the curtains and past a confused Weasley.
His feet carried him to the bathroom. The mania he had felt at Voldemort's intrusion had carried over into the waking world and all he felt was paranoia and a white hot rage. Just what he needed: a few extra layers of paranoia to tip him from 'healthy' levels to Moody-esque, with a sprinkling of homey violence.
It didn't matter. He was going to die anyway, right? That was what that fucking prophecy meant.
Now all he cared about was keeping the friends he had left alive.
Harry stormed the lavatory with all the subtlety of a wrecking ball. Then he jabbed his wand straight out in true prison shiv fashion, snapping, "Homenum revelio!"
The light flashed out blue, and came back blue.
Not once did it glow green.
No one was there. No Death Eaters were waiting to ambush him. He was almost disappointed.
He fired off a few stunners at the stalls anyway. Two of the doors blew in, but regrettably he heard no bodies hit the floor.
Right. He shouldn't be too surprised by that. Of all the ways Voldemort had tried to off his ass, luring him into the boy's bathroom to cut his throat while he was taking a piss hadn't been one of them.
Logic told him this, but years of attack refuted it.
And now he knew, beyond a doubt, that there were student Death Eaters in the school.
Harry reached the sink, turned the knob and splashed his face with the vigor of the recently desert-stranded. The running water poured down, the sound relaxing as it circled the drain, and he dropped his head forward, his elbows supporting him on the counter's cool stone.
The familiar onslaught of pain hit him then, throbbing behind his temples. The pulsating pain of these nightly occurrences always hit him once the adrenaline rush receded.
So much for any chance he had of falling back asleep. He didn't know why he tried. Every night he either inadvertently intruded into Voldemort's mind, or Voldemort intentionally intruded into his.
Voldemort may not know the contents of the prophecy yet, but he had somehow found out that Harry knew, and the creature had been trying to break into his mind ever since. And night was when he was the most vulnerable.
Right now he felt too weak to deal with that. He wasn't about to collapse, like he often did during his Occlumency sessions with Dumbledore, but nevertheless, he was drained from the effort it had taken to shove Voldemort out. The wizard was like a parasite resistant to all modern drugs.
Then again, there was always that super comforting possibility that Voldemort had let himself be shoved out. In the world of dreams it was awfully hard to tell who was doing the brunt of the work, and Voldemort was a Slytherin at heart. He was a manipulative bastard, and a strategic one. It wouldn't be outside of the snake's playbook to 'pretend' to let Harry knock him out of his mind, only to hang around undetected for a lot longer.
Really, Harry could get led to believe Voldemort was gone, only to have the bastard hanging around for his school lessons, hearing who he talked to on a daily basis, finding out who he actually cared for and who he didn't, all so he could use it against him.
Well, wasn't that just fucking comforting?
Snape had been right. He might hate the bastard, but last year he had been right. He needed to get control of this. He should have gotten control of this a year ago.
Then Sirius might not be dead.
As it was, Harry had been a little bitch and hadn't. So now sleep was intermittent, his coursework was suffering, and the cooling weather just about matched his friends' demeanors towards him.
Every time Ron and Hermione looked at him their faces seemed tauter than usual, their expressions strained, lips pursed, voices lowered, and frowns in place more frequently.
That was probably a good thing though. They didn't know what the prophecy said. They didn't even know that he knew it, and they couldn't find out. It'd put more of a target on their backs then there already was.
He'd be damned if he led his friends into danger again. He knew he couldn't exactly tie them up and keep them out of future battles, or convince them to not play a part in the upcoming war, but they sure as fuck wouldn't be risking their lives on his account.
Not again.
He'd make damn sure of that, especially since Voldemort so oft taunted him with promises of sparing his friends if he would only join him.
He rose his head with new resolve, brushing his sopping wet, sweaty hair out of his eyes. Perhaps a shower would be enough to vanquish the disjointed images still lashing violently across his mind. Or, at the very least, it might help him brainstorm a bit.
Then again there was always the comforting possibility of drowning himself. That'd solve the whole problem, wouldn't it? Then Dumbledore could just walk straight up to Riddle and off the snake himself.
But, bitter as he was he still wanted to live, so he filed that suicidal plan into the 'last resort' column.
For now he needed a way to piss off Ron and Hermione. Not that he wasn't already doing it, what with his charming personality and all, but he needed to hit a fourth year 'Ron thinking he had entered the tournament and lied about it' level of pissing them off.
Fuck if he knew how to do that. Whatever it was would have to be extreme, yet subtle, because if it were anything slightly off they would guess the rationale for his behavior. But if he struck the right nerves properly, their natural pride would be enough a motivator for them to keep their distance.
For now.
He needed to cut ties with them for their own safety. He was a dangerous association to have, and it was time to stop being a coward, seeking solace in friendship and camaraderie, and time to start acting like the man he was supposed to be.
The one that was supposed to take out Voldemort, or be taken out himself.
He stormed to the shower, a quiet tirade of thoughts storming through his mind as he mulled over ways to gain an advantage on Voldemort. It was his favorite past time as of late, and his six NEWT classes and constant studying showed the extent of his obsession when it came to finding a way to beat the creature. One thing he had been working on with his friends was animgai study. It had been slow going, but he felt confident he could pull it off. His father had been able to. He would be able to. And after he assured his parting of the ways with Ron and Hermione he'd have to do it alone.
The time for acting like a bratty ass child squabbling with Snape was over.
It was time to start acting like the man he was meant to be.
Fuck.
ECOTS
"Silenco bourderas dispora."
He tore his eyes from the unfriendly storm clouds with a jolt. If he hadn't been paying attention to Tonks before, he certainly was now.
"I'm really beginning to think," Remus hissed as the sound barrier erupted around them, "that the Andromeda constellation was glad to get rid of you and your utter disregard for protocol."
Her ash gray hair hung artfully in front of her face, obscuring her eyes for a moment, before she flipped it lightly, a gray eye peering over at him all too seriously beneath gray lids. It was remarkable how she could change her whole body color to match the roof shingles.
"Remus, while I assure you that my mother appreciated the correlation between my departure from home, and her possessions' subsequent longevity, she never thought I had a lack for protocol."
He snorted. "You're right, it's Kingsley that you drive mad with that."
Tonks merely sniffed before redirecting her eyes to the expanse of ever brightening lawn before them, quietly humming the latest Hob Goblins hit, drumming her fingers on a shingle.
It was all he could do not to give her a good hard shove.
Besides, it wasn't like she'd get hurt, she was a witch after all, and he was pretty sure she'd bounce.
Pretty sure…
Just when he'd nearly justified that possible recourse for her nearly giving away their position to the early rising Muggle gardener mowing the lawn below, or even worse, to possible Death Eaters, she interrupted him.
"You're probably wondering Wolfy, why I did that."
Wolfy? "Well the thought did cross my mind."
She fixed him with a dazzling grey-toothed smile. "Well, since Kingsley and Spruner are due to replace us soon, and they are late..." Remus didn't need any reminder about that. Spruner and Kingsley were late, and he had been getting increasingly tense each minute.
Tonks voice drifted back. "...when they get here they may need a quiet landing area, particularly with that portly gardener outside. I'd hate to have to do a memory charm if he overheard us giving Spruner the night's report."
Almost as an afterthought she added, "Plus I was getting sick of being quiet. It's maddening."
Now he was not a violent man, but he felt his foot twitch slightly in a real urge to kick her.
"Alright Nymph..." he said, voice pacifying in a way best used on toddlers and terrorists. "Next time you decide to tempt fate, because you had an urge to chat, let me know. That way I can remind you how abysmally stupid it is to use a bright spell when we are supposed to be hiding. It's like putting a flashing beacon on a bear trap."
"You're too serious, you know that?"
"And so were you up until about twenty seconds ago. Now since you've obviously missed the analogy..."
"What's the analogy Remus?" She smiled sweetly, drumming her fingers, fraying his already frazzled nerves.
Ah, so he was indeed going to have to explain this to her.
He decided the best approach would be to use small, easily decipherable words. It'd suit her short attention span.
"The analogy, Nymphadora, is that we are the bear trap, and the bears, being the Death Eaters, are more likely to Avada Kevarda us to death if they know where we are because silly girls decided that they wanted to cast a bright colored spell. I do realize this is a taxing concept, but if you were worried about making too much noise when delivering the evening report to Spruner and Kingsley, when we are already located all the way up on the roof and quite out of ear shot of that poor gardener, had you perhaps considered the concept of whispering?"
Tonks, as usual, ignored all of this.
"So you'd prefer that my lump of a boss lands loudly and wakes up Muggle Man, String Bean, and the Pixie?"
He groaned quietly. Somewhere, over the course of the night, she had taken to referring to the President of Ireland, his wife, and his nine year old daughter that way. It was like she took glee in being as disrespectful as possible.
He drug in a patient breath. "Remind me again why you insist on referring to them so creatively?"
"Not personally referring to people you're assigned to protect keeps you dis-attached. It dehumanizes them in a way." She shrugged.
"And what was wrong with their official titles?" he asked, purely for the sake of argument.
"It's funner this way."
"Uh huh..."
Kingsley and Spruner were now fifteen minutes late.
An idea struck him.
"Tonks, do me a favor. Apparate back to Spruner's office and see what's keeping him will you?"
"And leave you? Don't think so Wolfmeister."
He was suddenly glad that James and Sirius were dead. He shuddered to think of what they'd make of her increasingly worse nicknames. "I think I preferred Wolfy."
Tonks flashed him a gray toothed grin that, but just as she opened her mouth to reply something flashed in his peripheral vision, freezing his blood cold.
"Don't," he whispered, "move."
Gratitude for the sound barrier rushed forth – not that he would ever admit this - and the werewolf clamped a steadying hand on her arm.
He felt her stiffen besides him, and he tightened his grip on his own wand, hoping fervently that it was just Kingsley and Spruner flying down in a disillusioned state from the gathering clouds above.
But it wasn't.
There were more than two disillusioned figures blurring swiftly through the air. He could see their silhouettes against the undersides of the heavy, dropping, rain clouds.
Tonks gave his wrist a hard jerk, signaling that she saw movement below.
He strained his eyes as far to the side as humanly possible, naught to incline his head, and caught sight of three posh, heavily guarded, limousines arriving at the Aras an Uachtarain's front gates. Early morning light glinted off the cold steel.
He could only hope that sunlight would be the only thing spilling upon these ancient grounds today, because the Death Eaters were arriving.
They would attack soon.
He counted nearly a dozen. That was far too many to arrange a quiet attack on the President of Ireland. No. This was no longer what their intelligence had suggested – a politically motivated attack on the leader of one Muggle nation to be blamed upon the leaders of a neighboring country. All that would have required was a single assassin. But a dozen?
This was something else. Something worse than anything Snape had anticipated.
He dimly wondered if Snape was up there, fulfilling his obligations as a spy, before his mind, numbed with shock, began operating properly once again.
Startled, he lay there, hissing instructions for Tonks to apparate away, watching the brewing war above him. They needed every available Order member here, and here soon.
They were going to need them.
ECOTS
Harry re-emerged from his fourth shower that morning, where he had been trying to drown himself. He'd rethought his suicidal plan, and decided to give it a go.
As it turned out, drowning oneself was a lot more difficult than imagined.
Despite his best efforts to be an unfathomable asshole, avoiding Ron had not been easy, and about the only place he could successfully do that was in the shower. He knew Ron wouldn't try to talk to him in there, and if he did then they had a whole new set of problems.
Regardless, Harry had stayed there until he was positive that Ron's hunger would have driven him down to breakfast.
He tossed away the towel, shrugging into his trousers, and beneath the fogged up mirror he saw a piece of paper just sitting there.
Harry stared at the counter like he'd gone mad. It was a note in Ron's handwriting, it so messy even he could barely read it. Harry squinted and deduced it was something about 'Great Hall', 'meeting him', and having 'aspirin waiting, or booze, whichever he could get out of a house elf first.'
Despite himself he flat out snorted.
This whole 'shoving his friends away to keep them safe thing' was going to be hard.
Hell, Harry actually considered not doing it, for about half a second.
And then Voldemort fired into his head like a rampaging bull. Harry's skull near exploded and his scar screamed. The water droplets still on his forehead sizzled, steam coming off his literal skin, and the pain ravaged him like wildfire.
His knees buckled and he nearly hit the countertop on the way down, but hell, at least he had nice hard kneecaps to absorb the floor's very hard impact. A low moan was coming from somewhere, and Harry was pretty positive it was him. Voldemort wasn't giving up this morning, the snake determined to 'chat'. This wasn't normal. Voldemort didn't just try to break into his waking thoughts on a daily basis.
But he was. Right now he sure as fuck was driving the maniac to desperate measures.
Well fuck him.
Harry's teeth gritted and he tried. He really tried. He tried to clear his mind despite the sadistic, pick axe wielding phantom from hell that had clearly infiltrated his skull, and slowly, very slowly, he began to succeed. He pictured his barriers, the ones Snape had told him to create after clearing his mind. He envisioned them as a looming wall of the strongest bricks imaginable, and as he did that lime green snake image appeared on it.
Harry scowled and mentally drew a horse's ass over Nagini's graffiti for good measure.
For some reason that actually worked. He'd think on all the ways that was deeply damn disturbing later though. Right now he just slumped down on the bathroom floor, his head bowed against the counter as he thought soothing things about vomiting. It took three minutes for the pain to pass, and once it did he staggered to his feet.
Too bad his head still throbbed and he seemed to have trouble walking straight.
He really hated that bastard. It was bad enough that the papers were constantly demonizing or idolizing him, that the school's thoughts could turn on a sickle, yet now he was being forced to fight for the privacy of his own mind. It wasn't fair, and he was right pissed off about it.
Anger boiled in his blood, a cold burning fury always there, just beneath the surface.
Harry grabbed his shirt and slung it over his shoulder, snatching up a towel and dragging it over his head, his hair still damp and sticking up in every conceivable direction. He stormed into his dorm, still drying his hair, and came to a dead stop.
The dorm wasn't empty.
A slim figure was bent over his nightstand, searching through his drawer. As he stood there the witch was oblivious to his presence, tossing something out of the drawer and onto his mattress, the scroll bouncing once and rolling to a stop against his pillow. The sun's morning light caught on several more rolls of parchment, all of which had already been spread out across his bed.
His nightstand was being ransacked.
If Harry had thought he had been mad before, this took it to new heights.
Kalliandra-fucking-Kaylens stood there, her back to him, the witch lifting a delicate hand and smoothing her hair behind her ear. She wore a mild frown, as if not finding what she was looking for.
Kalliandra-fucking-Kaylens.
Kaylens, who was lying about something.
Kaylens, who had been at Borgins, without explanation.
Kaylens, who had hexed him in the back, was in his dorm, rooting around furtively in his nightstand.
The pain roared in his skull, blood rushed in his ears, and he saw black.
He was on her in three foul steps. He snared her by the wrists and spun her around in a single rough move, twisting her arm behind her back. Kaylens made a startled sound that evaporated the instant she saw his expression, the wizard shoving her hard against the bed post, the sharp edge of the bed frame nearly taking out her knees.
She nearly fell, her form going weak. Harry tightened his hold and jerked her up, making sure she stayed standing. He wouldn't drop her, but he wouldn't let her go either.
"Potter…" she breathed, her legs kicking out in an attempt to move, but he shoved her harder against the edge, eliciting a small cry this time that left his boiling blood oddly regretful.
He wrestled that remorse and threw it down a dark damn hole, where it belonged.
"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" he hissed.
Kaylens cringed and went still. Very, very still as her eyes swept up, her hazel irises anchoring to his in bewilderment. "Ease off, Potter."
"Not," he shot angrily, "until you explain why you're going through my belongings."
She squirmed uncomfortably, pinned between him and the post, and only then did it occur that he'd dropped his shirt. The realization had him nearly drop her arms, the feel of her skin against his suddenly scalding.
But he didn't. His hands flexed on her small wrists and a drop of water rolled into his eyes, but he didn't.
Ultimately he didn't move, and neither did she.
She wet her lips, eyes dancing with nerve. "I wasn't," she whispered, as if trying to reason with a lunatic waving a gun, "going through your things, Potter."
"Then what the hell do you call that?" he demanded, tilting his head towards the mess on his bed, but never once removing his eyes from hers.
"Dean borrowed one of my Muggle books," she said. "He forgot it at breakfast so told me it was up here."
"Right…" he drew the word out. "And you expected an inanimate object to find its way into my nightstand how?"
Realization flitted across her features, softening them for the briefest of moments. Then she closed her eyes, Harry staring at the backs of her eyelids as she let out a long, irritated breath. "In case you haven't noticed," she practically whispered, her eyes cracking in a mildly annoyed glare, "your nightstands aren't exactly labeled. I would think it was rather obvious I choose the wrong one."
She paused, an errant lock of hair slipping in front of her eyes. Kaylens simply peered through it, her long, black eyelashes a startling contrast to the gleam of her hair.
She wrinkled her nose and blew it out of her face. "Now…can you please let me go?"
His hand nearly loosened.
And then it didn't.
He didn't know what to make of her. He never had figured it out, and there were enough Death Eaters roaming the halls in the guise of Slytherin uniforms to make him wonder exactly how many had wound up in Gryffindor.
A dull throb in the back of his skull sent that irrational anger resurfacing.
"What were you really looking for?" he asked suspiciously, tightening his hold, but this time he was met with a surprising amount of resistance.
She twisted and shoved back, and he reacted on sheer instinct, tightening his hold and grabbing her. The scuffle resulted in Kaylens arms both pinned against him as she nearly twisted away, the witch stopping as if startled.
Instead she just stared at him, and he stared right back, both heaving angry breaths at once.
His gaze slid down, studying her fingers with piercing scrutiny. They lay awkwardly against his chest, both her wrists clenched in his fists, Kaylen's fingertips growing slowly white as the circulation was cut off. Beads of water from his shower now coated her hands, his chest slick and not dried as well as he'd thought.
And his palms tingled. They tingled everywhere they touched.
He hissed a breath, and so did she.
"Potter, I made an honest mistake," she whispered with unnatural calm. "Now please… Let. Go. Of. Me."
His gaze darkened, boring into hers for another moment, searching for any hint of dishonesty. He wanted to see it, but he didn't. It was absent.
All he saw in her eyes was sheer exhaustion.
Her normally defiant features seemed somehow lessened, as if too fatigued to twist into anything else. Her golden hair hung limply down, as if a brush hadn't touched it in days. Darkened circles fell under her eyes artfully, rather than marringly, as if purposely put there to add to her rather than take away.
He took this all in and his grip relaxed, marginally. "What book?" he finally asked, rather weakly.
"Life, the Universe, and Me," she muttered, looking away, her anger at him still apparent.
"Sounds like Astronomy."
"It's not."
Kaylens turned her wrists within his loosened grip, as if testing mobility. He hated that. He needed her to stop, the friction it created as her skin moved under his…
A fresh wave of pain wracked his head.
With a pained growl his grip re-doubled, as did his suspicions. His gaze, clouded and dark, bored down. "I'm not entirely sure I believe you."
Kaylens winced. Every centimeter of her strangely plain face winced. "Then I suppose," she managed breathlessly, as if in pain, "we have more of a problem than just your over-inflated ego."
"Let me remind you which one of us spends half their time looking in a mirror," he shot back, once more noticing those darkened circles beneath her eyes. "You look like hell, by the way."
Something like hurt flashed in her eyes. "My apologies," she said quietly, not sounding sorry at all, "not all of us have mommy and daddy around to tell us how pretty we look so they can feed our egos all the time."
It was a lot like having a hand shoved straight through his chest.
He said nothing, absolutely nothing.
Ice flooded his chest. It filled his veins like antifreeze; cold and toxic and utterly incurable.
When he finally spoke he didn't recognize his own voice. "I don't know," he said with preternatural calm, "what you're really doing here, but I will find out."
"Is that a threat?"
"More a promise."
She made a quick move, trying to yank free-
He was quicker.
Harry jerked and jerked hard, pulling her back towards him with borderline violence. She slammed to his chest, letting out a startled sound. He didn't care. He just tightened his fingers around the delicate bones in her wrists and stared straight down, eyes blazing a hateful, angered trail across her face.
This time she didn't try to speak. She didn't try to yank away. She didn't so much as move. She just breathed against him, Harry feeling her every move. Finally…
"Considering that I think the sorting hat got you wrong, Slytherin, yes. It's a promise."
He could see it. He could see the slight pain in her expression, but when he spoke something strange shadowed her face.
She blinked at him for a half second.
Abruptly Kaylens pressed closer, leaning into him, not trying to run. Harry's heart thumped unnaturally, but he didn't move. He just stared down, anger and loathing etched in every centimeter of expression he could muster. Kaylens was equally determined, the witch's face tilted delicately up, nearly meeting his own, and her breathing….
It had gone shallow.
Incredibly, shakenly, shallow.
"You know Potter," she practically whispered, "I suspect you're right. There's a lot it got wrong."
He didn't know what that meant.
He didn't know if he wanted to.
She was so close he could see the flecks of green and brown in her otherwise golden irises.
The ice in his blood crackled. He opened his mouth, then closed it. Whatever he wanted to say, venom or not, refused to come out. His tongue, throat, refused to work. They'd gone dry. Beneath his grip he felt Kaylens wrists twist, her skin warm and soft, a strange tingling beneath his fingertips. The muscle in his chest thudded, skipped. He felt sick, and he couldn't talk.
So Harry stood there, pinning her to the bedpost, her warm form pressing to his half clothed one, a blazing look in her eyes as they remained there in utter silence.
Simply looking at one another.
Simply hating the other.
The hostility held out a moment too long; a deep voice barreled in.
"Hey Kal did you-"
The voice stopped.
Dean had choked on his sentence, but recovered quick. "Mind telling me what's going on here?" he demanded, voice loud. He sounded barely controlled and ready to do something about it.
Harry didn't acknowledge Dean. He just let go of Kaylens as if he'd been scalded, releasing her wrists, mulling over what she'd just said.
But Kaylens hadn't moved. She just stayed there, practically shaking, looking as if she weren't sure what to do. He looked deep into her eyes, and what he saw shook him.
"Harry!"
Ire, hot and deep, rushed into his throat. "Dean," he responded, voice almost mechanical, "I'm taking care of a problem." And then he stared at a point on the wall, eyes vacant as Kaylens came to life, pushing past him.
He heard a muffled exchange behind him, and thought over what she could have meant by that. It was better than thinking about why the fuck his chest had just twisted, his stomach jerking. He focused on anything else.
More than one person had been sorted wrong.
In the background her distantly heard Kaylens telling Dean, "Don't!" but paid it no mind. It was like being underwater, every sound distant and muffled.
And then a question broke through, loud and clear.
"Did you hear a word I just said Harry?"
Dean's contorted features appeared next to him. He hadn't, so he shrugged, not caring. He was too fixed on what Kaylens had been doing, on what she had said, on that burning feeling he'd had just from being touched.
Dean's prominent brow bent deep over his eyes. "Well, I'll ask you again, what were you doing?"
Ah, that.
"She was snooping through my stuff. What would you have done?" he replied, voice stiff. Heaving a hard breath he turned, bending down to grab at his belonging and unlabeled reports, beginning to shove them back into his dresser drawers.
Kaylens had ransacked it.
She needed a damn bell. Then next time he'd hear her coming.
Dean stared at him as if flabbergasted, before shaking his head like a wet dog trying to dry off. "Jesus Potter. You left fucking bruises on her."
That stab deep in his gut struck. He hadn't meant to. It didn't even occur to him that bruises couldn't, shouldn't form that fast. A wave of guilt washed over him, but he shook it off. "Can't be too careful, Thomas. Case you missed the memo, Death Eaters are everywhere, and when you find someone known to regularly consort with one going through your drawers..."
"Woah, Kally? You think Kally is a-"
"Death Eater," Harry supplied with a meaningful glance. "It's a possibility. You can't really tell anymore, can you?"
Dean looked as if he had just been dipped into twenty degree water, set on fire, then re-immersed in icy depths again.
"You really ought to think about things like that Dean, since you're around her the most. I'd hate to see her turn out to be one and you her first victim."
Dean had dropped onto his bed, staring wide eyed at Harry for several minutes, simply observing as he put his things back.
"Look," Dean started more gently, "I understand you've been through a lot Harry, but this paranoia of yours is getting ridiculous."
"Actually," he replied with remarkable calm, "this paranoia is what's kept me alive."
It took Dean a moment to regain his momentum. "You know what? Forget about it, I'll talk to her, but where have you been this morning?"
He paused, dropping the last of his reports back in the drawer. "Why does it matter?"
"Dumbledore's looking for you. He just took Hermione and Ron away." Dean paused, seeming to be thinking what he was about to say next over.
Ultimately he just took a deep damn breath and dove in.
"This morning…the Daily Prophet reported it. There's been more attacks on Muggle families, and this time every family that got targeted had a Muggleborn student here at Hogwarts."
Harry froze.
His first instinct was to bolt for the stairs and run to Dumbledore's office.
He'd check on Hermione. He'd check on Kaylens wrists afterwards.
His next reaction was much more logical, and it was the one he showed to Dean as his thoughts from this morning came back to him.
It was the perfect chance to drive them away.
He needed to cut ties with Ron and Hermione for their own protection.
No matter how much it gutted him.
"Send them my regards," he said, not even looking at Dean as he started leisurely making his bed. "But I'm in the middle of something. I'll see them later."
Dean was, for the third time that morning left speechless. It took him a moment to get out the jolted word, "What?"
"I said," he replied with dead calm, "that I was in the middle of something."
Dean was suddenly standing, his arm yanking Harry around to face him forcefully. "The hell you are!"
Harry already had his wand pointed at Dean's midsection. "I don't want to use this on you, but I will," he said. "So I'll be there when I'm good and ready."
Dean jerked away, staring at Harry as if he had never met him before. "Don't you get it, man?" he choked. "Are you really that thick? Hermione's parents are Muggles. Her parents could be-"
"Dead," Harry cut him off. "Yes, I'm well aware of the possibility."
"And don't you care? Hermione's your best fri-"
"Like I said," he cut across, "I'm busy."
Dean stared. "You asshole."
"That's one way of looking at it. I simply call it prioritizing."
The other wizard stared at him for one second, and then another. His fists had coiled at his sides…
Dean left, suddenly and swiftly, as if he needed to in order to avoid lunging at him.
But that didn't stop his dorm mate from sending him the most vivid glare he had ever received in his life.
Harry just stood there.
Just stood.
A wave of nausea swept over him. He choked it down and closed his eyes.
His head throbbed with deep, dark pain, Voldemort once again trying to get in. This…
This was the only way. He had to distance himself from them. He had to keep them safe. And after this…they would never speak to him again after this.
ECOTS
"That asshole..." Kally stood, shaking in front of the bathroom mirror, her skin on fire where Potter had touched. Her wrists hurt, throbbing, and she stared at them both as she tried to simply not shake. They hurt. They were sore. She couldn't tell why they were burning so badly.
With a shudder she shoved her hair away from her face, looking at her reflection in the bathroom mirror. Pale skin, limp hair and sunken eyes stared back. Potter was right; she looked like death.
That unbelievable asshole…
She tossed down her satchel, things scattering out of it and into the sink. She didn't notice. She just rooted around for the pepper-up potion she'd snagged from Madam Pomfrey. As she uncorked it the bruises around her wrists were visible, having formed quickly and still darkening to a purple-green hue.
She would have been just as pissed had she caught him going through her stuff.
She could still feel how he'd pressed her against his nightstand.
Her hands shook. "What an asshole," she whispered, stating it aloud to the empty bathroom, as if reassuring herself that she should have every right to be angry with him for roughing her up, calling her a Slytherin, and then telling her she looked like hell.
Well he's right, you do... a small voice agreed in the back of her mind.
Oh shut it.
She uncapped the remedy and downed it.
The effects were instantaneous. The lethargy she had been feeling since she had awoken from her unconscious stupor that morning vanished. The nausea that had been so severe that she had skipped eating breakfast altogether, favoring a visit to Madam Pomfrey instead, was significantly lessened. Even her pale skin seemed to regain some of its color back.
This should have improved her mood, but it didn't.
She'd practiced magic this morning; she'd also passed out. It hadn't worked, because it never sodding did.
She was sick. She could see it in the mirror, see it in her every sodding movement. She could feel it.
She was still angry at Potter.
But she'd rather be angry at Dumbledore, at Remus, at Hagrid. That was easier. That was easier than thinking about that asshole in the dorms nearby. The adults should have warned her about what was coming. They should have warned her about how much it was going to physically hurt when she tried using magic, about how easily she would lose consciousness each and every single time.
Thing was, she'd learned more from Madame Pomfrey this morning than from any of them, and she was still upset, shaken over it.
Apparently the adults around here sucked at providing information clearly.
With that thought in mind Kally unearthed her compact from her back jean pocket. She was just about to flip it open and have a heated word with one such adult, when she noticed it was already glowing.
She snapped it open.
"Remus you have got a lot of explaining to..."
Her voice died in her throat at the bloodied, mangled sight that met her.
