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Chapter Eleven—Blasting Hand
Harry shook his head as he watched Riddle ordering a fifth-year around, sending him off to fetch Riddle's books and quill, berating him when he supposedly came back with the wrong ones, and firing off insults that made his "Knights" laugh and scramble closer to him.
They were partially scrambling for his approval, too, Harry noted. It was obvious, seeing them close at hand now and not from a distance as he'd viewed them the first few days he'd spent in Slytherin, that they were as much afraid of Riddle as anyone else. But instead of confronting him or even running away, they also tried to use Riddle for his power, and deflect his anger and sadism onto other people.
It made Harry sick, but he kept repeating to himself that he wasn't here to cause trouble or change things. And so far, although he'd heard rumors of Riddle torturing people, he hadn't seen it happen.
He couldn't interfere.
At least he had the ability to sneak outside and get on the brooms when he really wanted to fly. He didn't know what he would have done if he had no escape at all. Probably have exploded in the middle of the common room and told Riddle all about how he was noseless and incompetent in the future.
Riddle started in with taunting another fifth-year, and Harry abruptly couldn't take it anymore. He made sure to stand casually and stroll out of the common room as though a thought had just occurred to him and it had nothing to do with Riddle. Encouraging anyone to notice him would defeat the whole point of being Sorted into Slytherin in the first place.
He got a few corridors away from the dungeons before allowing himself to walk faster. He could actually go outside and ride a broom legitimately before curfew if he hurried.
"Evans."
Someone willing to call him Evans was a rarity that made Harry stop and spin around for all that he really needed to get on a broom. There was a painfully familiar face on the boy standing behind him. This must be Charlus Potter, Harry thought. He'd seen him at a distance but never approached him.
"Harry Evans," Harry said with a nod, and tried to ignore the sneer on Charlus's face.
"I hear that people have been calling you Potter."
"I told them to leave off," Harry muttered, and didn't have to disguise his own irritation. It made Charlus blink and look at him a little more closely. "I'm not your cousin or anything. I don't mean to make any claims on your family, okay? My mother was Muggleborn, and she never told me much about my father." All true, as it happened. "I've tried to get the professors and my Housemates to not use it, but they keep insisting that my hair proves I must be a Potter or something."
"Maybe," Charlus said, dragging his gaze along Harry's hair. It was a concession Harry hadn't expected to get from him, and he was left off-guard and blinking when Charlus continued, "But do you mind if we quash the rumors? Now people are muttering that we left a child to be mistreated in the Muggle world, and we didn't. If someone from my family did father you, we didn't know about it. We would have taken you in. Made sure you were safe."
A wave of longing poured over Harry, so intense that he couldn't breathe for a second. To grow up with his father's family. To grow up with any family who would have done for him what the Dursleys refused to…
But it was another reminder that he didn't belong in this time period, where there were Potters around who could have done that. Harry smiled, and didn't care if the smile came off a little artificial, although it did make Charlus eye him. "No. Go ahead and get rid of them. No one has any reason to listen to me, poor Muggleborn orphan that I am. But they'll listen to your family. You're pretty powerful, right?"
That made Charlus puff right up, and got his gaze off Harry, which Harry had been aiming for. I suppose I'm learning some Slytherin manipulation. "Yeah. I don't want to brag, but we're pretty wealthy. And we have a huge house, you know?"
"Potter Manor?" Harry asked, just because he'd heard people tossing around names in the Slytherin common room and knew there was a Malfoy Manor. Well, of course, there was also Grimmauld Place.
It was hard to look at Orion Black on a daily basis. It hurt too much.
Charlus grinned, making him look almost exactly like the James Potter Harry had seen in Snape's Pensieve, only shorter. "You have no idea. It's this huge, pretentious maze of a house, and I don't think that half the rooms have been used since my grandmother's time. It's—look, we're wealthy, we have nothing against Muggles or Muggleborns, we would have taken care of you, you know? If you had any relation to us," he added hastily.
Harry smiled and nodded. "Of course. I understand. And if you can get people to back off calling me Potter and call me Evans instead, it'll be a relief, frankly."
"Good. You know, Evans, you're not such a bad bloke, for a Slytherin."
"Thanks. You're not bad for a Gryffindor."
They shared a laugh, and then Charlus trotted off and Harry cast a charm. He didn't have enough time left until curfew to go to the Quidditch pitch openly. It would have to be secret passages and shadowy corridors, like usual.
But he was glad that he had run into Charlus, nonetheless. Maybe the Potter family could calm down the rumors and stop unwanted attention from being directed at Harry. Maybe people would stop mistaking him for someone who belonged in this time.
Maybe he could take out the Darker books that he knew were lurking in the library but hadn't found enough unsupervised enough time alone with yet, and people would ignore him because that Evans, that Mudblood piece of rubbish, who cared what he did?
Maybe I can go home.
Harry is running faster than Orion knew he could.
And he's running so fast that Orion knows he's going to be reckless, and probably plow into some of the traps that Riddle has waiting for them.
The first of those is a tripwire at knee height that Orion only sees because he's a little way behind Harry and catches the light flashing off something silvery that shouldn't be there. That silvery color indicates a nasty hex. He opens his mouth to shout, and between one stride and the next, Harry leaps over the tripwire.
Orion blinks and dissipates it with a slash of his wand, in case Abraxas didn't see it in time, but he feels a little more hopeful.
Up ahead, though, he sees something dark and winding spread its wings through the middle of the corridor, and he shivers. This won't be something that Harry can just dodge or ignore. It's a Despair Cloud, and Orion doesn't know if Riddle invented it or found it in some really old Dark Arts book that no one else has accessed in years, but it gets into your mind, it fills you with a conviction of your own uselessness, it—
"Expecto Patronum!"
Harry's stag forms in the middle of the corridor and gallops ahead, his antlers lowered. They pierce the middle of the Despair Cloud, and while they don't get rid of it entirely, a lighted path opens up in the middle, letting the Patronus charge through. Harry goes right behind him.
Orion shakes his head as he follows with Abraxas now running at his side. He supposes it makes sense. The Despair Cloud mimics some of the effects of Dementors, and a Patronus is effective against those…
But a small sensation of unease keeping pinging in the middle of his chest like an alarm ward at Grimmauld Place, whispering that while they might have been lucky so far, they won't be lucky when they get there.
It doesn't matter, of course. Harry is going into danger, and where he goes, Orion follows.
He just wishes it did matter.
They find Riddle holding Alphard in a shimmering cage of pure magical energy at the end of the first-floor corridor nearest the Grand Staircase.
Harry slams to a halt as he sees Alphard. Orion doesn't know if he recognizes that Riddle's wand, resting on a bar of the cage, is a threat, or knows the spell—which Orion doesn't—and that it's complicated to get rid of, or simply has to make a plan. But from the utter black rage on Harry's face, Orion won't give much for Riddle's chances.
"Now, Harry," Riddle says, his voice caressing Harry's name in a way that makes Orion feel as if someone's dumped Bubotuber pus down his spine, "it's time for you to dance to my tune."
"Alphard, are you okay?" Harry asks, his eyes locked on the cage, ignoring Riddle entirely.
Alphard lifts his head. He has a split lip and a swelling of some kind on his cheek that's probably a welt caused by a spell. His eyes are wide, and he's shaking, but Orion can see the way his hands are clenched. He's angry, too, and Orion hopes that means that this mistreatment by Riddle won't break his spirit.
"I'm all right," Alphard whispers.
"Are you paying attention to me, Harry?"
Harry turns around and stares at Riddle. But Abraxas actually speaks up before he can, which isn't something Orion would have suspected. "You've done it now, Riddle. Attacking a member of the Ancient and Noble House of Black? One three years younger than you are? Arcturus Black is going to have a conniption."
Riddle laughs. "I hardly think so. If I could torture his son…"
Orion withstands Riddle's searing gaze when it sweeps to him, but he says evenly, "I never told him. I was older, and I had chosen to follow you of my own free will. I didn't think I had the right. But Alphard is thirteen, and hasn't made the same choices. This was wrong of you, Riddle. Abraxas is right. My father will be very interested in this."
For a moment, Riddle's face twitches with uncertainty. But the next instant, it's gone, and he's sneering at Orion and Abraxas, and turning back to Harry. "So what are you going to do, Harry?" he asks conversationally. "You must know there's no way to get dear Alphard here out of the cage without hurting him. In fact, it'll take a sacrifice of intense pain to break the cage. And it can't be the caster's."
Harry is breathing hard, which Orion doesn't think is just because of the run they undertook to get here. He flickers his eyes back and forth between Riddle and the cage, Alphard and Riddle's wand, and Orion thinks he looks lost.
But a second later, he smiles grimly. "Catch, Riddle," he says, and tosses something into the air.
It's the little black book that he called insurance. Riddle's head snaps around to follow it, and a sharp hiss emerges from his lips. He lunges for it.
Which means he removes his wand from Alphard's cage, and Harry lunges forwards and grasps one of the bars with his hand.
The cage hisses more loudly than Riddle. Orion smells charring flesh. Harry screams.
But he also reaches forwards with his other hand, which goes through the cage bars as they vanish without any burning smells, and drags Alphard out and behind him, spinning. His right hand goes with supernatural quickness from Alphard's arm to his wand, and then he's holding it, eyes locked on Riddle's back like goblin diamond drills.
Orion stares at Harry's left hand. His palm is bubbling, the skin is scorched black, and—
Harry is missing his last two fingers.
Riddle is scrambling around with the little black book in his hand while Orion is still trying to process that. He stares at it, opens it, then drops it and turns towards Harry. "This isn't—"
"Oculus pro oculo!" Harry snarls.
The spell, which Orion recognizes as a profoundly Dark curse, strikes Riddle in a jagged stroke of black lightning, moving like a cobra. Riddle gives a short, sharp shriek. Orion looks hopefully at his hand, but it isn't blistering or losing fingers like Harry's. From the way Riddle bends over, though, it's given him the same pain.
Orion is disappointed, but he knows it must be the first time Harry's cast the Eye for an Eye Curse, and it makes sense that it wouldn't repay Riddle the exact damage Harry suffered in that case.
His own rage makes him slow, slower than Abraxas, who takes a step closer and kicks Riddle in the chest. Riddle manages to twist away from the kick and settle back into a corner of the wall, but he's distracted, and still clutching his hand, and his wand rolls away from him and into the middle of the floor.
Orion steps on it.
He catches Riddle's eye, and lets his own anger surge through him, lets his smile lift the corners of his lips, the smile that his father told him not to wear in public unless he's just scored the political coup of the decade. Well, Father will understand, once Orion tells him about this.
Abraxas is right. Riddle has gone too long tormenting members of the Ancient and Noble House of Black. Orion should have told his father a year ago, should have told Mrs. Malfoy about it when Riddle tortured Abraxas. He should have stood up for himself before this.
It took Harry to make him do it. Orion's not proud of that, but he's glad.
"I could snap it right now, Riddle," Orion says softly. "I could make you wandless. I could force you to buy another one that will give out on you in a duel one day."
Riddle gives him the snarl of a cornered tiger, although his eyes are still distended with terror as much as fury. Orion knows forcing him to actually buy a new wand won't end well.
Even if it would be so, so satisfying.
But Orion can do something else. He says, "Swear an oath."
"How can I do that without a wand?"
"Swear an oath on your magic," Orion says. "Unless you can't do that because you're so weak without a wand, Riddle. Are you? Were you having us on when you tried to tell us that you're the scion of Salazar Slytherin's great and noble bloodline? I'm sure he could swear an oath without a wand."
In truth, not having his wand means the oath will be less binding on Riddle, too, hurting him if he breaks it but not taking away his magic. But giving him his wand back is not an option. And this confrontation can't end or change things once and for all. It will give them some breathing space, though, and that's the only thing Orion wants at the moment.
Riddle snarls again, but his eyes are locked on Orion's boot. Orion helpfully presses down harder.
"What oath do you want me to swear?"
"You'll leave Alphard alone for a year and a day," Orion says. "In fact, you'll leave any student below sixth year out of your games. A year and a day," he adds, as Riddle's lips start to shape a denial. "If you refuse, well, you know what happens."
Riddle glances back and forth between him and his boot. Orion stands tall and wonders a little at how quiet Harry is being behind him. Then again, with his pain and the powerful curse he already cast, maybe he needs time to recover and is staying still to prevent Riddle from learning that.
"Fine," Riddle spits out at last. His eyes are locked on Orion again, something Orion once craved, then dreaded, and now just feels able to stand up to. "I swear that I'll leave Alphard alone—"
"No, Riddle, we're going to work out the wording of the oath between us, you and I."
It takes several rounds of spitting and cursing (the wandless kind) and refusals and sighing from Orion until the oath is hammered out to their satisfaction. Well, Orion's, anyway. He doesn't really give a Niffler what Riddle wants. Riddle swears in extensive detail to leave any student in Hogwarts, in any House, below sixth year out of his games, including not torturing them, bullying them, cursing them, pranking them, trying to recruit them, using them in rituals, poisoning them, potioning them, and so on, for a year and a day.
Orion nods when it's finished. He consulted with Abraxas at several points, because Abraxas has a mind much more like a solicitor's than Orion's. He steps back and flicks his boot at the same time, so Riddle's wand clatters towards him.
Riddle immediately raises it, of course, and that's when Harry speaks again.
"Ignis intus."
This time, the curse works the way it's intended to. Riddle chokes back his scream as his right arm bursts into flame, and snatches it back to his side, muffling the fire. Orion turns to see Harry standing absolutely straight, his blackened left hand down at his side, his body still shielding Alphard, his right hand clutching his wand.
"You know what's waiting for you next time, Riddle," Harry says.
Riddle's eyes dart back and forth between them. "We'll see what the professors say," he sneers, and stands.
"Yes, we will," Harry says, with a sweet smile that Orion doesn't understand. Of course, even Riddle's threat to go to the professors, who absolutely trust and like Riddle more than most of them do with most Slytherins, is better than Riddle cursing children like Alphard.
And perhaps Orion could have got Riddle to swear an oath that would prevent him from taking vengeance on the rest of them for a year and a day, although he honestly doesn't know what Riddle would have done if forced to choose between his revenge and his wand. But he doesn't think they need to. The people who stood up to Riddle today are three: Harry, Orion, and Abraxas. They aren't depending on just Harry to protect them anymore, and they no longer believe Riddle is invincible.
Still a dangerous opponent, of course he is, and Orion doesn't plan to turn his back on the bastard. But not invincible.
He watches Riddle walk away, and turns to Harry. Harry has his eyes closed and his body half-curled to shield his left hand, but he still looks up at Orion when he comes near with a shining smile.
"You made sure he couldn't hurt Alphard again," he says. "Thank you."
Orion wants to say lots of things as he meets those eyes, including that Harry is the one who inspired him to stand up against Riddle, but he doesn't get to, because in the next second those eyes are closed, and Harry slumps to the floor in a dead faint.