Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, and I do not claim any monetary funds or otherwise on the creation of this story. The only things I own are the plot and the loveable original characters coming up in the story. So please, don't sue~!

A/n: First of, thank you for your lovely reviews~! I only wish I could've gotten this to you guys faster.

Second of…

Umm… well, I did have a beta, but then we never managed to get in contact, so, once again, I give you an unbeta-ed chapter. (=__=) I'm terribly sorry, and Sabina8, if you see this, 's messaging system wouldn't display the screen name you were trying to give me so I couldn't contact you. If you're still interested, just toss me a PM. Now, without further delay, chapter 3~

Chapter 3: Connaissance

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"Lily. Li. Dmitri Li," he answered finally, tapping his hands on the table.

Snape smiled and nodded. "I like it."

And that, as they say, was that.

Harry, now Dmitri, stared at the golden quill as Snape wrote down his new name in fanciful, curlicue letters. The moment the last dot on the 'i' was placed, the quill disappeared and the page of the notebook tore itself out, folding itself neatly before vanishing as well.

"What was that all about?" he inquired softly, following the wisps of smoke both vanished items had left behind. Snape watched him curiously.

"That was me formally putting your name into the registers of the Second Realm," came the equally soft response, and Ha- Dmitri took a moment to ponder upon it.

"What is this Second Realm you keep speaking of, anyways?"

The was a long pause before both men sighed, Dmitri more out of boredom, and Snape out of weariness. "That is a very broad topic, actually. To put it simply, there are four realms that lay side by side, five if you count the Elven one, which most people don't, for fear of their lives: The Earthen Realm, the Light Realm, the Dark Realm, and the Second Realm.

"Each of these realms hold different types of beings, the Earthen Realm holding the most diversity of all, which is currently something from each realm. The Dark Realm holds a variety of demons and beings that feed off of negative energy. The Light Realm is, essentially, where Angels, Pegasi, and other light based creatures such as nymphs and dryads come from. And, the Second Realm is where all the hybrids stay. Humans aren't exactly the most accommodating, and neither are the other realms when one thinks about it, so another realm was created to protect the hybrids. Which is where you fall. You're bloodline, the Potter-line, descends from the Light Realm. Your father's father was an ambassador between the Human Realm and the Light Realm.

"Your father, James Potter, was a full blooded Seraphim, who fell in love with your mother, Lily Evans. When they consummated their relationship, you were born, but nobody knew whether your mother's muggle genes would affect you as a hybrid."

"Which they didn't," Dmitri stated, an unreadable look in his eyes. Snape sighed again, absently fiddling with the sleeve of his robe.

"No, they didn't."

Dmitri nodded absently, drumming his fingers on the table. "So, what about this place then? Which realm is this in?"

At this, Snape smirked. "None, actually."

Dmitri sputtered. "What? None? How?""Quite easily, actually. In between each realm, there is a non-dimensional portal, a pocket so to speak, which people call Oiad Niiso, which means The Way in Enochian, an ancient Angelic language. This place is inside one of these pockets. It is a Nia-Cod Oali, a safe house."

"So, this place technically exists outside of all the other realms?" he murmured, gazing around in wonder. Snape nodded once, pleased Dmitri had caught on so quick.

"Exactly. Which is why our wounds here have not given us any trouble. In here, the same rules don't apply and things like pain work differently. That is not to say you can't get harmed here. Just that, whatever happens here, will not be present when you leave, and whatever you had before you came here, will not be present whilst you remain. However, after you leave…"

"Everything returns to the way it was?"

"Precisely."

"What about things like knowledge, or effects from potions and such?" Dmitri asked after a bit of contemplation. Snape paused, surprised at the usefulness of the question, having been expecting the boy to be more than a little unintelligent. Dmitri spotted the surprise and scowled, knowing exactly what the other was thinking. "What? I can ask meaningful questions too, you know."

At that, Snape snorted. "I don't doubt you could," he answered dryly before shaking his head. "Your uselessness aside-" Dmitri's scowl deepened, "things like knowledge will be retained, and depending on the potion, depends if it will work. If you took healing potions now, they would not heal the injuries you received outside of the realm, since they technically do not exist here, but potions to enhance the mind and make the body efficient will carry out, if you take them either whilst connected to another realm, or within real time."

"Ah, that makes sense," Dmitri replied, an intent look on his face. Snape studied him silently, unused to seeing the boy so focused. "Hang on, you said real time, right? So, does this mean this place is also set out of time?"

A nod was the only response he got, and he stood up, summoning the library index once more. All the library books that he'd been reading before levitated up and back into their places and he watched them absentmindedly. "Can this time flow be controlled, or will I suddenly appear fifty years into the future?"

Snape shook his head. "You misunderstand. There is no time flow here at all. This place doesn't exist in any dimension, and therefore shouldn't exist at all. But it does, and nothing works logically here. Or maybe everything does, and we're the illogical ones…"

At this point, Dmitri's eyes began to get unfocused and Snape chuckled. "But, it is pointless to think of such things now. Just accept things for what they are here and try not to get lost. This place appears to simultaneously be made entirely out of matter and non-matter, magic and non-magic, and logic and nonsense."

Dmitri grinned. "So, pretty much 'The Wonderland of the Wizarding World'?"

He was proud when Snape let loose an amused bark of laughter. "Indeed, Mr. Li, indeed."

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A few hours later found Dmitri still in the library, pouring over books on Nephilim, Seraphim, and the other realms. His stomach grumbled, protesting loudly its mistreatment and he sighed. Obviously, it was time for some grub.

He left the room with a book entitled "The Newcomer's Guide to Species and their Habits", and left for the direction he remembered the kitchen being in…

… which is why he was under stably confused when he found himself on the third floor of the house when he hadn't climbed any stairs whatsoever.

The hallway he was standing in was covered entirely by vines, with strange and vibrant orange-red lily-looking flowers blooming intermittently along it, each emitting a golden light that was the only thing illuminating his way. When he turned around to go back, he found there was no corner, and that there was only the same hallway, leading so far back, he was entirely sure it wouldn't have fit along the length of the Hogwarts castle.

"What was that Sn- Severus said about not getting lost again?" he muttered to himself, hesitantly continuing his journey.

As he walked, the hallway seemed to fill with sounds he had heard from behind the door at the Dursley's, high-pitched laughter, and ethereal voices, teasingly brushing against his senses and filling him with a deep sense of urgency.

"Noasmi ol ollog… ol pashs… ol hoath… noasmi ol ollog…"[1]

He gasped, dropping his book, and clutched at his head as the voice thundered around it, strangely translating itself in his mind, falling to his knees right beside an ivory door. There was a large chain dangling on either side of the frame, as if it had been broken, but Dmitri didn't notice that until the door had swung open.

Killing-curse green eyes widened in shock and he yelled as he was confronted by an onyx shadowy mass that stank of evil and ill-will. He scrambled back and hit a wall, prompting the vines to start writhing angrily and constrain him to the wall.

He struggled futilely, feeling sick as the black mass came towards him, creeping slowly over his shoes and caressing his legs in a cold embrace. He shuddered, nightmare after nightmare re-surfacing, some not even his at all. He saw his mother fall, the scream, the flash of green, a cold laugh, pain, Voldemort on Quirrell's head, Aragog… memory after memory.

His eyes had turned all green again, with flecks of silver that swirled in his agitation, and the mass crept even further up his body.

// Pathetic human… ssssss… asssss if yousss could be the onessss from the prophecy….//

Dmitri gasped at the words that appeared to be coming from inside his head, and the demon laughed cruelly.

// I sssshall have funsss killing yousss… maybe even makesss yousss my petsss… yessss…. Wertlossss likessss thissss plansss… maybe I even ussse your pretty little face… yesss…. //

It caressed his face slowly, pinning him further in place, and Dmitri looked up fearfully. The demon, Wertlos, grinned, mouth an even blacker hole, lined by grotesquely disfigured rotting teeth. A wave of rancid breath washed over him, making his choke and gag, eyes watering as the gnarled hand burned a trail across his skin.

"L-let me go!" he cried, trying to wrench himself free to no avail.

Wertlos cackled gleefully. // No… with yousss, I will… becomessss… a full-fledged sssshadow demons… andsss thosssse foolsss will laughsss at me no moresss… //

Before it could say much more, there was a flash of light, and Dmitri saw Snape appear, hair flapping around his back wildly in the wind from his own appearance. Briefly, he wondered when Snape's hair had gotten so long, but the thought soon vanished as the demon wrenched itself off of him, launching its body at Snape.

The ex-professor side-stepped the attack with a practiced ease and then held up his hand, eyes narrowing.

"Thosi… Shes!"

Tendrils of fire flew from Snape's outstretched palm and wrapped around Wertlos, whose scream was so awful Dmitri had to clap his hands over his ears, and burned hotly, causing the vines still wrapped around him to retreat further up the wall.

The demon spat out globs of black fire that Snape blocked with another word and a swipe of his palm, until finally, the retaliation stopped. Picking the creature up with yet another word to levitate it, the potions master smirked.

"Speak now your purpose, demon, or be silenced forever."

// Neversss… you disssgusssting lower breed… dissssgrace to our kindssss… taintedsss bloodsss… //

Snape's mouth twisted up into a disgusted sneer. "The only disgrace here is you, Wertlos."

A globe formed around the blob at a sharp gesture from Snape who sneered at the creature.

"O , shai porali os vali, jhaeli sor vaer! Balor!"

Wertlos vanished with an enraged scream, and Snape was left standing within a string of runes that Dmitri somehow knew to be Elven.

For a moment, neither men said anything, until Dmitri shifted, looking down at his legs.

"Didn't I warn you, brat, not to get lost?" the older man snapped, turning flashing red eyes onto him. Dmitri didn't even bother responding, instead gaping upwards.

"I had been wondering why you knew so much about everything… it's because you're not human either, are you. You're a hybrid… but… from the Dark Realm, right?"

Snape seemed to visibly flinch. "No, I am not a half-breed. My father was a half-breed, which makes me a quarter breed. I was not eligible for the Second Realm on the grounds that my inheritance hadn't manifested enough."

The bitterness was evident in his voice, making Dmitri regret asking him the question. "Oh… I didn't realize it mattered."

He sounded so apologetic that Snape rolled his eyes and reached over to smack him lightly upside the head, staring straight ahead.

"It doesn't really, and it shouldn't. Never forget that."

Dmitri smiled inwardly, even as he scowled and rubbed his head. His stomach chose that moment to announce, quite loudly, how hungry it still was, and he looked at Snape sheepishly.

"So, er… which way to the kitchen?" he said slowly, picking up the dropped book.

Snape snorted. "Useless brat."

For once, it didn't carry it's usual bite.

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Finally back in the kitchen, Dmitri decided to make up for his earlier mistake by cooking the food, shushing Snape when the other man tried to stop him grumbling about brats destroying his kitchen.

At that, Dmitri had spun around, eyes shining with mirth.

"Wait, so this fairytale cottage is yours?" he cackled, practically beaming with glee as Severus shot him an irritated glare, just a tinge of red colouring his cheeks.

"No. And you'd be wise to keep your gleeful comments to yourself, Mr. Potter," he snapped waspishly, prompting Harry to start laughing again.

"That's Mr. Li, now, professor."

Snape just responded with a scowl, retiring to the front room with a book he'd pulled out of somewhere. Dmitri smiled slightly and began clanking about the kitchen cheerily, surprised to see everything well stocked and ready to use.

"Severus, I'm going to make Shepard's Pie, alright," he called, and proceeded after an affirmative was given. After a few moments of silence, Dmitri decided to fill it by asking some new questions that had been brought to his attention.

"You were speaking an Elven language just now against Wertlos, weren't you?" he called, grinning a bit as Severus sighed and made his way back into the kitchen to sit.

"Indeed I was," was the only reply he got, and Dmitri sighed as well. Apparently, this was going to turn into a game of Twenty Questions.

"Which one?" he asked. For, as uneducated as he was at Hogwarts, even he knew there were more than one Elven language. "The High Elven one?"

At that, Severus laughed. "Oh no, Dmitri. Nobody but the Elves, the Deities, and the Arch Demons know the High Elven language. No, this is a more common tongue, one that all hybrids and all other realm creatures know. Well, if they are taught. It is called Eberron. It is the tongue that is used to cast spells, rather than Latin, which is a purely human language, though it is rumoured that the Elves themselves had something to do with it."

"Oh, so, there is also a hierarchy throughout the realms too?" he asked, frowning slightly. Snape smiled wryly.

"Yes. Even stricter than the pureblood supremacists you have faced thus far," he answered.

Dmitri looked incredulous. "Even more so than Lucius Bastardius Malfoy?"

The potion's master rolled his eyes. "Language, Mr. Li. And yes, even more than him. Which, in all honesty, is very amusing, considering everyone knows they have Veela blood in them, even though it is less than my own Vampiric blood."

He snorted as the other jumped and almost dumped the mince onto the floor. "You're a vampire?" he exclaimed, mouth forming an 'O' in his shock. "B-But you walk in sunlight, and you have a reflection, I'm pretty sure garlic does nothing to you, and… I've never seen you drink blood!"

Snape stood through the tirade looking bored, faintly frowning at the ranting boy.

"Perhaps all those things you've heard are merely urban myths, boy. And, did you make it a habit to watch me? Because I am fairly sure your eyes were more than occupied with drooling at Draco Malfoy most of the time."

He was pleased when Harry jumped again, not at all fazed by the dark glare he was receiving. "I was not drooling at Malfoy, you git. I was making sure he wasn't doing anything to try and get me bloody killed, as per usual, in case you hadn't notice, professor."

Snape ignored the deliberate jab, turning back to his book and smirking as Dmitri went back to clattering about, cursing him under his breath. If there was one thing he had truly loved about his job, it was his ability to antagonize as many snivelling, useless creatures people called children as he wanted. He sighed as Dmitri spoke again, seemingly on the idea that conversation was a necessity between them. They were both surprised they had managed civility so long.

"What were the spells you cast?"

Ah, an easy one this time.

"First of, they weren't spells, but incantations that tie directly into the magics of either the realm or one's own core, thus making the use of a focus such as a wand obsolete. Second, the first incantation I used was essentially 'Fire… burn!', in which I directly tapped into the magic of nature to manipulate the element of fire. If I was a fire demon, or a being with an affinity for fire, I would be able to call a stronger flame, and I could use my core more effectively.

"The second incantation I used can be literally translated to 'You, who disgrace our race, leave this realm: Vanish!' was more intent based, which means the magic came from my core to do what I willed it to. It basically works on the same principle as wandless magic, where it taps directly into the magic flow and is channelled by your intent."

The food was almost done at this point, with only the light baking of the pie left to be done, and Dmitri shifted over to the table and sat down after setting the timer.

"Oh, I see. So, instead of focusing on forcing the magic to operate a certain way by limiting it to words, wand gestures, and a medium, instead, you channel it directly by using intent and will combined with the essence of the incantation to make things happen the way you want," he summarized, blinking over at Snape to see if he was correct before continuing.

Snape nodded, once again surprised by the boy's intellect and fast ability to pick up on things.

"Which basically means that, in theory, anything is possible as long as one has the will for it, but it also depends on the skill of the one doing the incanting, and how much power they can control with their intent, and how much magic their channels can hold, right?"

Snape nodded again as he continued to talk, dumbfounded at the boy's keenness before smiling so softly, Dmitri almost had a heart attack. "What? What's with that creepy expression?" he muttered, looking around oddly. Snape shook his head.

"Nothing, I was just thinking about how you are more like your mother than I thought," he said, right as the timer for the food went off. Dmitri didn't reply, scrambling off of his chair to get to the food, hiding his expression from Snape. Reflected in the glass of the over, his sappily smiling face stared back out at him and he shook his head, grabbing the grub.

"Thanks, Severus. That means a lot to me, especially now, more than ever," he answered, serving up the food and bringing it to the table. Snape dipped his head in acknowledge.

"By the way, I like Earl Grey, two slices of lemon, one sugar, no milk or cream with my meals," he stated smugly, a hint of a smirk on his lips. "Oh, an a glass of Bloodied Merlot, that you'll find on that top shelf above the sink."

Dmitri scowled in irritation. Really, the man was just too damn infuriating and--- "What? Bloodied Merlot?" he exclaimed, staring in disbelief at Snape.

"Yes, that's exactly what I said, Mr. Li. Glad to hear that your hearing works just fine. Now let's test out the little brain of yours," came the amused reply. Dmitri huffed.

"Insufferable git," he muttered, grabbing the wine and a wine glass and turning on the kettle, before sitting down, his own glass of pumpkin juice already by his plate. He raised an eyebrow at Snape who shrugged a shoulder elegantly, pouring himself a glass of the red liquid and smelling it in delight.

"A toast, Mr. Li," he stated, raising his bloodied wine. Dmitri studied him closely for a few minutes before raising his own glass.

"Certainly, Severus. To freedom and a new start," he said softly, clinking his glass against Snape's.

Snape paused before nodding in agreement and drinking. "To freedom and a new start, indeed."

Deca, 05/16/10

End Notes: Alright, so, as you can see, a whole bunch of questions have been answered this chapter, as well as a whole new slew of other ones. Only 3,500 words this time, but, without a beta, I am forced to make the chapters shorter, so they are easier for me to attempt to proofread. Sorry about this guys. As soon as I get a beta, you can expect chapter lengths to increase to around 8,000 to 12,000 words per post. For now, please bear with this. Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter and that I am keeping you interested. I am trying to be as original as I possibly can within reason, so, I am winging it within my own plotline. Hehe, as always, review if you like!

[1] "Come to me… my child… my love… come to me…"

Questions for the readers: Should I provide translations for the different languages in the actual text, or at the end? Also, I'm planning for there to be a lot of action in this fic, fight scenes, battles, blood and gore. Is it preferred for longer fight scenes and less dialogue, or shorter focus on the actual battle, and more on dialogue, or do people prefer a more even balance? Leave a response in your reviews, if you review. Until next time~