WARNING: The first part of this chapter contains scenes of a disturbing nature. It deals with child molestation. If this squicks you, then skip to the second part.

Chapter 6:

Silence.

Thick and syrupy, the silence surrounds him.

The smell of dust and dung permeate the air that he breathes. There is a chirping of crickets and the low sound of cows.

Harry takes a deep breath and tries to open his eyes...

That's when something hits him in the solar plexus- sending him spiralling out of control.

The feeling of spinning stops just in time for him to retch onto the floor. A hand across his mouth to wipe the bile from his mouth, and Harry thinks that it's probably not a good thing that he's so used to waking up in his own vomit by now.

His green eyes take in the alleyway he's landed in... and his heart plummets into his shoes.

He knows this place.

"There now, that's a good boy. Eat it all up." Says a cultured, soothing voice.

"Thank you, sir." The scrawny boy says, his green eyes wide with a touch of hero worship.

"Hm, yes. I do believe that thanks are in order- though the words seem old and stale do they not?" The man says, straightening his suit jacket.

The little boy cocks his head up at the well dressed man. "But 'thank you' is all I have, sir."

"Hm. I think you underestimate yourself boy." The man reached out a pale hand and stroked his cheek. Little Harry's eyes went a bit wide, but were still trusting.

"Sir?"

"You're such a pretty little boy..." The man softly intones.

And Harry wants to scream, wants to put his hands to his ears and warn himself. Wants to forget about this- needs to push it deeper into his subconcious, needs to get away...

"I- what?"

The man, all elegant refinement and Armani suits smiles at the boy and moves his hand down to take the boy's. "I have an apartment near here, with space for good little boys with pretty eyes. Would you like to live in an apartment... Harry?"

"What? Me, sir? Really?"

"Of course Harry- pretty little boys like you shouldn't be running around the streets like this." And then he leans down to brush his lips against the boy's.

"You- no!" The boy tries to turn and run.

"Now you little-! I've been feeding you for months now! You owe me!" The man grabs him around his waist and yanks him flush against his body. "Such a pretty little boy... Like I said: these streets are dangerous for little boys. Come to my apartment and we can play some nice games in front of the fire..."

"No! No! Let me go!" The boy was screaming and banging his fists against the man.

"Stop it!" The man snarls- delivering a brutal blow to the back of the boy's head, leaving him with a dazed look.

And Harry knows what's coming next...

Being dragged to that filthy hole... the searing pain as his nine year old body is invaded... the blood and the dust and the feeling of being choked... of being used... of having his innocence ripped forcefully away from him... the filth he could never seem to get off... it never seemed to come out... the bathtub he's chained in... the fear of every little sound, afraid that it heralds the arrival of his tormentor, afraid that it heralds another round...

So afraid.

So alone.

Hurts so much.

Tears streak down his face as he tries to ignore the images, tries to ignore what's going to happen next, tries to pretend it isn't happening again in the supposed safety of his head.

Another round of retching.

But there is nothing but bile to make the trip.

And then there is a voice- the same soft female voice- and a light chases the alley away.

"Oh, you poor dear."

A soft hand runs through his hair, and though he can't see anything in the blinding light he knows that she's kneeling down next to him.

"Wake up, Heir of the Lotus Tree!"

His next blink is into the real world, and he knows he's a mess. The stench of vomit is all around him, and he's curled into a pathetic ball with tears running down his face. A broken sob, followed by another, and then a keening sort of sound that was so pathetic it made him grateful for the fact that all Slytherin dorms had silencing charms on them.

For the first time since the night of his nightmare, Harry Potter cried.

HP-BaB-HP

Miranda Vector yawned.

Another sleepless night working with Bathsheba on the castle's new wards, getting them to allow the Beaubaxtons and Durmstrang guests and their transports in. Why couldn't they just have done this in the summer?

Oh. Right. Bathsheba had been on some singles cruise- something about needing to get a life. And Merlin damn it- Albus had given the woman the ticket!

So what if it had been her birthday? Miranda had a very important vector brewing at the moment, and all Albus had done was to give her a little shrug and say 'Dear Miranda, the woman works hard enough as it is. I'm certain it won't take much time, you have more than nine weeks to modify the wards after all.'.

What the hell kind of boss did she work for?

Never mind. She didn't really want an answer to that one.

"Miranda!" She was brought out of her musings to see Aurore Sinistra snapping her fingers in front of her face. She looked better than Miranda thought anyone had the right to look at this hour of the day- her wavy black tresses spilling perfectly over her shoulders and her teaching robes looking spick and span.

Miranda, on the other hand, knew that her curls were scattered all around her head, and her robes were covered in chalk and dust.

"Oh, er, hi Rore. How you doing?"

Aurore rolled her eyes at her before tucking Miranda's arm into the crook of hers. "Better than you, I think. How are the... erm, 'special projects' coming along?"

"Oh! That! Yes, well, they are coming. Although..." And here Miranda frowned.

"What? There aren't any problems are there?"

"Well... actually, it's a lot more complicated than we could have predicted. I mean, there are a bunch of strange circles that are interlinked with the actual wards we know, so we're stuck trying to figure out what the weird circles were meant to do... Luckily we've managed a temporary sort of symbiosis... we think... good thing we still have a week before the guests arrive... although that time is starting to seem woefully inadequate... and I haven't even looked at my matrix in a week..."

"Well, that's alright then. I always know you'll come through. I mean, you are the most brilliant Arithmancer in the world!"

"I-! What? No I'm not! There are many great arithmancers out there!"

"I never said that we lacked great aritmancers, I merely said you were the best."

"Stop it Rore, you're making me blush!"

"False modesty does not become any one, Vector. And with your rather... lacking favourable attributes you can hardly afford to become any less attractive." A voice sneered from behind them.

"... You? You're calling me ugly?" Miranda turned around and poked him in the chest. "You? The bat of the dungeons?"

Snape grabbed her hand and smirked down at her. "Bats are able to find mates. What do lonely little numbers do?"

"... They combine to form lovely matrices of light!"

"And yet, they always stand still. Can a one become a two? Or keep its identity whilst being added to another number? No?"

"Grah! You! I... what is your problem with me?"

"Tsk. I have no problem with you. The choice to go on a singles cruise merely reeks of desperation. Another unattracative quality." Snape growled at her before letting go of her hand and sweeping off into the corridor towards the Great Hall.

Aurore stood there with her eyebrows reaching into her hair line.

"Why... That... That! Can you believe that... that greasy, grubby, grotesque, barmy bat! That dungeon dwelling dimwit! That...! Wait- why are you looking at me like that?"

"He thought you were the one that went on the singles cruise." Aurore said slowly.

"Well, yes! That just proves the dimwit part of my insult!" Miranda huffed. "Come on- I need a shower to get all that bat-guano he uses for brains off of me." She stormed off towards her rooms without pausing.

Aurore rolled her eyes. "He thought... oh, never mind! Let them figure it out for themselves Rore, don't meddle!"

HP-BaB-HP

Harry was dead on his feet.

This was his third day without sleep, and it was starting to show.

He'd been getting nothing more than nightmare-haunted sleep since the beginning of the term.

Dreading sleep so much that he now only went to bed every third night, then waking up a mere three hours later... He ached, he couldn't keep anything but toast down for a few hours, his face was a sickly sallow colour and he'd lost so much weight he was nothing but a skeleton.

And through it all he just felt... stretched.

Like a rubber band just before you shot it off at someone.

Too thin and too tightly wound to really do anything but fly off into someone's eye.

And now he was desperately trying to stay awake and concentrate on the arithmancy test in front of him.

At least it was his last period. He could probably sneak off and try to have a nap until dinner...

Harry sighed, trying to concentrate, because yes this was important... but his eyes kept going over to Li Su.

She wasn't really writing her test with that much fury, but she was watching every move Hermione made.

Which was weird, because Li was generally the type to keep her nose firmly in her books. Harry cast a sideways glance at Hermione, who was so busy scribbling all over her answer scroll that she'd managed to get ink on her nose. Another look at Li revealed that she was now jotting something down with furious scribbles.

That was weird- especially after what Hermione had told him about in their first week back- six weeks ago.

Was Li Su watching her?

Did the HWA intend harm on her? Why would they? What could make a powerful organization keep an eye on someone as, well, semi-peaceful as Hermione?

He needed to get to the bottom of this. If the HWA presented a threat to his friend, he would need to neutralize them with immediate effect.

And no- his dream had not made him paranoid, thank you very much. He was always paranoid.

He had a strict policy against hurting women- made it his life's mission to make sure no one else did either- but he'd be damned if anyone got away with threatening his friend.

"Harry! No looking at the other students' work! Come on- I know you know this work, concentrate. Not that there's any use now- time's up! Send all your parchments over to Hermione." Professor Vector snapped at him. "Well, whatever was on your mind better be worth failing this test over, Harry. Detention with me tonight. You haven't been concentrating at all. I expect better- especially in O.W.L years!"

Harry just gave his professor a half-hearted glare, but she was too busy hurrying off to notice.

"You know Harry, she's right." Hermione said, worrying her lip between her teeth. "Usually you start to look better after the term starts- now you're just starting to look worse. Are you okay?"

Harry gave her a half-hearted smile, all the while eyeing Li Su's bag. He could probably snag whatever she was working on. But then how would he get it back? Definitely not with Hermione watching him- she tended to take exception to breaking rules/laws.

Hm. Could be a problem.

"Come on- let's get you some food." Hermione said, a determined look on her face. Harry let her steer him down to the kitchens, dutifully tickling the pear when Hermione realized she didn't actually know how to get in.

When they stepped into the kitchen, the entire place came to a standstill.

The house elves, it seemed, had not forgotten about S.P.E.W.

Neither had Hermione, because her eyes narrowed as she took in the scene.

"... House elves!"

"Clothes Lady!" Squeaked one of the little elves.

This seemed to have the effect of breaking whatever spell the house elves had been under since they immediately all scurried out of the way. Finally they were staring at an empty kitchen.

Hermione's lips were pursed, but Harry needed to sit down.

The dreams so far had been flashes of light and dark, nebulous, disappearing with the morning light. But that last dream... it had been as though it had been about to replay the whole thing in slow motion...

He'd been held in the bathroom of Tim's apartment for three months before he'd finally managed to use his magic to get the handcuffs that had held him to the exposed pipes in the wall off and climb out the window.

The flat had been on the third story, and Harry had slipped a story up, falling and breaking his arm.

But he'd been free.

Once he'd run away, he'd stashed the memories and figured that time would make them heal. Obviously it hadn't worked.

He hadn't been able to eat even some toast today.

Honestly, with everything he'd seen and done after that, it shouldn't seem that bad. But it did. And now he was here- exhausted and nauseous.

"Harry- I'll wait for you outside, since they don't seem to want to come out while I'm here. Get something to eat- okay? See you outside." He heard Hermione leave through the door and a few seconds later he heard a plate clatter in front of him.

"Nelly is seeing that Young Master is not eating today, so Nelly is giving him dry toast and tea. Is Nelly being good? Else Nelly will iron her ears!"

Harry just gave her a tired smile and sipped cautiously at the black tea. It did settle his stomach somewhat, and he continued to sip at it until it was all gone. By the time the toast had disappeared as well he was feeling much more human.

He slung his bag over his shoulder and grinned at the house elves, all of whom smiled back at him and tried to force treats onto him until he finally closed the portrait behind him.

Hermione had settled herself onto the floor, her runes text open and already half a parchment into their assignment when she looked up at him and smiled.

"Harry! Feeling better?"

He wanted to shoot her a grin- planned on it really- but his stomach got the better of him as he threw up again.

All over Hermione.

And then he was on his knees, the world twirling around him like a demented merry go 'round on speed. He heard a voice, vaguely...

Then it all went black.

A/N: Ugh. What a chapter to write- there are still bits that are bothering me but I've had a week from Hell and my boyfriend of three years dumped me last night. So. I figured I should just get this bloody thing up.

Thank you all SO MUCH for your reviews, alerts and favourites. They manage to make me smile even when I'm heartbroken.

I'm going to go curl up in a ball and cry some more now.