Chapter Three: Scylla and Charybdis
Seated near the front of the courtroom, Hermione Granger struggled to hold back tears as Harry's monotonous voice continued to drone. The words seemed endless, forming a list of thoughts, actions, and events that would no doubt doom Harry to life in Azkaban, if not death itself. But still, she couldn't bear to believe it.
The smile that Hermione could not help but allow past her lips was a horrible one, as the Wizengamot practically pounced on Harry the minute he spoke of the Half-Blood Prince. Breaking from his narrative to answer questions, Harry identified that the person in question was indeed Snape, and that he had used Snape's old Potions book throughout the year. The Wizengamot probed at Harry's memories of the book, asking questions that might have proven that the book had bewitched him. Harry fended them off without expression, explaining that Hermione had felt that way too, and had checked the book thoroughly for such things when she learned that he had planned to use it.
The Wizarding World so wanted Harry to be innocent, Hermione realized. They wished for any excuse to once more call him their Savior. Were Harry in his right mind, and not drugged with Veritaserum, he could have used that to his advantage. But time and war had taught the Wizarding World not to trust accounts of previous Death Eaters unless they could be sure, through magical means, that they were telling the truth. Not that Harry was a Death Eater – or had ever been. No; as the Wizarding World was finding out, word by word, he was much worse.
Yet, she knew of Harry's guilt. She had been there when he had betrayed them… betrayed her, and Ron, and every other good wizard or witch in the world. She'd seen him choose Draco Malfoy over those who had stood by him for so long. She'd watched as the war had progressed, watched as everyone around her changed. They all aged so quickly. Ron had been forced to take on more duties and responsibilities than anyone his age should have. But he was the closest link to Harry that the aurors had, and thus he was called on to predict Harry's next move as well as he could. It took a long time before they truly realized that Harry had changed so much that no one but himself, and Draco, could have known what was going on in his mind. Still, Ron was too entwined in the war to back away, and that had left scars that only Hermione seemed to see.
Even she had not escaped the war completely unscathed. She knew what was said about her, how she was unable to speak to others now. She could speak, she was able to, but she just didn't want to. She had spoken before, during the war, in tactical meetings. No one had listened. And, now, she just did not have the will to speak to them. Only Ron seemed to understand. He was the only one who didn't push her to speak again, didn't try to make her 'snap out of it'.
Only Ron and she seemed to see Harry in Lord Scylla. Even now, with such treacherous words spilling evenly and calmly from Scylla's mouth, all she could see in him was Harry Potter. Harry Potter as he had been… as he had been before…
The hallways of Hogwarts were empty as Harry made his way down toward the Slytherin Common Room. It was well past curfew, and all the students were either sleeping or hanging around in their house's respective Common Room, if they were smart. Any stragglers out this late would soon be caught by Snape, Harry thought to himself as he clung to the shadows in the hall. Of course, they didn't have the help of an invisibility cloak, the Marauder's Map, and a teacher who'd been adamant that he learn to walk soundlessly and invisibly, even without the two. After eons of walking without sound in Voldemort's dream-state, having to force his footsteps to make noise on the stone floor was an interesting experience, and an annoyance.
The guard for the Slytherin Common Room opened silently to Harry's whispered, "Stoicorum Ratio" (lit: stoicism), and Harry entered the dungeon. If anything, the Slytherin Common Room was colder than the hallway outside, with the fire apparently having gone out long before. It hadn't changed in decorum from his second year, either, except that the few festive decorations that had been present over the Christmas holidays were nowhere to be found.
The Slytherin Common Room was devoid of all students, except one. A result of having Professor Snape as Head of House most likely, Harry thought. He would check his own house first before his rounds to find any students out of bed.
And it would only be Snape's favorite student who would be able to bend that rule, Harry reflected, watching the small candle flame play with the contrasts of Draco's face. The only light in the room was that solitary flame, throwing Draco's hair into almost a golden halo around his face, and bathing his features in shadows. The blond hardly ever slept, a byproduct of the small amount of Vampire blood in the Malfoy lineage; Draco had told his "pen pal" this before he knew whom he was writing to. This was how the rumors of Draco's promiscuousness began, since there were so many nights that Draco did not find the need to sleep at all, and thus it was presumed that the reason he never went to bed was because he was in someone else's. But, while Draco was no virgin, he did have standards, he'd written Harry, and the idea that he'd sleep with just anyone repulsed him.
There was no sound in the room as Harry walked towards where Draco was sitting, reading. Occasionally, he'd write a note on a parchment that sat next to the book. Ah, still doing homework then. Draco read almost as much literature as Hermione, though he at least hardly ever found the need to quote it; but if he was making notes, that meant it was not pleasure reading. As Harry neared, he listened to the soft whispers Draco made as he concentrated on what he read:
"A curious phenomenon at the south end of the Messina Strait are the little whirlpools, formed by the swift current flowing south into the Ionian Sea. There are several at a time, coming and going as the irregular currents move around. In ancient times, they could capture a small boat for a time and literally scare the occupants to death. The myth of Scylla and Charybdis was born to explain the mystery. The circular shaped white-water resembles a carnation, giving rise to the Sicilian name garafano, or carnation.(1)"
Harry was just behind Draco now, reading the page over his shoulder for a bit, waiting for Draco to pause in his reading before allowing his breath to ghost over Draco's neck as he spoke:
"Good evening Charybdis."
Charybdis and Scylla: the two pennames that Draco and Harry had used to commune with each other. When used in mythology, the idea of between Charybdis and Scylla was that of "between a rock and a hard place". Directly, Charybdis was a whirlpool, and Scylla was a woman with frothing dogs tied to her at her girdle. Together, they would destroy ships and kill sailors who dared to try to pass through the Strait of Messina. How fitting it was that, now, Harry hoped to enter that same kind of alliance with Draco.
The blond stiffened at Harry's words, placing his pen down on the table as a bookmark for where he had been reading.
"I thought I told you to get out of my life, Potter."
"In great detail."
"Then save me the time of repeating myself, and get out."
"You're not even interested in how I got inside in the first place?"
"Not at all," Draco lied while making a mental note to change the password first thing in the morning… or maybe right after Harry left.
"Well, I've decided not to leave until we talk, Charybdis."
"Will you stop calling me that?!" Draco snapped, twisting around to see… nothing. "And come out of whatever shadow you're in, Potter. I will not argue with an empty room."
Harry tossed the invisibility cloak off in a fluid motion, and stepped back to give Draco some room. As it was, the blond was already backed into a corner.
"I will not stop calling you that, because I wish for you to respond to me in kind." Harry smiled beatifically at the blond, and the candle's flame twisted the smile into a smirk with the shadows it cast.
"I will not call you Scylla, Potter."
"Why?" Harry tilted his head to the side. "Because the name now belongs to another, perhaps?"
The blonde's eyes narrowed. "How do you know that?" he snarled. No one outside of Death Eater families should know of Scylla, the man that the Dark Lord had pronounced to be his heir the night before.
"How do I know the name of Voldemort's heir?" Harry grinned lopsidedly. "Because I've met the Heir himself, of course."
"If you know Scylla's name, then you also know that no one has seen him yet, Potter, except the Dark Lord, and that we won't see him for at least a year."
"But Charybdis, everyone in Hogwarts has seen him. They just don't know that his identity is connected to whom they are seeing, just like you right now."
"You're treading on very dangerous ground, Potter. Get out before I lose what little control I have and hex you."
"Oh, you won't do that," Harry spoke calmly. Deftly, he pushed up his left sleeve as far as the fabric would allow.
In the candlelight, the emerald mark glittered like reptilian scales as Draco's eyes looked at the fanged snake head that seemed to hiss up at him from Harry's left arm.
"Do you need to see the rest of it? It's a rather extensive mark," Harry commented.
"No." Draco struggled to get the word out through the sick feeling that was forming in his stomach. "Why in the name of all things magical did you do that?" Draco himself wasn't sure what he was referring to exactly, getting the mark itself or joining the Dark Lord.
"Why? Because you told me to."
Draco was now pressed up against the table he'd been working at, the contours of his body melding to Harry's as the other boy pressed down on him.
"I'm not the Dark Lord yet, Charybdis, but am I close enough?" Draco was allowed no opportunity to answer as Harry brought his lips down upon Draco's own.
A moan slithered forth from the back of Draco's throat as he brought his arms up to encircle Harry's waist, to push them closer together. Holding Harry was like holding sin itself in your arms. A dark current of magic tingled all over Harry's skin, the effect of which was euphoric to Draco. The night before, the Dark Lord had described his heir as a fallen angel, and he had not lied. Fallen from the high celestial heavens of light magic into the depths of the hell of dark magic; and Draco was the demon that had summoned him forth, shattered his wings, destroyed his morals, broken his heart, and put it back together in a grotesque formation. Draco could easily have gotten drunk on the aura of complete and utter darkness that now coursed around and through Harry's very being, but Harry abruptly pulled back. Draco's mouth protested such an action before his mind realized that he'd done so.
"I won't make love to you on a table in the Common Room."
"Would you settle for one of the couches?" Draco asked breathlessly as he nipped at the sensitive skin on the juncture between Harry's neck and shoulder.
"No."
"Har-ry…"
"The last time we fucked on a couch, I woke up to you screaming at me because the glamour had worn off while I was sleeping."
"I promise I won't scream at you afterward this time."
"No, in all likelihood it would be one of your fellow Slytherins who would come down to the Common Room early, and find us unclothed and sleeping on the couch."
"Bloody hell."
"You do have a bed, Draco."
"But I don't want to walk that far… oohh, do that again."
"Bed, Draco."
Harry woke to the sound of heavy footsteps outside Draco's room. Blearily, he blinked and shifted out of Draco's embrace. The blond muttered softly in his sleep before curling up in the warm space Harry had just left. Soundlessly, Harry dressed and, with a last look at the sleeping Malfoy, disappeared out the door and into the shadows. His invisibility cloak hid him from view as he traversed the halls and climbed into his own bed in Gryffindor Tower. It was still early enough that his dorm mates would still be sleeping, and would never notice that he had not actually slept in his own bed the night before.
Harry walked silently beside Hermione and Ron as they made their way through Hogsmeade back towards Hogwarts, all of his thoughts centered upon not losing control of the small static feeling underneath his fingertips. Any irritation he felt seemed to bring on this tendency, and it was becoming harder and harder to hide the small sparks of lightning. It was also becoming harder to summon the will to hide the lightning, as well. Harry found he didn't want to hide his powers; he wanted to embrace them, instead, and learn their full extent right now. But he could not afford to let anything, not even the tiniest hint of his Ravenclaw inheritance shine through to where someone could see it; he could not afford for a hint of anything different to get back to Dumbledore.
"It's nothing to do with you, Leanne!"
Harry looked up at the shout to see Katie Bell and another girl fighting over something Katie was holding. Harry heard the sound of ripping paper as it fell to the ground.
Harry blinked as Katie rose into the air, as if she were learning to fly, her arms outstretched from her sides. Harry frowned as the wind began to pick up, seeming to center around her. He'd seen this before… a curse… what was it called again?
Harry's thoughts were cut off as Katie let out a shriek and continued screaming. Realizing he should be horrified that this was happening, he followed Ron towards Katie as her friend began to tug frantically at her ankles in an attempt to get her down from the air. Katie fell down as they reached her, but she continued to writhe in agony, so much so that Harry had to pause for a moment simply to watch; he was that impressed.
But she would be dead soon if this wasn't stopped, and that would cause too much unnecessary commotion. Harry yelled for Ron and Hermione to stay with Katie and ran off to find a teacher.
Hagrid was the first person he found, and he yelled frantically that someone had been cursed.
"Cursed? Who's bin cursed – not Ron? Hermione?"
"No, it's not them, it's Katie Bell – this way…"
He led Hagrid to where she still lay in the thrall of the curse, and Hagrid wordlessly lifted and carried her to the castle.
As Hermione tried to comfort Katie's still-sobbing friend, Harry and Ron turned to look at the package that had been broken and still lay on the ground.
Harry caught a glimpse of opal and the slight aura of a very old, and thus lasting, curse as Ron saw the stone. And he pulled Ron's hand back with a hissed, "Don't touch it!"
He looked more closely at what was hidden by the brown package paper. It was an opal necklace… one that seemed familiar to him. Yes, he'd seen it before.
"I've seen that before. It was on display in Borgin and Burkes ages ago. The label said it was cursed. Katie must have touched it."
This, of course, begged the question: who had bought it? And why had they given it to Katie?
But, as Leanne told them how Katie had come back from the bathroom with it, saying she was supposed to give it to someone at Hogwarts, Harry began to reconsider those questions… and to whom he should be directing them.
That Draco was waiting up for Harry to appear in the Slytherin Common Room after curfew was no extraordinary event to Harry. That Draco outwardly appeared relieved to see him was.
"Interesting events in Hogsmeade today," Harry commented, sinking onto the couch next to Draco. "Katie got cursed. Poor thing, really; I doubt I would be so cruel as to set such a deliciously horrible curse on her." Harry had slithered over Draco's body to rest his head on Draco's shoulder, his movements as fluid as the snake tattoo he wore. "Then I had to think, of course, who could be cruel enough to do that, and tasteful enough to use an ornate opal necklace." His eyes lifted to Draco's own and something shifted in their pupils as Draco watched. He couldn't place how it was strange, but something was off in that gaze.
"Why did you want to curse poor Katie? What did she ever do to you?"
"Why do you care?"
"I don't. Not about her anyway. I am curious as to your motivation though." Harry licked the curve of Draco's ear as he waited for the blond to tell him.
"I can't tell you that."
"Really?" Harry sounded bemused. "Why not?"
"Because I am not able to."
Harry frowned, and pulled back from Draco to look at him.
Draco watched as that strange look in Harry's eyes seemed to become even more prominent, though he still couldn't name exactly what was wrong.
Harry watched as something seemed to shift in Draco's image, and he saw a thin gray band circled around Draco's throat. But it had no substance. What was it? Harry blinked, and it vanished, along with the shifted view. Mentally Harry promised to speak to Hedwig about it as soon as he could, as he outwardly shrugged and settled back against Draco as if he had dismissed the entire incident.
Harry shivered as he made his way up the steps to the Owlery in the pale dawn light. The cold winds were a reminder that winter was fast approaching. Though, Harry thought with a hidden smile, he had no urge to fly south… at least not yet. Apparently, Ravenclaw wasn't as tied to birds as that.
Hedwig flew down to him as he entered the relative warmth of the Owlery with a murmured admonition about being up so late.
"You're going to tire yourself out, Harry."
"I know," Harry grinned ruefully, "but this was important."
"Yes, you say that often, just like a chick. What is it that is so very important this time?"
"Tonight, when I visited Draco, something strange happened to my eyes."
Hedwig hopped down Harry's shoulder to look into his eyes and nodded. "Yes, but this was expected. Your eyes are shedding their old form for their new one."
"Do you mean they are fixing themselves?"
"Not particularly. As long as you embrace that human part of yourself, your human eyesight that is, they will remain the same vision you have always had. But a different sight is part of your inheritance. Your eyes are adjusting so that they may see as one of us does, as I do."
"What does that mean?"
"You shall see as we of the sky see: as clearly in the night as in the day, and a better perception of what truly exists. You will be able to see the threads of magic within a person, and the trappings of magic that has been inflicted upon other people or things."
Harry frowned. So then… if what she was saying was true…
"What did you see tonight?"
"A... ghost of a line around Draco's neck. It was gray."
"It is a band of magic. Tell me, what is it that he finds he is unable to speak to you about?"
Harry frowned. "I'm not sure exactly."
"I would find out, chick. Remember, you are not the only influence he has in his life."
(1)This comes, almost word for word (had to change it a bit to pass as a wizarding text), from www(dot)ancientroute(dot)com(slash)cities(slash)messina(dot)htm I felt that it sounded like a historical textbook and therefore am shamelessly copying it and recommending it for this story. Recently going to this site, I found that it does not exist anymore; however, it's still not mine to claim anyway!