A/N: Hey-o people! Finally I mean. I have had this story in my head for ages, and now its here. Now I stopped calling the story A New Kind of Fun and have made it the last book in a trilogy so everything you see here is gonna be extra special planning stuff and submissions for Challenges. Its gonna be cool and epic and stuff and I love it.
SO this installment is actualy what I had planned for the actual first chapter just with just the Hogwart School of Witchcraft and Wizardry Flying Lesson added in. Don't worry this is completely original (written in like seven hours) just the idea was old. I used the prompt [object] Bottle of Firewhiskey, and the word count is 3,199 the longest chapter I've written in a while. I really hope y'all enjoy.
Hoots,
Owls
Peck, Peck, Tap... Crack. The noise from his window woke Jame from his pre-Hogwarts sleep, that he would most likely never get back again. "Stupid bloody owl, at too bloody early in the morning," he grumbled as he walked to the window above his desk. Why was an owl there and not delivering the letter with the normal post? Obviously someone needed him, but who would be so discreet?
Rubbing his eyes with one hand and yawning, James opened the window and let the jet black bird inside. The owl ruffled its feather leaving a few on a stack of unsent letters. The half-asleep boy plucked the letter from the owl's claws which were sharpened to deathly points. It hissed at him when he pulled out the letter before flapping off into the horizon-the sun just rising.
James looked down at the letter and back to the open window at the dot on the horizon. "It's too bloody early for this!" He closed the window and flopped down on his bed.
He opened the letter, and curly, nearly unreadable script began to carve its way into the paper:
"Mr. Potter," it began-the ink drenching the page like blood seeping into a dying man's clothes.
"It has come to our attention that you know too much. That, as you know, is a dangerous thing, and well, we can't risk it.
"Sorry about this. It's a shame to lose such a… valuable man, but winners can't be too risky… We, however, don't care about those stupid rules. Instead of killing you when you are so unsuspecting, we have installed a potion in this letter's paper activated when someone-only you actually-touches our seal," James looked down the page to see what the letter was addressing. His thumb sat over a green wax seal of a serpent constricting a skull. Shocked, his eyes continued reading: "a vicious monster will be released, a serpent, and will reek havoc over everything you love. Good luck dealing with this demon; if you pass, who knows what the Master will do for you.
"Sincerly,
"The Serpent's Order," the seal was to the right of this, looking extremely offical.
A burning sensation started in his thumb, and he dropped the paper, shocked and confused. On the floor, the paper burst into smoke, releasing a large slinking thing into the room. It was made of ghastly, gray-gray smoke, but at times, it seemed made of marble. The beast, with snake-like qualities-no legs, scales that scraped against his walls and floor and desk, fangs-but had strange features that made it demonic (there were two sets of black eyes, it was the size of half of his room, and its fangs were the size of his arm and numbered over a thousand).
James pushed himself back into his headrest at the top of his bed. The clatter he made drew the attention of the monster, and it slinked towards him, marble and smoke. Each shenk of the its scales against the walls or the door, sent a chill raising up to his neck. James was shaking out of fear, and his breath was ragged. He was certain that the serpent could hear him.
It watched him for a moment with it's two sets of pitch black eyes. Then, it leaned in closer, and James couldn't get away. There was no escape-he was going to die, and it was all because some stupid cult thought he 'knew too much'. In that moment, he prayed to any God that was out there to save his sorry soul.
The thing peeled back its lips in a slow grin. Saliva drenched its gums and fell onto him, reeking of old blood and guts that had laid on the asphalt a second too long. The grin soon ended and transformed into a horrific screech. A hiss mixed with the scoldings of nails on chalk board and stubbing your toe and hitting your funny bone all at once. It was the most horrific thing he had ever heard since Moaning Murtle had come onto him in the fifth year.
"Scared yet, boy?" The words were jumbled inside his mind, as though on a delay. Each word came through at a different time and in no order, so the thing had to repeat each phrase. "You should be."
The monster slithered into the hallway, leaving James to his traumatized stare at the wall. The feathers left on his forgotten unsent letters to loved ones and friends to his family. He wondered if all of his mistakes would get them killed. "All because of that stupid bloody cult," he murmured.
A scream shout up from the distance. It could have been hours away or years, but he heard it. His mother, he quickly identified after hearing a string of colorful words following. Another scream rose and shouts proceeded. Spells, he assumed. The snake hissed again and he felt it up his spine, terrifying. James didn't feel much else, though. The beast had been drained from him for the moment-the will to live. Dramatic, yes, but true.
The fighting stopped on the floor below him, and his feelings of emptiness began to slip away. He gathered the energy to finally stand, placing a hand on his desk to steady himself. There was already a dark figure at the door. "James Sirius Potter, what the hell have you done?" His father began. The man's green eyes blazed with a fury only seen in the most serious of cases at the Auror Headquarters. He gripped his son's collar.
"You wouldn't understand," James said, his tone dead. It sounded cliched in his head, which was gaining back its previous vigor, but the rest of him just couldn't care.
"I understand, that a snake made of smoke came from your room, and nearly killed my wife, daughter, and son. It was obviously dark magic, James. If you are delving into anything beyond the realm of the light spells they teach you at school, I will not hesitate to take care of this like an Auror, do you understand me?"
"Of course," the boy choked out, his father's grip getting too tight. Harry released the boy, who collapsed to the ground. "I'm sorry, Dad. It'll never happen again."
"Good. Now get packed; we leave for your grandmother's in an hour."
With a final sucking feeling of the floo-though he could cast spells legally, including Apparition, but his wand had been confiscated-James arrived in the homely, crowded living room of the Burrow, his grandmother's home. The rickety, old building had expanded to impressive heights only possible, on its wavering structure, with magic, but many families (those not of the Weasley line, family friends and such) stayed in tents in the large yard. From the small windows and cracked door, James could see the flickering colors of children playing and parents talking over small platters of food from tables setup by various groups around the yard. It was a joval place, but the attack from earlier had left the Potter Family in a less than celebratory mood.
"Oh my!" the matriarch of the Weasley family had turned to her latest prey, leaving Lucy and Molly, Uncle Percy's daughters alone. "James, have you grown again? And oh, your so muscular? You must be a lady's man? When are you going to bring a girl here? I know! There are so many young ladies here! Fleur was just talking about a cute one, but I can't remember her name…" James felt that a much shorter, plumper, more fleshy serpent had attacked him again. Luckily, Albus pulled in her attention by trying to slip away, allowing James to do just that.
A burst of fresh air finally hit him, and James felt some of his freedom come back to his life. If he could only get a broom and circle around the pitch set up by the lake. Some of his cousins and their friends were already having a game. He quickly decided against joining them, not wanting to draw more attention to himself. James tucked himself deeper into his leather jacket and settled on watching the sky. The movement of the clouds was slow and steady. It was a nice change of pace from his life at the moment.
"Jamie, is that really you glooming over there?" a laugh that could only belong to Fred Weasley broke his thought. "Oh, is it a girl? Can James Potter not get some bird into his bed? Have I finally won our bet?" His brown eyes sparkled with mischief.
"First of all, it's not a girl. Secondly, I'm not interested in any of these girls. And I have no idea what bet you're talking about."
"I guess the bet was with… Doesn't matter?" Fred grinned. "So what's wrong? You can tell old Freddie anything."
James gave him a suspicious look before rolling his eyes. "It's nothing, maybe just the fact we have one year left to truly figure out who we are."
Fred froze, "don't tell me you're growing up! No Jamie, that's the one thing we promised!"
"We have to, Freddie. There's a big angry adult world out there." James grimaced at how much of like buzzkill he sounded.
"Oh dear me!" a shrill tone shredded towards them. "Is Jamie Potter growing up?!" April Longbottom was standing behind Fred, screaming into his ear. She was gripping the hand of a scared-looking brunette, tightly. "You can't, Jamie! You were going to be the last of us."
"Don't call me Jamie, April, and I have to. Unlike the two of you, I have an auror for a father who already expects me to fail."
"Awww," April cooed releasing the poor girl from her death grip. "Oh, right, sorry Rowan." She moved so she was no longer upstaging the mousy girl. "Jamie, Freddie, this is Rowan. She's been my best friend for forever, but she finally agreed to meet my family. Exciting, right!"
"Hey, love," Fred greeted, kissing her hand. Rowan responded by stepping back into April. She seemed distressed.
"Freddie, don't scare her. Like I said, best friend here. You've slept with all of the other ones, remember, and now they won't talk to me," April seethed. She brought a set of bright blue eyes down on him in an unsettling glare.
"Now, now, dearie, don't get jealous." Fred turned his grin to April. "There's always room for you on Freddie's list of-" April whacked him on the side of the head. "Hey, you devil woman!"
"Are they going to get a room?" James looked down to see the brunette watching the two intently. Her eyes seemed to be gauging every movement, analysing.
"One day, yeah, but there's no way Fred will settle down anytime soon."
There was a short silence. The two of the watching the Longbottom girl obliterate the Weasley. "April says she wants that, but I know she really just wants someone romantic and stable."
"You really are best friends," James looked down at her for a moment then focused back to April and Fred. One of the two was blushing. "How do you do it?"
She shrugged. "I'm quiet, she's loud. We just fit, I guess."
April turned from Fred who tried to turn her back around, looking apologetic.
Suddenly, James felt a chill up his spine. His knees nearly buckled, and he could feel the world getting a little darker. "Are you scared?" The sound of a thousand horrible deaths crawled up his leg. James saw the snake, slipping through tables. It started to weave its way through the groups of children, circling the group with Victoire and Teddy's, his cousin and god-brother, children. His nieces and nephews were being sniffed by a vicious beast.
"Can you see the snake, circling the group of kids?" Cold fingers gripped his wrist. He turned to see Rowan watching the snake the same way she had watched April and Fred, analysing.
"You can?" He had thought since no one else was panicking he was the only one.
"Yes," She released his arm. "It's attracted to magic," she explained.
"But spells in such a crowded place would make people think we're crazy and send us to St. Mungo's before we can blink." James told her. Rowan nodded a hard look on her face.
"Accio: pixie dust," Rowan whispered, a packet of gold powder slipped out from the pockets of a few aurors and assorted sundry assembled. "Spread it on the ground, and lead the snake to the shed. I'll be there waiting." The cold fingers left his wrist.
James looked between the snake and the pixie dust, noticing the door to his grandpa's shed closed. "Damn fast little bitch." he hissed, opening the bag. The snake's reaction was instant. It and cocked its head towards him.
The four-eyed beast began to ghost forward faster than he expected, and James began to throw pixie dust on the ground racing towards the door. His heart was pounding, and adrenaline pumped through his veins. He loved the rush.
Passing the first pile of powder, the snake seemed to just absorb the stuff. It seemed to get even faster. Five feet from the door, James dropped the powder and began to claw at the entrance to the shed, trying to watch the snake and open it.
Finally bursting in, the snake was on his heels. James managed to catch its head in the door as it wriggled and forced him to push harder to try and close the door. Rowan was standing at an industrial skink with a knife, he eyes wide with shock. He raised a brow and opened his mouth to comment, but the snake lashed its tail at the door causing James to lapse and the snake to get a few more inches into the shed.
"Right." Rowan stepped forward looking determined and little scared' the knife shaking in her hand. He realized she wanted to kill it. For a moment he caught her gray eyes and they seemed to speak of the little girl inside, not wanting to face the world. Scared.
He brought his boot down hard on the snake's skull, with a sickening crack. The girl released the breath she was holding and relaxed. "Thank you," she whispered approaching the thing. She pulled it completely into the shed leaving a puddle of blood by the door. Rowan sliced off the beast's head and began to bottle venom and blood.
"What happened out there?" James asked her. She glanced up at him, analysing again. His eyes were focused on her. He wasn't taking 'no' for an answer.
With the knife, she cut off the snake's head and started collecting blood from its wounds in bottle. "It's called an afterthought. They come after the initial Nightmare. I imagine you got one of those recently."
James nodded. "But my family saw it before."
"Like I said Nightmare and Afterthought. Two different things."
"I don't understand." James furrowed his brow, sitting on a box and watching her scarp away scales.
"Its like a thestral," she explained, "only those who have seen death can see the thestral, so only those who have seen the Order's torture can see it. Most of the time people never remember the torture so they don't see the Afterthoughts."
"And you…" saw it. "How did you know about the pixie dust?"
"Oh, the Order's been getting cocky lately. They send Nightmare's to government officials and haunt them with Afterthoughts."
"Was that how the Minister was assassinated?" He remembered reading it in the news a few weeks previous. It was a big shock to everybody that the well loved woman had died.
"No he really did die of a cold, but the aurors have been dealing with that, and some magical creatures have been known to also eat magic. It's exactly uncommon."
James processed the new tidbits of information, glaring at the floor while Rowan continued to skin the snake. He walked over to a shelf and pulled out a bottle of amber liquid hidden behind some boxes.
Rowan raised a brow at the alcohol. "What's that?" She plucked a few teeth before finishing off her scraping with a bit of magic.
"Firewhiskey," He took a sip from the bottle, slipping to the floor, and held out to her.
She paused for a moment, before moving to him and accepting the bottle. She took a swig, coughing as it went down, and handed it back. "That's awful."
"But it's good."
"Sure, if you need to forget something horrific at two in the afternoon."
"I just killed a demon sent to haunt me for the rest the rest of my life."
"And I skinned it."
"Cheers to that," James raised the bottle and handed it back to Rowan. "Why did you need all of that stuff anyways?" He pointed to her jars and bottles of snake paraphernalia tucked inside a box the struck down the fit easily in her pocket.
"A potion." She wrinkled her nose at the drink's taste and handed it back.
"You're weird," he took a sip and passed it to her again.
Rowan gulped some down. "Yup," she croaked. "I can see what you mean about this stuff being so bloody good."
"Yeah." He held onto the bottle staring at the trinkets in his grandpa's shed.
"Do you think they're missing us?" Rowan motioned to the door.
"Nah, they proably think I'm snogging you right now."
She laughed, a little drunkenly, "Right! You are the playboy of the seventh year. I've heard a lot about you from all of the girls fifth year and up."
"Is that really my reputation?"
"Sorta, I don't really pay attention to the gossips, other then April and her group of Hufflepuffs and on occasion the girls in my dorm."
"Are you not a Hufflepuff?"
"Ravenclaw."
"Smarty-pants."
"I wish! I made only got 'O's on five OWLs. The others in my house get 'O's on every little thing and have like twenty OWLs and I get five 'O's."
"I got like three or something."
She laughed again. "But you're in Gryffindor, grades don't really matter over there. Heck failing is actually normal for you people, but a Ravenclaw has to do everything right!"
"I'm in Slytherin," he said, his tone hollow.
"Oh, really? I always thought you were at the Gryffindor table all the time."
"I am. They're nicer there."
"Hmm… Can I be a Gryffindor too sometime?"
"Sure, but you have to get that stick out from your ass because you really are smart and brave if you can face this thing the way you did."
"Then you should stop feeling sorry for yourself because your dad hates you or some bullshit because you're lucky to have realized what you're gonna do when you're older."
"I haven't-"
"Yes you have." She retorted cutting him off, leaving the two in silence. Rowan started laughing. "This is a great start to a friendship." She kicked at the toothless snake skull cover in frying blood with a large hole in its head.
"Yeah," James took another sip from the bottle and passed it to her.