Author's Note: Arrrrgggghhhh! Okay, so I know I told you that I would pick a romantic interest for Harry by now, but I just can't decide. So I am going to leave the poll up for one more week and try really, really hard to decide. Please help. The main problem with me writing a HarryLuna is that I'm not sure I could pull it off. Luna is very hard to write romantically; it's just the way she is. I don't know why, but I feel like a HarryDraco would be a lot easier. Oh, and just to specify to all you HarryWerewolf fans, the werewolf would be a guy. You will actually meet the possible guy in this chapter. Let me know what you think about him. I just don't like girl OC's for some reason. They tick me off…maybe because they're usually all Mary-Sues or trying way too hard not to be Mary-Sues. So, please, help, by review and by poll. By the way, my sister keeps telling me she wants Harry to get shoved up against a wall and have the life snogged out of him by Draco, and I said no. (Why? I have no idea. I guess I just don't feel like it.) So there are officially no more walls in my story. They are just wizarding illusions of walls. You will never know the difference because no one will get shoved up against one. Anyway, thank you so much all my reviewers. And keep reading! I will figure out the pairing eventually.
Disclaimer: Seriously, I don't. I'm serious, I don't own Harry Potter! Stop asking me already! And you, the lawyers, be gone from this happy place! I put this up; you have NO CASE! Muhahahahaha!
Chapter 10 I Met a Werewolf at a Bar
"-ir…sir…Mr. Harry Potter, sir, you need to wake up."
"Mmmblfgh." Harry rolled over and pulled his pillow over top his head nearly smashing the house elf trying to wake him in the process. Kreacher continued to try and wake up Harry, this time, more forcefully.
"Harry Potter, sir, you told me to wake you up." Kreacher shook Harry forcefully, causing him to groan and bury his head even further under his bed covers.
"Go away, Kreacher, it's too early." Harry moaned pitifully; it had to be, like, 6 a.m.
"It is 8:30, Mr. Potter,"
'Lies!' Harry thought peevishly.
"And you copy of the Daily Prophet is here. You told me to wake you when it came, so wake up!" In actuality, Harry had never said that, but Kreacher didn't care.
"Marghlth!" Harry mumbled as he tried unsuccessfully to press the off button on the elf by numbly tapping the top of Kreacher's head with his hand. Kreacher stepped back with a sigh snapped his fingers with a crack. "Kreacher what are you doing!" Immediately, Harry's entire bed flipped over, spilling him onto the cold, unforgiving stone floor.
"I is getting Sir up," Kreacher responded, sounding smug. Harry picked himself up off the floor and moved over to a table set up next to his bed covered in a small breakfast of scrambled eggs, orange juice, toast, and a copy of that day's Daily Prophet. Harry moved to take a bite from a piece of toast when he noticed Kreacher still watching him, unblinking.
"Uh, thanks, Kreacher, you go back to, er, sneaking around the house slimily, or whatever it is everyone here thinks it is you do."
Kreacher gave a nod and a bow. "Kreacher will continue to fool the blood traitors and filth so as not to let then know of Master Harry's presence." He agreed.
"Good," Harry said cheerfully, "And don't let the filth get you down!" Kreacher gave another bow and popped out of the room. Harry then turned his attention to his breakfast and the paper. Mouth full of toast, Harry picked up the front page and read the headline.
The-Boy-Who-Stayed-Sane Speaks Out!
By Rita Skeeter
The Boy-Who-Was-Betrayed, Harry Potter, yesterday was escorted out of Azkaban and into a press conference by his traitorous ex-family and former mentor Professor Dumbledore. Despite his wrongful imprisonment by the bumbling Ministry of Magic officials and his gut wrenching betrayal from his former friends and family, Mr. Potter has miraculously managed to survive unscathed. At said press conference, Mr. Potter displayed his animosity towards his former teachers, friends, godfather, and the British wizarding community as a whole.
Professor Dumbledore, Minister Fudge, and Sirius Black tried to force our martyred, young hero to resume his magical training at Hogwarts and live with those who betrayed hi;, but our gallant hero refused. When questioned as to where he would go, Mr. Potter truthfully replied that it was none of their business as he is officially an emancipated adult. He even hinted that he may like to, in the possible future, move to different country in hopes of a fair and understanding wizarding community.
The Bulgarian Minister was quoted after the conference to say, "This would never have happened in Bulgaria. We take care of our own and conduct proper cases, not half-baked ones like England."
After putting them in their places, Mr. Potter graciously allowed this humble reporter to question him. Harry has no immediate plans for the future or You-Know-Who, but he told this reporter that, despite the quote un quote "differences" he and the British magical community have had, he will defeat You-Know-Who, but not for us. Mr. Potter claims that You-Know-Who's defeat shall not be for the British wizarding world as a whole, but for the "innocent" muggleborns and a mysterious group of people he promised to defeat him for.
How does he mean to accomplish this task without accepting the support of the wizarding community? And just who is this strange group of people he's close to, and how did he meet them while he was in Azkaban?
This reporter wants to know.
Harry nearly snorted his orange juice out of his nose and succeeded in spilling it over the table on down his leg. Cursing profusely, he stood up and wiped off the table and his pant, all the while trying to comprehend what he'd just read. Had Rita Skeeter just written a decent article not defaming him at all without being blackmailed? And Harry was actually starting to genuinely like her – or at least respect her.
So pigs do fly!
Shaking off his surprise, Harry finished off his breakfast (without spilling anything else) and went to go take a much needed shower – he had been too tired to do so last night. As he basked in the warm water, Harry decided to start planning his next move. (1)
First off, he needed allies. They didn't have to be completely trustworthy; they only had to be trustworthy enough that he'd know they'd do what he said. Well, even if he were considering the Order (which he wasn't), that would count them out right then and there. He tried to think back to one of the Prophet articles on Hogwarts he had read a year or so ago. What had it said? What was – Oh! Right, it had spoken about Luna taking over the positions as the muggle studies teacher at Hogwarts, as well as writing articles for the Quibbler on the side. So he did have someone one the inside at Hogwarts.
Good, he was going to need to go there soon to find the Diadem (which the dementors had only said was in Hogwarts – how unhelpful.) and to get a Basilisk fang. Even the dementors didn't know a spell that could destroy a horcrux. Stupid Voldemort. Why couldn't he just have decided to be a normal maniac and not split his soul into pieces? He probably just didn't want to "regular." Stupid pride, but then again, pride like that is a common thing, so wouldn't that just make Voldemort "normal" or "common"? Hmm, food for thought.
Now, he needed to find an ally in Voldemort's castle. (Yes, he had gotten a castle since Harry had been in Azkaban. Actually, it was more of an armed fortress. How medieval. The dementors had showed Harry what it looked like in their memories, and he strongly suspected Voldemort had asked Count Dracula for design advice.) He wasn't planning on going there until the very end, but if he got an ally now, his continuous successes would be able to even further convince them to stay joined with Harry, as he would seem even more powerful and likely to win.
The dementors wouldn't count as an ally. Not only were they more like family, they would be being kept under constant surveillance, so they wouldn't be able to tell him all the secret places of the castle, or where Nagini is, or sneak him in, or important stuff like that. Hmm. He could always try to black mail Draco into joining him, (Setting aside the fact that he wasn't nearly as horrible anymore, Harry wasn't sure he'd join his cause anyway. Still … it'd be funny to see his reaction.); but Draco would only be a lower-level death eater because of how young he was, and not of much use. He just hadn't been at it long enough to be in Voldy's secret circle, (2) but, still, he would be a good connection to the lower death eaters. Maybe Harry could enlist his help to find possible traitors among the bunch who could join Harry and help him into the castle as well. Harry made a mental note to visit Draco later.
But, still, he need some sort of … of, minority group. A group being oppressed, that would always be oppressed, even under Voldemort's reign despite what he says. A people group looked down on, feared, disliked, that found it hard to get jobs, houses, just to live; but who? Then it hit him.
Werewolves.
They were perfect, and if he could only find the right argument, he could easily sway them to his side. Slowly, a plan began formulating in Harry's mind. He grinned widely; this could work awesomely. Harry reached over to turn off the water and scrambled out of the shower, mentally thanking its miraculous powers profusely. Drying off quickly, he pulled on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt and pocketed a few galleons. Turning on his heel, he set off on his search for the main werewolf community.
(3) 'You Know,' Harry mused absently as he surveyed his surrounding area, 'Apparating is really convenient, but you'd think wizards would have thought of how to make it less uncomfortable by now.'
Harry really didn't enjoy apparating, but, hey, it was still better than flooing. Harry had apparated to Celsburn Alley, the wizarding equivalent of the slums of London. He was outside the Bloody Claw, an infamous werewolf haunt. Harry quickly transfigured himself a long trench coat with a hood and pulled the hood up to cover his face. He also transfigured himself a pair of sunglasses.
Putting them on, he noticed that he was getting strange looks from the weirdos on the street. He repressed a chuckle as an old lady on the side of the street wearing strange robes that looked like they were covered in some type of fungus and who was selling what looked like rutabagas with eyes on them that glared at him. He walked up to the door of the tavern (skirting nervously around the Lady's cart and jumping when one of the rutabagas hissed at him) and opened the door.
It was dark and musty and smelled faintly of blood and cigarettes. (Not the kind Mudgungus smoked, though. It seemed even this crowd was more refined than him.) There was a mean-eyed bartender glaring at him from across the room. The room was noisy and filled quite well with every unsavory character you could think of. The many tables all had at least one person at them and were all beaten up, (the tables, not the people…though they weren't exactly new looking either) as if fights here were extremely common.
Harry made his way over to the bar, knocking into the table of two seedy looking goblins on the way, who sent murderous glares his way. Harry quickly moved along, weaving through the crowded tables. He didn't need a fight … or at least not yet. Stepping over some drunk passed out on the floor, Harry plopped down onto a chair at the bar and flashed the disgruntled barman an award winning smile and extending 7 sickles.
"One firewhiskey, my man!" Harry really would have preferred a butterbeer, but he doubted they even had that stocked here. The bartender looked at Harry suspiciously before taking the money and pouring him a drink. Harry leaned over his drink and looked around between sips, people watching for werewolves.
How was he going to tell if they were werewolves, you ask? It's simple. When a werewolf joins a clan, they get a tattoo to prove that they're part of said clan. The type of tattoo depended on the particular clan, and it was always right on the cheekbone of the werewolf. Most clans weren't very big, but Harry was looking for a particular clan.
The West End Clan was one of the largest clans out there, with around 100 werewolves; and they were known supporters of Voldemort. Perfect allies for when he wanted to sneak into Voldy's castle. Harry glanced around, looking for someone with a star with 8 points on their cheek.
Let's see, circle, triangle, two circles, wait, star! Harry craned his neck to look at the girl passing by's cheek, and, to his dismay and embarrassment, he fell out of his chair.
'Darnit,' He thought blushing furiously on the floor as the bartender glared fiercely at him, 'I just humiliated myself! And only for a star with 5 points.'
"Is the floor really that much more comfortable than these chairs? I could believe it, though." Harry heard a deep-throated chuckle above him. Looking up, he saw a tall, slim frame, short, dark hair, bright, blue eyes, and an 8 pointed star!
Harry stared, wide-eyed, at the werewolf standing above him. He certainly looked out of place in this cesspool. Well, he wasn't exactly rich-looking; but his clothes were nowhere near as threadbare as Lupin's had been; and he didn't look very exhausted at all. All this told Harry that he was probably way up there in the clan hierarchy. Harry felt a grin spread across his lips. Perfect.
"No, I just thought I'd give it the floor a go, though, just to see. I think they're about the same." Harry smirked, eyes dancing playfully. The stranger let out another chuckle, drawing eyes to Harry and himself. The man reached down his hand and pulled Harry to his feet, but when Harry tried to pull his hand back, the man refused to let go. Raising one eyebrow confusedly, Harry offered up another grin. "My name's Harry."
The man smile seductively (Yes, seductively.) and reached down to kiss Harry's hand. "Lucas, au chante." Harry's eyebrows shot up to the roof. A gay werewolf? And he was flirting with him? What was it about Harry that seemed to make people think he was gay?
"I'm not French."
"Really," the werewolf purred. "You could have fooled me. After all, they are infamously beautiful."
"Save the pick up lines for some other guy." Harry smiled politely. "I'm straight." 'Or at least I was the last time I checked.'
"Really?" Now it was the werewolf's turn to look surprised, but he covered it quickly and flashed Harry another smile. "That's okay; I've turned plenty of handsome young men, such as yourself, around for the other team."
This time, Harry shot the man a glare. "Not this guy, you won't. But you will help me out with something else, won't you?"
"Anything."
"I need to meet with your clan leader."
"Mmm … not that. How do you know about me being in a clan, or a werewolf for that matter? Not many outsiders know what our tattoos mean."
Harry raised an eyebrow. "Outsiders?"
"Non-werewolves."
Harry let out an exasperated sigh. "Man, and you guys wonder why most of the wizarding world dislikes your kind. You just keep distancing yourselves. You're practically asking for it."
Lucas bristled at this. "It's not our fault. We didn't' ask to be oppressed and hated like this. We – "
Harry sighed again. "Yeah, yeah, I get it. 'My life sucks, and it's not my fault. Pity me; pity me.' Whatever. The truth of the matter is that you guys aren't doing anything to make it better."
"And what can we do?" The enraged werewolf glared at Harry angrily. Lesser werewolves would have attacked Harry by now.
"You can do a lot of things-look! I didn't come here to argue with you about the way you werewolves live your lives; that's what I came to do with your clan leader."
"Huh? You want to meet with our leader just to argue with him?" Confusion clouded over the anger on Lucas' face.
"Not to argue, discuss. Look, I want to meet with your leader to talk about another option for the werewolf community rather than just joining Voldemort. I need your kind's help, and you need mine."
Lucas looked at Harry curiously. "And who are you to give us help?" Harry let out another angst filled sigh and pulled back his hood. Immediately, people began crowding around and shouting his name, as per the usual. However, unusually, these people looked like they'd rather kill Harry, than fawn over him.
'Oh, well, that's different.'
Lucas looked completely shocked out of his mind. As two goblins Harry had bumped into began advancing on him, Harry decided it was time to go. Grabbing the astonished werewolf's hand, Harry quickly apparated away. (4)
"Ugh," Harry let go of Lucas as soon as they both arrived, stumbling to the ground. Apparently, side-along apparation wasn't just hard on the person being apparated along. Harry took a few breaths to clear his head and looked over at Lucas, who was staring at Harry in amazement.
"You – "
"If you say, 'you're Harry Potter!' I swear, I'm gonna slap you, werewolf or not."
"But you are!" Lucas leaned in to get a closer look at Harry. "Wow, so you do have a scar."
"Moving on," Harry laughed, "Look, can you – I can't believe I'm about to say this – take me to your leader?"
Lucas let out a snort of laughter before looking closely at Harry again, as if judging his seriousness. "You really want to help the werewolves?"
Harry nodded. "Yes, all my feelings on your attitude aside, you don't deserve this life; and I want to help you change it."
"Okay," Lucas said, pulling Harry out of the alley they were in. "I'll take you to see my father."
Harry's eyes widened in surprise. "Your father? You're related to the leader of the West End Clan?"
Lucas gave a small smile and a shrug, pulling Harry's hood back over his head and weaving his way through the crowd to some unknown destination. "Not by blood, but when I was turned as a kid, he took me in."
"I see," Harry said, yelping as he narrowly missed colliding with a cart some seedy-looking old man was pushing down the street. "And what is your father's name, and what should I call him?"
Lucas thought on this. "I guess you should call him Lord Rupert. We werewolves aren't' too big on titles, but it'll be good coming from you. You need all the help you can get if you're going to convince him about whatever this little scheme of yours is."
"No last name?" Harry questioned.
Lucas shook his head. "Most werewolves renounce their surnames after they're bitten because their families turn them out. Mine did."
Harry nodded his head in understanding. Lucas pulled him into a dark alley and all the way down to a brick wall. "Where are you taking me?"
"To see my father." Lucas drew a wand out of his pocket (he was wearing muggle clothes) and tapped it on the ground beneath the wall. (5) Immediately, a staircase opened up. Lucas cast a lumos and dragged Harry down. The entrance disappeared behind them.
"Where are we?" Harry asked as they moved through a maze of tunnels.
"These tunnels were created hundreds of years ago by goblins during one of those thousands of wars they had. They were eventually forgotten until, one day, a werewolf looking for a place to change found them. They stretch all the way around London, both wizarding and muggle. We werewolves use it to get around without being heckled by wizards."
"How long is it until we get to your clan's court?"
"Oooh, did your research, now didn't ya. Remind me to ask you later where you learned all this stuff. Don't worry; we'll be there soon."
Lucas took a sharp left, dragging Harry behind him. "Are you sure you know where you're going?" Harry asked worriedly.
Lucas let out a bark of laughter. "Don't worry; I'm sure. We won't get lost and become trapped in here forever or something."
"If you're sure…" Harry trailed behind Lucas through the dark cavern; the only light coming from the tip of Lucas' wand.
Alternate Ending
"Lucas!"
"What?"
"We're lost!"
"No, we're not; I just don't know where we are."
"Arrrrrrggggghhhhhh! Stupid werewolf!"
And so, tragically, Lucas and Harry get lost in the tunnels, trapped for what seemed to be forever. Summoning food and water, they managed to survive until, one day, 40 years later, Lucas finally found the way out…right back to where they had started from.
At this point, the two boys had, deciding they were forever trapped, legally married themselves to each other using a spell Harry had learned from the dementors. (Juan seemed to think it was very important Harry learn this spell for some reason.) Stuck together for good, they went off in to find out what had happened in the world since they had been gone.
As it turns out, while Harry had been gone, the wizarding world had turned to Ron, who had been killed a few weeks later in a tragic hot dog cart accident. (How a hot dog cart randomly appeared in Hogwarts, the world will never now.) Hermione, in her sadness, had become a nun, living in a monastery in Switzerland. Strangely enough, becoming a nun was the only way to escape the Dark Lord's wrath, as he wanted nothing to do with nuns. Go figure.
Voldemort, after killing Ron, went on to conquer the wizarding world, enslaving all creatures. He named the new world Voldetropolis. Death eaters ruled provinces of the world under him, and their dental plan was found to actually be quite good. The rest of the Weasleys were killed in a "freak" accident involving Draco Malfoy, a house elf, a rutabaga, and lots and lots of butterbeer.
Sirius Black and Remus Lupin eventually were captured and are now for sale in a local pets store. Dumbledore died of shock when he found out that Tom Riddle and Voldemort were the same people – he chocked on a lemon drop. Luna goes off in search of the infamous snipe soon after Voldemort came into power. After proving it's existence and discovering that it was an extremely smart sentient being, she and Hagrid – who joined her as her assistant – became famous zoologists and used their riches to prove the existence of more and more previously thought non-existent magical beings. Many people heavily believed that Voldemort only allowed them to live for stress relief through laughter. (Although no one has ever seen the Dark Lord laugh … or no one alive, at least)
Hogwarts was run by the same teachers, except Severus Snape became headmaster; and Gryffindor students were officially all declared "pompous nitwits." Snape and McGonagall married happily and she retired to raise their 2.5 metro sexual boys. Dolorus Umbridge became the new transfiguration teacher.
Draco Malfoy died of heartbreak and loneliness, as his only one true love (*cough* Harry *cough* *cough*) was missing. Dobby became the head of household at Malfoy residence in his absence.
Since they were legally married and stuck with each other, Harry and Lucas ran away to Bulgaria to live the rest of their lives incognito as llama herders. Eventually, business for llama milk boomed; and they became multi-millionaires. (Apparently, Lord V had a fetish for it and made it the national drink of Voldetopolis.) They lived happily ever after and had 4 children, who took over the family business.
The End (Not really)
Author's Note: (1) Because we all know you get your best ideas when wet. It's true.
(2) Gosh, that sounds like Voldy has own secret club of exclusive friends. Come to think of it, that's kind of what the inner circle death eaters are. I mean, they all have to be pureblood, have some big, long family name, be related to their spouses, (All those pureblood have to be at least, like, second cousins or something) and have money. It's just another way to make himself seem better than others. Man, he must have low self-esteem.
(3) Ha! I finally figured out how to make a page break. No more squigglys for me. And, yes, before you ask, computers hate me; and I know next to nothing about them.
(4) Yay! Apparation solves every problem!
(5) Or illusion of a wall. Remember, walls don't exist anymore in this story.
I combined another two chapters today, because the one chapter alone was way too short. Be happy. I actually had already prewritten a lot of my chapters before posting this story, but I only have, like, 2 and 1/2 of the prewritten left even though I keep writing throughout the week, so after I run out, I may have to cut my updates back. School and tennis come first; remember that. It's the way it goes, so just remember that even if I don't update for a while, I will never ever abandon this story-my sister would never let me, and I would never let me. Well, now that that depressing and boring (I'm sure someone out there has just fallen asleep on the computer reading this) part is over, what did you think of Lucas? ood romantic possibility? Personally, I like him. Hope you enjoyed, and Review! Now! My magical hypnosis commands you!