Harry stumbled up the road to the fourth-floor passageway at a brisk trot, shaking with anger as he searched the road. Other than a few scattered footprints and dog tracks, there was no sign of Black or his intended direction. Harry felt a wave of despair engulf his senses, a testament to the rising guilt over the past few months. Since his second (or seventh?) chance, he'd failed his stated objective to establish connections to fight You-Know-Who again and again, making bitter enemies out of former friends and allies. Neville slammed into him in the corridors every chance he got, one time shooting a reducto at Harry's bag, which narrowly missed a group of seventh years, destroying half a shelf in the charms section. Professor McGonagall had taken seventy-five points from both Hufflepuff and Gryffindor in a fit of rage, assigning them to re-write Filch's files, assist the house elves with the meals under close supervision, and single-handedly clean all the men's rooms without magic.
By the time they got out of detention, Harry reflected gloomily, insides clenched at the head of Gryffindor's reaction once she found out he skipped school on a Monday and had nothing to show for it, they would likely be in fifth year. If one of them didn't start a duel that landed both in Azkaban first.
"Harry, mate, hold up," Ernie interjected, gripping Harry's shoulder as he examined his friend's eyes. "If you'd thought Sirius Black was innocent," he continued, voice tinged with a slight hint of patronization as well as concern, "you should have told us," he said, throwing his hands up.
"I know you don't like politics and old family influences," Ernie declared, taking a few steps back as the boy who lived's eyes narrowed and fists clenched, "but we could have made it work for you. You've only got a couple weeks to find a new guardian."
The dark-haired teen's eyes shadowed and grew diamond-hard, green eyes taking on a watery sheen, "Yeah well, thanks for reminding me that I've got no proper family," he spat, pushing Ernie's arm down, the memory of Ron's betrayal last seventh year still stinging. Said redhead strode along with his hands in his pockets in silence, visage flickering with disgust at his ex-pet being a wanted criminal and awkward uneasiness towards his former friend.
"You could also speak to my auntie," Susan chimed in, the auburn-haired girl pushing aside locks, a slight sheen of sweat visible on her brow. "I'm sure she'd be happy to have some company, especially another 'puff," she finished, offering Harry a kind smile.
Although Harry felt a spark of fondness for the Hufflepuff he now thought as something of sister or a cousin, his gut told him to reject this suggestion at once, "If you'd fallen off the staircase from that stunner," Harry blurted out, his entire being cold at the thought, "we'd have been scraping you off the floor. Plus, in case you haven't noticed, I'm not exactly the safest person to be around."
As Susan opened her mouth, a sharp voice rang out. "Truer words were never spoken." A familiar bushy haired Gryffindor approached through the thinning trees. Harry took a sharp breath. Hermione's robes were tattered and covered in leaves and sticks, as if she'd traversed thick hedges in a hurry. Both her shoes were missing, feet covered in dirt, blood and bone poking through her right foot, which was missing several toes.
"What in Merlin's beard happened?" Harry blurted out, running forward towards his former friend, only to stop as a wand aimed at his chest.
"Stay back!" Hermione blurted out, voice tight with pain, but overall steady and composed, as always. "I can take of myself!" she insisted, crumpling to her knees a few seconds later. Harry did a quick assessment of Hermione's injuries, the Hufflepuffs and errant Gryffindor huffing behind her. Harry scowled as he examined Hermione's foot, the appendage crushed, four out of five toes were missing, the rest of the foot torqued by pressure, from a trap of some kind?
"Blimey, she needs a healer!" Ron blurted out, his eyes wide as he took in the full extent of the girl's wounds, his freckled face slightly green.
"I've got eyes Ron despite these bloody useless glasses thanks," Harry snapped, ignoring the hurt on the Gryffindor's face and the set of his jaw. Harry's wealth and fame had frequently been a sore point between the two during their acrimonious friendship, despite the boy who lived's habitual efforts to downplay his status. At first, Harry didn't really care that walking around in rags lead the students to evaluate him in a poor light, a testament to years of being told he was a good for nothing and general indifference towards his image. Now, he was going to show some degree of class and try to build a new reputation as a respectable, considerate student, hot-tempered red-heads be damned.
"Apparently not good enough to keep your guard up," a high-pitched voice chimed in, robes snapping around Ron, Ernie, then Susan as they collapsed to the dirt road. Harry's wand snapped up to meet a fourth spell, a stunner, just in time, the shield from the battered wand failing but weakening the spell slightly as Harry was thrown back but remained conscious.
"What the hell, … Schofield, right?" as he spied a weedy Slytherin second-year with cropped dark brown hair, his freckles making him look like a Weasley from a short distance. Schofield was one of the newer pure-blood families, not part of the Sacred Twenty-Eight, but still fairly influential in British society. The boy was flanked by a small black-haired girl with a pale complexion and a curious gaze and a burly seventh-year with a blond mustache, his arm gripping the boy's shoulder protectively as he stepped forward.
"Saw the Granger girl skip class and run straight into the forest and out of bounds," the presumably older Schofield continued, facing the newly freed students and Potter with a tight, gloating smirk. "What with Malfoy in detention again, I thought I'd myself some witnesses," he waved his right hand at his beaming brother and a polite smile from the girl, her expression uncertain. "And take the trash out of school," he continued, left hand and wand pointed squarely at Harry and his friends. "Let's see if Dumbledore can save his Mudbloods and Muggle-lovers this time," he intoned with a mocking lit, grinning as blood oozed from Hermione's foot.
A surge of hot anger spiked as Harry didn't think, he just rushed forward and punched the bastard square in the jaw, shaking his hand in pain as his wrist torqued from the backlash. The seventh-year reacted faster than anticipated, spitting blood and grabbing the errant whelp in a half Nelson, darkness encroaching on Harry's vision.
The Slytherin suddenly slumped in a pile of wet mulch and tattered leaves, petrified.
Hermione slowly reached out a hand, her expression conflicted, pulling Harry to his feet.
"You alright, Potter," she asked with a wary expression, posture tensed no doubt in case the dark-haired teen lost his temper again.
Sadness creased Harry's face as he accepted her hand. "Yeah," he sighed. "Hermione," he blurted out, "I'm so sorry I hurt you, I should have taken your advice about keeping my temper," his eyes fell to the ground, as he waited for her reply.
Hermione half-rolled her eyes and pursed her lips, eyes hard, before softening slightly. She patted his arm with a sigh as she turned to him. "Look, Harry, ever since coming back …"
Hermione's words cut off as she out a piercing scream, left foot tumbling into the brush as a pink beam narrowly missed the neck, before severing her appendage. A river of blood gushed as Harry frantically cast burning and binding charms to contain the damage.
"Back off Mudblood!" the younger Schofield yelled, now peppering Hermione with stinging hexes, the teen's eyes rolled up and bloodshot, face turning gray.
"Expelliarmus! Immobulus!" Harry blurted.
The disarming charm snatched the wand from the boy's grip, a curtain of blue light holding the Slytherin in place. The girl, a Greengrass? Harry wondered, shifted her feet, wand pointed in no particular direction. "You're Daphne, right?" Harry said in a firm but polite voice, not wanting to provide any more ammunition towards the student perception of him as a troublemaker and a loose cannon.
"Astoria," the girl replied in a clipped, wary voice, wand shifting to point at him as her brow furrowed.
"Oh, right," Harry mentally smacked his forehead for his stupidity, although he supposed losing his godfather once again, being held at wandpoint and tending to an injured … he didn't know what Hermione, was an acceptable excuse.
"Listen, when we get back to the castle, I'll turn myself in," Harry urged, mentally preparing himself for a life as a muggle or a short stint in Azkaban at least once the authorities got through with him. "Help me get your friends and we'll go together, yeah?"
"Not a chance!" the girl squeaked, cheeks flushed. "When I get back to the castle, Snape will have you expelled before lunchtime," she spat, gingerly taking Slytherin boy's arm before walking on the other side of the older Schofield, his flat eyes promising retribution.
A creeping mist and wave of cold swept over the group as fifteen dementors approached, the front three already with hoods lowered, shapeless holes promising oblivion for their unlucky victims.
"Think of something happy!" Harry yelled, feeling a tug on his inner self as he struggled to remain upright. "Expecto Patronum!" A weak wall of silver light flickered, slowing the front dementors, as the others glided to the other sides, cutting off all escape.
Ron and Susan managed to cast translucent beams of light, quickly collapsing as the effort became too much. Ernie was muttering that he wasn't arrogant or entitled as he squatted on the ground, arms over his head as the darkness increased. The second years clutched their hands to their mouths in a futile gesture, limbs tugged apart as the dementors started feeding slowly.
The elder Schofield stood slightly to the side, knees bent, chin trembling but firm as he pointed to Harry. "Take the blood traitors, and the Mudblood, and leave the rest of us alone!"
The dementors ignored him, continuing to glide forward, mouths rattling. The blond Slytherin's face creased in a determined frown as he fired a bombarda and cutting curses at the fiends. The bombarda destroyed a half dozen dementors with an accompanying shower of rock and dirt, the mouths on battered heads opening and closing uselessly before turning to ash. One or two crumpled in pieces on the ground, relatively intact but unable to pose a threat.
The Slytherin attempted to retreat, screaming as he fired yellow and maroon spells from his wand, several narrowly missing the cowering students. The rotting and blood-boiling curses had no effect on the shapes of darkness, the remaining four dementors growling as they continued to feed off the students.*
Harry's vision surged to white and black, now mostly unconscious as he continued to chant.
A red-haired woman pleaded for mercy as a hooded figure sliced her to bits before a jet of vivid green light slammed into her heart, coming to a halt before a silent dark-haired boy in a crib.
"You got me killed Harry, and you abandoned me when things got tough," Sirius Black insisted as maggots and beetles consumed his now dead face, laughing figures approaching and burning his skeletal remains.
Black's body reformed as dogs tore his corpse, trotting to the Veil of Death and tossing them in a piece at a time, wagging their tails as Bellatrix Lestrange patted their heads before shooting avada's at them, as she danced on a pile of dead Muggles.
A scowling man with dark hair and muscle protruding from his temple stood before Harry, suddenly changing to his sixteen year old self. "You're a loser and a bully, and that's all you'll ever be," he sneered, impaling Harry's stomach as he changed into a deer.
Harry choaked and clutched the antlers as he threw up, sinking to his knees as he returned to the present, a dementor a foot from his face. Suddenly an image flashed across his mind, Hermione laughing at his awkward meeting with Cho Chang in fifth year, her face relaxed and happy. "Expecto Patronum," he yelled.
The wand crackled as a stag erupted out, throwing the first two dementors as they left the students, and fled, mist evaporating as the surrounding cold returned to normal.
A scream erupted from Harry's left, as he turned, feet sliding on a nearby bank as he scrambled after the students. The three Slytherins had managed to evade the dementors after the stag appeared, but were now corned by an embankment and dense cluster of trees, loose limbs offering easy access to their trembling mouths. The stag threw back the first dementor just as it reached Astoria, slamming the dementor to the ground, hooves releasing the wraith as it fled. However, just before the slag reached the Schofields,' Harry's wand grew hot and broke in two as he dropped it to the ground, the patronus dissolving a second later.
"Damn it, not now!" Harry yelled, scrambling up the hill in an attempt to retrieve a working wand, which happened to be Astoria's. The girl must have dropped it as she fled the dementors, Harry thought wildly as he adjusted his aim, sending a volley of reductor curses as the dementor's torso. The dementor shuddered and buckled before turning to ash, but the second-year had already slumped, eyes blank.
"Potter!" the red-eyed seventh year yelled, pointing at Harry with a clammy hand. "I'll have your head for my brother's life," he spat as he charged towards the boy-who-lived with all the savagery of a raging beast. Harry threw up a shield as the boy charged as his enemy fell backwards in a burst of blue sparks, head lolling as he slumped against a tree root.
A strangled yell and surge of cold alerted Harry as he turned. Hermione had thrown up her hand to protect her face as a wraith clutched her wrist. The hand had turned an unseemly black-gray, frost creeping slowly up her wrist. The flabbergasted teen once again summoned the stag, the wounded beast fleeing the beast's strong prongs. Harry gently set Hermione to a resting position as he severed the limb, the damage having crept a third way up the arm.* Shouts echoed as perfects, teachers, and one or two aurors appeared over the rise, far too late to make a bad situation better in his not unbiased opinion.
Whatever happens next, Harry reflected a grimace, teeth scraping, he knew that once again, someone he loved got hurt, because of the boy who lived.
*In this reality, the more powerful spells work against the dementors, but the effectiveness is limited, as there are tens of thousands stationed in Azkaban alone, and additional groups scattered throughout the world.
*A similar injury to Hermione's hand occurred in White Squirrel's The Arithmancer, although the damage is permanent this time.
One more chapter to the completion of this installment date unknown, can't be rushed.