POTTER FILES : THE LIGHTNING THIEF

Chapter 17 : Returning to School

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Disclaimer : I do not own Harry Potter or Percy Jackson.

Note : The timeline of the HP universe has been changed to fit PJO universe. Some slight changes have been made to HP canon to fit girl Harry. So, Iris (fem!Harry) Potter was born on 31 July 1993 and COS happened in 2005-2006.

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This chapter will be in Iris' Pov unless stated otherwise.

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To say that the last month was interesting would be a lie. Percy chose to stay with his mom after his plea for exception was rejected. I guessed, after nearly losing her, he would want to spend as much time as possible with her. A pity. Chiron had mentioned that had the request been few weeks earlier, it would have been granted. Apparently, Mr. D said something like 'Pierre Johnson' getting a big head after his success at quest. We agreed to hang out during the Winter vacations, just the three of us.

Annabeth, on the other hand, took her new job quite seriously. She could be seen visiting every cabin and talking to them regularly. It was an uphill task indeed.

Hermes had no enemies. I did not know whether it was because they took everyone until they were claimed or due to Luke's charisma, perhaps a bit of both. When Luke had been the leader, he had near unanimous support. That just made his treachery hit harder.

On the other hand, Annabeth had to contend with not only Athena's traditional enemies but also the ones she might have made due to her inherited prideful nature. Hey, I was her friend but I was not blind to her flaws. She had a good head on her shoulders but no one would call her charismatic. The only reason Ares and Aphrodite cabins had not publicly acted against Annabeth was because there was no other candidate qualified enough to challenge her for the position. The closest was Clarisse who was one and a half years behind in seniority and the recent addition of successful quest to Annabeth's name had only widened the gap.

I had heard Annabeth openly curse Luke to the depths of Tartarus for leaving her with that mess and also wondering how the guy did it and made it look easy. Not all was lost however. After things settle down, she intended to start the Project New Athens and through it, unite the camp and firmly cement her position as the leader in everyone's mind. I wondered how much of the original design would remain after everyone was satisfied. The original scholar centric approach would not work. For all I know, even the name might have to be changed. Well, it was Annie's problem anyway.

As for me, with Annabeth busy, I had to occupy my time somehow. Hermes cabin had been in such a gloomy atmosphere since Luke's desertion that Stoll brothers stopped pranking. There was only so much I could talk with Lou Ellen and Alabaster.

I somehow decided it would be a good idea to ask Clarisse to spar with me while I was blindfolded and without using my nature sensing. It was not on a whim though. I met three monsters against whom eye contact was a bad idea : crossbreed, python and Medusa. It would be a good idea to learn to fight with other senses just in case.

One of the advantages of being the daughter of an archery goddess was superior eyesight. My part divine nature even overpowered the curse plaguing the Potter line. I was the first Potter in a long while to not need glasses. It was quite a shock to many. I never realised how good my eye sight was until the quest. A drawback of it was that I was more dependent on it than others, something I intended to reduce. After all, the enemies would not always fight from the front. Ambushes were the norm rather than the exception.

As I expected, Clarisse did not show me any mercy. She was of the belief that what does not kill you would make you stronger. She smacked me around relentlessly with her spear. By the end of the first day, my body was a mass of bruises. Instead of taking the easy way out by consuming ambrosia and nectar, I used the nature energy to heal myself. After a few days, when she was sure that I had no intention of squealing, she raised her level. Broken bones and torn muscles became more regular so too did my rise in self-healing skills. Improvement was slow but enough for me to continue. Two weeks later, I could clearly hear the sound of her boots on the ground and the whistling sound of the air being displaced by the moving spear.

Clarisse then proposed the idea of taking the spar to the next level. According to her, life and death engagements give greater improvement than casual sparing. I agreed. By then, I knew that she was not really angry at me anymore. In fact, she respected me and genuinely wanted me to improve. It helped that she admitted she was planning to introduce the same training to her cabin and was using it as a test phase. The other Ares kids would hate me and would have a genuine reason for it.

Well, say what you would about Clarisse, anything related to fight or getting stronger, she knew what she was talking about. I did improve faster. In our last fight, I already knew where she was going to strike, some sort of gut feeling before I heard the sound. Clarisse was quite surprised when I turned tables on her and won the spar. She then congratulated me for activating the Eye of the Mind (False). I had never heard of something like that and she explained to me.

Apparently, the ability was named so because it was frequently confused with another ability called Eye of the Mind (True). You know that interesting ability where an Athena kid looks at you and instantly calculates 1000 different attack combinations to defeat you and chooses the one with highest probability of your defeat. Yes, all Athena kids were born with the ability. Others could get it after spending enough time in the battlefield, time being measured in decades, that is. I understood then how Ares always knew where Percy was going to strike but did not do so well with surprise attacks. The former ability was more about instincts but on higher levels resembled precognition.

Basically, Eye of the Mind (False) was for surviving while Eye of the Mind was for winning.

It was finally August 31, time to return to school. I packed all my belongings, said goodbye to Annabeth and Clarisse and left for the woods. Once I entered into the woods however, I got a weird feeling. I immediately turned around with my daggers Apollonius and Artemisia in my hands. Yes, I finally named my daggers. The dagger made from fang of the crossbreed was slightly older and helped in the 'birth' of the other and so was named after my mother. The other one being python fang dagger was naturally named after the Sun god.

There was a man standing nonchalantly scrolling through his I-pad. He was lean and muscular, with a regal face, honey gold eyes, and black hair flowing down his shoulders. His skin was the color of teakwood, and his dark wings glimmered in shades of blue, black, and purple. In short, he was the tall, dark and handsome type the girls tended to swoon over. I instantly distrusted him. I was not usually the type of person who judges others based on prejudices or preconceptions but was there any anime where tall, dark and handsome who everybody loved did not turn out to be trouble later on. With all the stories and myths turning out to be real, I had a right to be cautious.

"I see. You detected me. As expected. That was an ability of your Cloak that surprised even us.", he said.

His voice was sweet like honey which put me more on guard.

"Who are you?"

"As you may have already guessed, I am Thanatos, god of peaceful death. I have two quests for you. First is to kill one Tom Marvolo Riddle, who had turned himself into a lich to evade us. You would have to destroy his five phylacteries first before you go after him..."

"Wait! Lich? Phylacteries? What are they?", I asked.

"Phylacteries or horcruxes as you call them are physical objects that serve as an anchor to a piece of soul. The wizard/sorcerer who creates them turn into something more closer to undead than living. We call them lich. They exist as long as their phylacteries do.", his droning voice spoke.

I blinked my eyes in surprise. I had not really thought much of the diary in the past months. Now that I thought about it, it seemed too intelligent and independent to be anything less than a piece of soul.

"When you said five, it was excluding the one I destroyed, right?"

"Yes"

I wrinkled my nose in disgust. That guy must have been born nutter. Who the hell tears their soul apart into 7 pieces when even the gods felt uncomfortable about manipulating it?

"Why can't you do it yourself? You did just say that he is not a mortal?", I asked.

Thanatos sighed as if explaining was strenuous work. He did seem to be the lazy type.

"I am god of peaceful death. My duty is to guide the souls that left their bodies to the Underworld not forcibly tear the souls from their bodies living or non living. Getting the souls to leave the bodies, that is demigod's work."

"You will be informed of the locations in time. The second quest is to destroy the monsters that you call dementors and free the souls trapped inside."

"Dementors? What are they?", I asked.

"You will know when you get there. Before you ask any more questions, you should know you would have done those tasks on your own anyway. We are only giving you an official quest to reduce our paperwork. Good luck on your quests.", he said and vanished.

I rubbed my forehead feeling a headache. It that was what Hades had to deal with, I was not surprised he was so cranky.

If the pitiful explanation was anything to go by, destroying these Dementor things would release a lot of souls. How were they going to decide which soul was going to which Underworld? It was a difficult enough with those that died properly.

It was then that I remembered the last part of the explanation. Perhaps, there was a old law where if a demigod on a quest released a lot of souls, the related Underworld got the first dibs or something. It would cut a lot of diplomatic red tape.

I dismissed the daggers, took my shoulder bag and continued walking. Once I went far enough, I shifted.

I could immediately feel the difference. Scotland was much colder at the time of the year. As I was walking towards Hogwarts, I could feel myself shivering and could see my breath coming out in puffs. I frowned. It seemed that living in warm, cozy New York had made me forget how cold it could get here, especially at night. I took out my new silver skii jacket my mother had given me and put it on. I instantly felt warm and safe. The jacket was enchanted such that even if it covers only part of the body, the entire body would be protected from cold. Artemis was never one to compromise when it came to her hunter's safety.

I walked a few more steps before I stopped. I swiftly turned and the next moment Appolonius was plunged into the chest of someone or something. The thing was around 6 feet tall wearing a hooded cloak as black as the night that covered everything. It had a depressing aura surrounding it and a smell of decay coming from it. Everything about it seemed to give off the vibe of cold, undead and unnatural.

It seemed surprised that it was hurt. It started lowering its head towards me and I could see a face, if it could be called that, beneath the hood. I let myself be surrounded by Selene's aura and grabbed its decaying face. It let out an unholy screech of agony that I was sure the entire forest heard. I ignored it with some effort and pulled the dagger upwards tearing its body apart. It fell to the ground, flayed about for a moment and then burst into white flames.

I was surprised. What was that? I knew it was not something that Dementor thing did. The aura of the flames was the opposite of what they stood for. It was pure, natural. It burnt out leaving no evidence of its existence except that the spot seemed more pure as if it was cleansed. Now that I was looking for it, I could sense their taint in the surroundings, their unnaturalness. I wondered how long had they been roaming around polluting the place. Weren't centaurs supposed to prevent that from happening? Or perhaps they had died trying? As depressing as it sounded, it was a possibility I had to consider.

I continued on forward keeping alert and slowly taking in natural energy. It was harder than I expected. They had done their best to pollute the place but the nature was not so easily beaten down.

I stopped, waiting. Suddenly, like ripples flowing through water, I could see the fluttering of their robes in the darkness. I could feel my blood boiling in excitement on seeing my prey. I dismissed my dagger and summoned my bow and quiver full of arrows. I lined an arrow aiming at the heart of one of them and stretched the string to its very limit. I then let it loose with a grin on my face. Let the hunt begin.

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