A/N: Hello there, guys! I can't believe it's been 6 years and I'm finally posting this note. I've dreamed about this moment (sometimes the dreams felt like nightmares haha).
Anywaaaaayyy... the sequel for TP is finally complete! There are 56 chapters, that are being posted biweekly, and possibly an additional bonus chapter after that. You can find it on my profile. It's called Black Phoenix Rising. There are 3 chapters up right now, and, just for funsies, I'm dropping the prologue below for you guys to enjoy, if you like.
Thank you all again. It has been a trip.
Rina
Black Phoenix Rising
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Prologue:
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He was drowning in red.
It was bleeding across his vision, as far as the eye could see. Farther. It was cascading down in waterfalls, crashing down in waves. He spun around, blinking it out of his eyes. When he glanced up, he saw it floating down from the scarlet sky in pieces. Like clusters of grapes.
Iron.
The smell of it burned through his nose, sliced through his whole being. Welled up in a fury that threatened to overwhelm him.
And then it was gone. He was lost in black. Buried, he knew, in a place so deep the light would never reach. The red was only an afterimage, glowing across his retinas. But then the lightdidreach, breaking through the darkness like thunder. The world shook. Colors danced across the night.
Pale blue bled to brightest green, and then to the softest pink, before it remembered the shade of crimson — before it dotted the sky in droves.
The very world was crying. The sound stabbed at him, burning across his heart. Pain blossomed. His own tears were sliding down his cheeks, blazing like trails of fire.
The crimson dots across the sky began to wink out, engulfed in shades of amber so vivid it was like poison melting the night. And as the darkness reigned once more, he felt something deep inside awaken, reaching forward, rearing to strike.
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Harry jerked awake, sweat trailing down his face, and whipped his head to gaze around the dark and silent room. His heart was pounding painfully against his ribcage, and he was breathing hard, as if he had just run for several miles. And yet the foray into the dark had left him cold. Even the sweat running down his brow was freezing, inching down the side of his face in icy tendrils. He reached up, carelessly wiping it away.
The metallic smell lingered still, mixing with the sweat and the fear, layering upon his senses in a mosaic of sensations he couldn't decipher. The pain was gone, its trace only a shadow; the imagery as meaningless as fog.
He couldn't reconcile this dream with anything he had seen before. There was no basis for comparison. No pool from which to draw understanding. For the first time in a long time, Harry Potter thought that perhaps a dream was simply that. A dream.
He allowed himself to sag back onto his pillow, drawing the blanket up to his chin as Snowy readjusted his position by his feet.
A dream.
He drifted off to sleep, her warm shape at his back a reassuring presence.
A dream, and nothing more.
He couldn't get lost in a nightmare. Not now, when she had finally led them from the dark.