FIC: The Creators -- Chapter Nine -- PG-13

[batsutousai]

Title: The Creators
Author: batsutousai
Beta: The amazing, the beautiful, tsuki_no_suzu!
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Susan/Neville, Ron/Krum, Hermione/Bill, Sarah/??, Harry/NO ONE, DAMMIT!
Warnings: Mentions of child-abuse, anti-Muggle sentiments, mentions of murder and rape, anti-Dumbledore
Summary: 'When their Creators return, their world shall be remade.' Four children hold the fate of the Wizarding World in their un-tried hands.

Disclaim Her: The end of this chapter caused a lot of grief for your dear author.

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Hanging By A Thread
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Harry took the egg into the Room of Requirement the morning of Boxing Day to see what he could find out about Cedric's suggestion. He listened to the damn thing screech at him for about ten minutes before he got so fed up he tossed the egg into the water, trusting Hogwarts to keep it from possibly breaking. "I don't get it!" he shouted at the room.

Hogwarts let out a mental sigh and said, 'Go get the egg, Sal.'

Grumbling, Harry swam over to where he could see the golden glimmer and ducked his head under the water to grab it.

"...searching, ponder this: We've taken–"

Harry jerked his up above the water, gasping, his mind speeding with questions and answers.

"Merpeople!" he finally shouted. "You're only able to understand them under water. And there's a colony in the lake, right?"

'Took you long enough,' Hogwarts replied.

Harry grinned at the ceiling, then took a deep breath and went to retrieve the egg.

"...An hour long you'll have to look–"

Harry broke the surface of the water again, eyeing the egg suspiciously. "An hour for what?" he grumbled.

He could practically feel Hogwarts rolling her eyes. 'And you're supposed to be nearly as clever as Row. Why don't you listen to the rhyme it's singing before just letting it be?'

Harry considered the egg, then sighed and, taking another deep breath, dipped below the surface of the water to hear the whole song.

He came back up again after listening to the song twice, closing the egg thoughtfully. "They're taking something I'll miss. Hmmm... Something material that I'll miss..."

'...Any ideas?' Hogwarts asked.

Harry sighed and shook his head. "My wand? You? Row, Ric or Helga? Sarah, or maybe Sirius? I don't know. Not sure. I suppose I'll have to wait."

'What now, then?'

"Now? Now I spend time researching all the ways to breath under water for an hour. They've got to have come up with something better than gillyweed in the past thousand years..."

-0-

As it turned out, they hadn't come up with anything better than gillyweed. Or, they hadn't come up with something that a fourth year could conceivably manage to cast, even one as advanced as Harry and his friends seemed to be. So, in the end, Harry bribed some gillyweed from Slughorn and found spells that he could use to speed himself up underwater. The best spell he found was something that, by no means, should a supposedly Light teen like Harry Potter be considering casting, but since Harry wasn't Light, and no one would be able to see them when they were under water, he decided that was the one he'd probably use.

The day of the task came upon the champions rather suddenly. When Harry walked into the Great Hall, he looked over the other tables, expecting to see four smiling faces from his friends and sister. Instead, he received worried frowns from Hermione and Susan.

Krum walked swiftly up to him, eyes slightly panicked. "Have you seen Ron?" he asked.

Harry shook his head. "Different dorms. My sister's miss..." Harry's comment died on his lips as he understood the meaning of the sung message. "What we'll miss. You'll miss Ron, and I'd... Shit! Sarah better not be in that lake," he finished, practically seething with fury. If they put his sister in that lake, so help them.

Krum seemed to relax when he realised what had happened to his boyfriend. After the ball, the two boys had only become closer, and when Rita Skeeter had shot out an article about Krum's apparent love life with another man, he'd calmly admitted it was true, which had made Ronald as happy as a new father. They'd been practically inseparable since.

'I can guarantee Sarah is safe,' Hogwarts soothed.

Harry eyes narrowed at the Head table while he followed Krum back to the Slytherin table. He hadn't missed Hogwarts' lack of assurance that Sarah wasn't in the lake. Safe she may be, but Harry was damned if he'd let his little sister suffer in the cold, dark bottoms of the lake.

-0-

As soon as the whistle blew, Harry was off, choking down gillyweed and taking a deep breath so he wouldn't suffocate before the plant took effect. In fact, by the time the gillyweed took effect, Harry was already zooming towards the sounds of the merpeople, eyes narrowed behind the muggle diving goggles Hogwarts had pulled from the Room of Lost Things.

It took Harry ten minutes to zoom into the merpeople's camp, and as soon as he saw the poles the captives were tied to, he felt his stomach sink and zipped over.

Sarah hung, pale and terrifyingly still, hair floating about her head in a black cloud. Harry felt sick looking at her, remembering her death all those many centuries ago. Tears clouded his vision as he stared at her blank face. "Sarah..." he tried to whisper.

The mouthful of lake water had him coughing and brought him back to his senses. She wasn't dead, and Hogwarts had promised she was safe. Harry doubted Dumbledore – for all his faults and stringent morals – would allow children to die because they took too long collecting their captives, but he wasn't willing to chance the man's sense of honour, not when Sarah's life was on the line.

Harry quickly cut the rope and grabbed her around the waist. As he turned to leave, he saw Cedric swimming towards him with a bubblehead charm. They nodded briefly, then Harry was off, speeding with his sister to the open sky, where, hopefully, the girl would be okay.

At the surface, Hermione was waiting with the counter-plant to gillyweed and Harry took it as Sarah started to stir. As soon as those bright aqua eyes opened, they focused on her brother and she asked, "Sal?"

Harry smiled a watery smile and leaned down to pull her into a hug. "You're okay," he whispered, "You're okay..."

Sarah couldn't quite understand why Harry was so upset, but she patted his back comfortingly and said, "Of course I am."

Above them, Hermione shook her head and shot a few confundus charms at people who might have been close enough to hear Harry's true name. (Though, it wasn't really a big thing, since the twins had been cheerfully calling the Founders by their real names since the Yule Ball, not knowing that they hadn't just been playing parts. They'd also taken to talking to Hogwarts as if she was alive, which the castle thought was hysterical. She'd almost spoken back twice.)

Cedric emerged next, a fair time behind Harry, with Cho Chang. Krum was practically on his heels with Ronald. The two boys staggered out of the water together, arms around each other's waists and looking somehow both exhausted and elated.

The merpeople followed Krum with Delacour's little sister, who the older girl cried over much more dramatically than Harry's brief moment of weakness. (By the time Cedric had shown, Harry was cheerfully regaling his sister and two female friends with tales of the deep, skilfully skipping over his own moment of panic at seeing Sarah's seemingly-dead body.)

When the judges gave the scores, Harry found himself in the lead, with Cedric a distance behind him, and Krum following the Hufflepuff. Delacour brought up the rear, though she seemed much too pleased with her sister's safe return to care about her score.

"Crazy speed you had," Cedric commented to Harry as the older Hogwarts' champion stopped next to where Sarah and Ronald were being fawned over by Harry, Hermione, Susan and Krum. "Magic?"

Harry nodded. "Gillyweed is useful for excursions like that, but not for speed, so I looked up a couple of spells that would increase it. Worked out pretty well."

Cedric nodded. "I'll say. If Karkaroff wasn't so biased – no offence, Viktor – I think you would have gotten straight tens."

Krum shrugged off the mention of his Headmaster's bias. "I bothers me sometimes too," he admitted. "Harry deserved straight tens."

Harry shook his head. "What's happened, has happened."

And everyone else left it at that.

-0-

'Brief Joke Gone Too Far?
'By Rita Skeeter
'Harry Potter came to the Yule Ball with an unknown woman,
who he called Hogwarts, as was reported months ago. To keep
up the pretence, of the girl's assumed name, Harry himself took
on the name of Hogwarts Founder, Salazar Slytherin, goading
his friends into playing along as the other three Founders.
'The three pulled a good performance, and Weasley twins Gred
and Forge have been keeping it alive by calling the four by their
assumed names in hallways between classes.
'Just as Hogwarts returns to normal and the joke starts to
become just that, the second task occurs, where Sarah Black,
adopted daughter of the framed Sirius Black, Harry's
godfather, was heard calling Harry 'Sal', a nickname
used at the Yule Ball in reference to him being Salazar
Slytherin, after just waking up. Harry, at the time, answered
to the name without pause and started crying into young
Sarah's hair without any reason.
'This reporter must wonder if this joke hasn't gone just a
little too far, to have a young second year calling a family
member by an assumed name just after waking and bringing
our saviour to tears.'

Harry tapped his fingers on the edge of the table, eyeing the article with some contempt. Hermione had assured him that anyone that had heard Sarah speak his name had been confounded, and that no one had noticed his breakdown as a result. That meant this reporter had some way of learning things that the Founders were careful about, and Harry didn't like it in the least. He'd never appreciated announcing his public life, and becoming a celebrity had hardly changed that.

"So, what are you going to do, Salazar?" Draco mocked. He didn't, for one minute, believe that Harry might be their Founder. None of the school did, really, and nor would the public, but the article would still cause trouble. "Are you going to go cry to your little sister?" Like that.

Harry sighed and absently hexed the boy's mouth shut, considering what to do. He could follow through on his earlier threat to the Skeeter woman and have her fired – it wouldn't be hard, not with the money in the Potter vaults – or he could simply let it go. Other than the occasional jab about him crying on Sarah and the rejuvenation of his "assumed" name, there wouldn't be many problems. And if he left Skeeter free, he might be able to catch her out in her spying, and figure out how she'd avoided Hermione's spells; Hermione wasn't about to take their secrets carelessly.

When Draco finally got his mouth open, he said, "Waa! Waa!"

Harry hexed his mouth shut again.

"You know, Draco," Millicent commented drily, "one might start to wonder where those famed self-preservation instincts all Slytherins are said to have might be."

Harry rolled his eyes. He liked Millicent – it helped that the girl was cunning and knew when to shut up, but she also genuinely liked Harry, unlike most of the rest of the House, who weren't sure about him most of the time – but she had her moments.

Harry stood before Draco could unstick his mouth again and left the Hall, thoughtfully tapping the paper against his cheek. Merlin knew he'd never gotten used to being called "Harry" – his muggle relatives hadn't helped, choosing to call him "boy" and "freak" instead – so if people started referring to him as Salazar, he would feel more comfortable. On the other hand, all of the Founders agreed that they shouldn't tip their hand until Voldemort was truly dealt with, once and for all.

"Harry!" Sarah called, running down the hallway behind him. He stopped and waited for her to catch up, cocking a curious eyebrow. She took a moment to catch her breath, then asked, "What are you planning to do?"

Harry shrugged and made his decision. "Nothing."

"Nothing?!" Sarah squeaked.

Harry shrugged again. "What's there to do, Sarah? I can have her fired from the Daily Prophet staff, but then she'll just go to another newspaper and write trash about people. I want to know how she's doing it, anyway. 'Mione said she got everyone."

"But..." Sarah shook her head. "Harry, you'll be teased!"

Harry rolled his eyes. Like he wasn't already teased occasionally for the attention he paid to Sarah. "I'll just curse their mouths shut; it works on Draco. It's no big deal."

Sarah chewed on her bottom lip for a moment, then asked, "What about people knowing who you are?"

Harry smiled in amusement. "Sarah, my dear, these sheep will never catch on to that."

-0-

Harry, of course, was right. A few more kids in the school enjoyed the chance to call him Sal or Salazar, just for shits and giggles, and his friends even slipped up once or twice, usually on accident, though Ronald was known to do it on purpose, just to see who would jump or look around suspiciously. By early April, the fad had mostly worn off and it was back to only the twins enjoying the joke, with maybe five students still calling him 'Sal' because they were used to it. (Among those were Neville and Millicent, as well as Krum, surprisingly.)

As the third task approached, teachers spoke warningly of finals, which Harry cheerfully ignored. Ronald and Viktor also became attached at the hip, as both were well aware that summer holidays meant Viktor would return to Bulgaria, while Ronald was stuck in England. Harry had casually mentioned that if Ronald wanted to visit Viktor over the holiday, he could probably manage the portkey costs and any hotel rooms they rented. He'd been practically squeezed to death, Ronald was so excited by the prospect.

Harry spent a lot of time looking up and practising various defensive and offensive spells for the final task. The Light spells he found he would practise with Remus, since the werewolf wanted to spend more time with his 'cub'. The Dark spells Harry only practised in the Chamber, where the wards were lighter and he was actually able to cast the spells without feeling like he was going to be sick to his stomach. (Hogwarts had assured him that the wards would be gentle enough on him during the task that, if he absolutely needed to, he could cast the Dark spells. She preferred that he wouldn't, of course, but she understood they were a part of his nature, just as Light was a part of the others.)

The morning of the third task, Harry walked sleepily into the Great Hall, only to be happily directed by Slughorn to where the various families of the champions were. Sirius stood there, with Mrs Weasley. Harry gave both hugs, then asked, "What are you doing here, Mrs Weasley? Not that I'm not pleased to see you and all..."

Mrs Weasley smiled in understanding. "Honestly," she whispered, "I wanted to meet the boy Ron's fallen for. Seeing you in the task was just a bonus." She winked.

Harry shook his head in amusement and looked over at where Viktor was standing stiffly with his parents. Harry really hoped the older Krums weren't planning to cause any trouble for Viktor; he'd genuinely learned to like the quidditch player in the months since the Yule Ball. "Hm," he said to Mrs Weasley, "It seems that he and his parents are having a bit of a stare-off, but I'm sure they won't mind if we interrupt."

"Excellent!" Sirius crowed, making for the three Krums.

Harry snatched out a hand and grabbed Sirius' arm in a tight grip. When the man looked back at him in confusion, Harry said, "Viktor calls me Sal, so don't freak, yeah?"

"Who? Me?" Sirius replied, attempting a hurt look.

Harry rolled his eyes at his guardian and quickly skipped ahead, pasting on a pleasant smile. "Hey, Viktor!"

Viktor looked up and managed a slightly forced smile. "Sal. These are your..." He frowned, recalling that Harry lived with his godfather and little sister.

"This is Sirius Black, my godfather, and Molly Weasley, Ron's mum."

Krum turned an adorable shade of red and greeted Mrs Weasley politely. He got a hug in return.

Harry eyed the older two Krums, both of whom looked rather disapproving at the whole mess. When they glanced at him, he narrowed his eyes, then offered them a smile which had sent stronger witches and wizards running when he was Salazar.

The Krums got the message and swallowed. Sirius, of course, leaned over and whispered, "Glaring at the in-laws does not endear you to them."

"I don't want to be endearing," Harry replied drily, "I want them to not cause trouble for Ron and Viktor."

Sirius sighed. "Where did I go wrong?" he inquired of the ceiling.

"You got thrown in Azkaban after being framed by your friend and I got left with a bunch of muggles who'd rather see me dead," Harry replied drily, rolling his eyes.

Sirius shook his head.

Mrs Weasley cleared her throat and asked, "Will you show us around the school, Harry? I know both Sirius and myself have been here before, but it's been so long..."

Harry nodded. "Sure." His lips curled with a smirk. "I think I might even be able to show you some secret passages and such that you've never seen."

Sirius' eyes brightened at the challenge. "Bring it on, Potter."

Mrs Weasley looked upwards helplessly. "Boys."

-0-

Harry had, in fact, been able to show Sirius a number of passages the man hadn't known of, but Sirius still managed to impress Harry with the number of passages he did know of. Sirius, of course, had been awed by the number of passages Harry had found after only four years. (Harry, of course, having helped build the castle, had an unfair advantage, but he wasn't going to tell Sirius that.)

Dinner was nothing to remark upon, and Harry decided to treat the meal as if he wasn't about to walk into a maze. (Which he was, of course.)

After dinner, the entire population of the castle made its way down to the quidditch pitch. There, the champions were told how they would be sent in and Harry got into the position.

As soon as Harry was in the maze, he pulled out his map, which he'd made of the maze from the astronomy tower – no one had said he couldn't make a map of the place, and they hadn't told him he could only use his wand, either, like they had for the first task (well, not explicitly). Looking over the map and the course he'd plotted for himself, Harry took off, watching carefully for his various opponents.

Harry's first problem was a dead end where there hadn't been one on his map. He sighed and shook his head – he'd half-way expected the path to change – and he glanced back down at the map to find another way. As he was looking at the map, he saw a bit of movement out of the corner of his eye and jerked his head up to look at the wall. It looked strangely fuzzy for a moment.

Harry shot a spell at the wall, blinking when it came back saying that there was no wall. Cautiously, he reached out a hand to touch the wall and passed right through it.

Harry finally just walked through the wall, shaking his head when he got through to the other side without mishap. "Glad I made a map," he decided, heading out again.

Other things he ran into included a Blast-Ended Skrewt – which he ran like hell from – a couple of spells meant to turn him around, a section of wall which threw Stunners at him, and a point in the ground that would have sent him half-way across the maze if he'd stepped on it. There was also a boggart, which had turned into a dead Sarah; since Harry could hardly find anything funny about that, he just found a way around it, rather than try and defeat it.

The last danger was in the form of a giant spider, which was guarding the Cup and clacking its pincers ominously. After checking to make sure there was no one around to see, Harry shot a Dark shearing curse at it and walk around it while it screamed in agony as its skin was torn off, bit by bit.

"Time to end this sham," he muttered, grabbing the Cup.

He felt the tug behind his navel and let go of the Cup a second too late, landing hard on the cracked ground of a graveyard. He was immediately on his guard; no one had said anything about the Cup being a portkey, and that was rather something you should have said.

Harry looked around to grab the Cup again, hoping it was a two-way port-key, but it had landed about seven metres from him, and before he could do more than turn towards it, he heard a voice say, "Harry Potter."

Harry turned to face a man he didn't recognise, who was holding what seemed to be a baby in one hand. The man was smiling madly.

"I'm sorry," Harry said carefully, "but I don't think we've been introduced."

"Barty Crouch," the man said. "At your service."

Before Harry could do much more than recall Winky's old master, the man was shooting ropes at him.

Harry brushed the ropes away contemptuously. "I've met Barty Crouch, and you're not him," he replied.

"No," the man agreed, throwing a couple more spells Harry's way, "I'm his son."

"His son?" Harry murmured, calmly blocking the spells as they came towards him. "Interesting. From what I'd read, you died in..." Understanding dawned. "You're one of Voldemort's followers."

Barty smiled happily. "Yes I am," he agreed. Then he stopped playing with Harry and started throwing Darker spells that a fourth year shouldn't be able to block at him.

Harry wasn't ready to show his hand to one of his Heir's minions yet, so he let a spell hit him and immediately hit the ground, unconscious.

-0-

"Rennervate," a voice said, and Harry opened his eyes blearily, feeling slightly sick. The spell he'd been hit with caused a nightmare-filled sleep, and he'd had plenty of nightmares to chose from – most of them involving his sister.

Barty was standing over Harry with a mad smile. Beyond him, a bone-white man stood, smiling cruelly at where Harry was tied to a tombstone. He registered a faint pain in his arm and saw the missing finger on Barty's hand. The resurrection ritual, then, his mind supplied. He briefly wondered how him being Voldemort's ancestor would affect the ritual, but didn't have time to ponder it further.

Voldemort stepped forward, smiling a horrible smile. "Ah," he whispered. "Harry Potter. We meet at last."

Harry cocked his head to one side, looking curiously up at his Heir. Recalling what the man had looked like from his diary, Harry commented, "You're kind of ugly. And I like snakes."

Voldemort roared in fury and cast the Cruciatus Curse on Harry, which didn't affect the boy, much to the Dark Lord's confusion. He cast it twice more, red eyes darkening further.

Finally, Harry asked, "Are you quite through?"

"What magic is this?" Voldemort demanded.

Harry smirked and said, "You ask me that like I'm going to tell you."

Voldemort hit him with a cutting curse in response, and Harry winced. Voldemort smiled nastily. "At least something works on you," he commented, then turned to the circle of men that Harry was just now noticing. "As you can see, my followers, we have Harry Potter here today. He's just won the TriWizard Tournament. Unfortunately, he's also won his own death!" He turned back to Harry, eyes mad. "How about we duel, Harry? Would you like that? Going out in a blaze of glory, just like your father?"

Harry said nothing to that, recalling with sorrow the way his father had tried to hold Voldemort off. He had wished, at the time, that Salazar Slytherin's own father had been that brave and wonderful.

Voldemort had Barty untie him and give him his wand. "Now," Voldemort said, "we bow." The circle laughed.

Harry sketched a quick bow, not trusting Voldemort not to hit him when he wasn't paying attention.

Voldemort's first shot was another cutting curse, and Harry dove out of the way, absently healing his cuts. Once he was back in duelling form, he started shooting off a load of spells, keeping them Light for now. When Voldemort actually became a threat, Harry might start showing his hand. For now, however, the man was just playing with Harry, and the boy grimly played the Dark Lord right back.

It didn't take Voldemort long to realise that Harry wasn't backing down, nor did the boy seem worried by his spells. Rather, the boy was an impressively advanced dueller, considering his age and muggle background. Rather furious that Severus hadn't known more about the boy – mostly conjectures from his own belief that the boy was just like his father – Voldemort finally stopped playing with Harry, shooting off three Killing Curses in a row.

Harry ducked behind a tombstone at the sight of the green spells and was already moving again when they impacted, creating a hole in the stone big enough to send it toppling over. He thought hard as he dodged the bright green curses. Hermione, Susan, Ronald and he had all agreed that there were probably more of the soul containers, since the man had made two. Him still being alive pretty much proved that there were more, so killing the man would cause him to just live as a spirit again until Harry could destroy them. Voldemort could probably revive himself at any time, now that his followers knew he would live if hit with the Killing Curse.

There was nothing for it. He couldn't stop Voldemort at this time, and if he showed his hand too much, Voldemort would no longer underestimate him. And wizards who underestimated Salazar Slytherin had always made mistakes which they might not have otherwise.

And then, they died.

"Accio portkey!" Harry snapped as he got close enough to the Cup. He was just hoping it would work when the Cup slammed into his hand, taking him away not a moment too soon, as a bright green curse sped through where he'd been standing.

Voldemort howled his fury into the sky, then turned his wand on his followers.

-0-0-0-0-0-

A/N: And, we'll stop there! (Don't you hate me?) XD

Next chapter, you'll find out who was Voldemort's man in the tournament, as well as what the Founders intend to do about Voldemort's horcruxes. Should be out next Wednesday.

Stay tuned! XD
~Bats ^.^x

Chapters:
Pro - Prophecy's Children / 1 - Home ||| 2 - Socially Acceptable ||| 3 - Touch the Sunrise
4 - Tomorrow Will Come ||| 5 - Fallen Star ||| 6 - A Dream Will Come True When It Will
7 - The Deepest River ||| 8 - Question of Honour ||| 9 - Hanging By a Thread
10 - Never As it Seems ||| 11 - Long Road
Incomplete

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