Monochrome

Prologue

Albus Dumbledore was angry.

Scratch that he was furious.

But more than that, he was worried.

Hogwarts didn't allow anyone to apparate in or out. The same held true for portkeys. Without the express permission of the Headmaster, there was basically no way to enter or exit the school properties. The excellent wards placed around the school by the founders ensured that.

Albus had done his level best to make sure that everything would work out exactly the way it should.

Every Champion had been given a robe powered with precautionary defensive enchantments. While they had told the children that death was a possibility and that participation was not to be taken lightly… Albus was not about to allow the lives of children to be taken for a competition.

In truth, the robe had a specific runic matrix sewn into it, one that could function as an intra-Hogwarts portkey. It functioned to transport a student to the main stage, should they give up or win.

As such, there had been no reason to worry.

Or so he told himself.

The tournament had ended in what he had begun to refer to as a classically-Harry fashion when he had decided to share his victory with the other child, Cedric.

And that's when it all went wrong.

Both Harry and Cedric had vanished upon touching the Cup. That much was expected— It was how portkeys worked after all.

Unfortunately, the boys hadn't appeared where they were supposed to— In front of the adoring crows to receive their prize.

No, the boys had simply…

Vanished.

"This wasn't supposed to happen." Albus murmured, glaring at the magical screen floating in front of him as if it was somehow its fault.

The signs were all there.

Unusual disappearances. The dark mark becoming more distinct. Harry's strange dreams.

He should have known, should have predicted, that Tom would have tried something.

And now Harry Potter, the boy-who-lived, the boy who he had sworn to protect…

Was gone.

The sinking feeling in his stomach only got worse.

"Is everything alright, Dumbledore?"

Albus nodded curtly at the Minister, before excusing himself. Rising up from his seat, he apparated out, only to reappear at the site of the anomaly a couple of seconds later.

This was where it had happened.

He wasn't so naive as to think that the portkeys had suddenly malfunctioned.

No, this was a deliberate attempt to kidnap Harry.

And it had succeeded. They had been taken right under his very nose.

"What are you up to this time, Tom?"

Flicking his wand out, Albus began to apply every single sensing spell he knew— locators, scrying spells, the works.

Unfortunately, nothing seemed to work. And with every passing second, Albus Dumbledore came closer and closer to experiencing an emotion he had thought he left behind him.

Desperation.

Ever since Harry Potter had entered the magical world, Dumbledore had been caught off-guard by Lord Voldemort, and now his student was paying the price for his hubris.

The young Potter was certainly much like Albus had imagined and whatever his limitations might have been in magical talents, the boy more than compensated through sheer courage and valor. No matter what the situation, the boy always chose what was right over what was easy. Far better than he had been at that age.

It only made Albus blame himself more.

With the growing list of constant skirmishes between the child of prophecy and the many shades of Lord Voldemort, a future showdown was all but inevitable.

That it would happen this soon was something that he had completely failed to predict.

No.

That wasn't completely right. Much to his shame, Albus knew that he did see it coming. Right from the altercation back in Harry's first year all the way to Sybil's recent prophecy, the signals of an approaching storm had been imminent.

He had simply chosen to ignore it all.

Ignorance was bliss, he told himself. To know that you must die to kill another— it was a burden he could not bring himself to place upon an eleven-year-old child.

And so, he had chosen to procrastinate.

This is Berlin all over again.

His inability to own up and make a stand had cost over ten thousand lives in the Great War. And now, his desire to force Harry Potter to live the life of an innocent, ignorant child had put the boy's life in lethal danger.

And now, he was gone.

Lost.

Anything he did would be too little and too late.

Or would it?

Almost on cue, his mind supplied him with all the information he had collected about Lord Voldemort. Knowing one's enemy was a vital part of winning a war, and Albus Dumbledore had been fighting this war for years.

He had meticulously delved into Tom's history— more so than any wizard alive —and yet for the love of all that was pure in the world, he couldn't remember a single location that had a graveyard in it. There had to be something in Harry's nightmares that could help.

"Did you find the boy, Dumbledore?" an almost drawl interrupted his musings.

"Severus," Dumbledore turned around to face his old friend, "I had expected Alastor."

The potions master sneered, "Jumping at shadows, no doubt."

Dumbledore sighed, ignoring the man's quips with practiced ease.

"I assume the Potter boy has been taken by the Dark Lord. The only question here is how."

"The Cup was turned into a portkey," Albus answered, "To an untraceable destination. Someone managed to alter its destination before it had been placed here."

"And who was that?"

"I… cannot say. Even if they were indeed portkeyed elsewhere, they should still be within the school boundaries. None of the school's proximity wards have been triggered… yet."

Severus looked like he was about to ask something, but he decided against it.

"Has your mark been acting out?"

Severus grimaced, revealing the fully visible Dark mark on his arm.

Albus sighed.

Severus seemed to take that as an acknowledgment and continued. "I did warn you about this. Allowing Karkaroff into Hogwarts was a mistake."

"I doubt Karkaroff has anything to do with this," Albus answered softly. "The runes for the portkeys were keyed in by me and the robes were personally checked for signs of tampering by all the four judges. Minerva herself placed the cup and—"

And then he stilled. Had something happened to her? Had she done something—

"Albus?" Severus asked warily.

"It's nothing," Albus shook himself wearily. There would be time to investigate later. He had to find the boy and the clock was not on their side. "We need to find Harry. Fast."

"And how are you going to do that? Assuming that the boy is even alive"

"I have faith in Harry," Albus replied resolutely as he muttered one final incantation. "Ah, so it's like that."

Snape stared at the coalescing particles in front of him, "What— what are you doing?"

"I have just finished examining the site. Whoever created the portkey was a genius. The base is runic, powered by the holder's own magic. The destination is… cloaked, and only a specific signature is allowed to enter."

"And you can't trace runic magic." Severus looked clearly frustrated.

Albus would have chuckled if the situation wasn't so serious. For someone that hated Harry with such passion, Severus spent far too much time worrying about the boy. Not that he'd ever say that to the man's face.

"Conjure me something solid, please."

Snape seemed to take it in a stride. Without hesitation, Snape conjured an empty potion bottle and placed it on the pedestal.

"What are you going to do?"

Albus smiled. "This."

And then he began his work. While much more complicated than anything he had ever worked with, the Elder wand's ability to beat the odds could turn even the most bizarre combinations into sensible, well-calculated matrices.

It's just like Nicholas. Helping me from beyond the grave.

His old mentor had taught him this particular skill. Of course, Albus's own level of finesse was nowhere comparable to the ancient alchemist who was a master of the craft.

Ignoring the nostalgic feelings growing in his heart, he focussed on the multiple beads of color around him, dragging them into all sorts of intricate combinations. They were beginning to form a path.

"How— how are you doing that?" Severus asked in awe.

Albus almost suppressed a chuckle. "Nothing is completely untraceable, Severus. Even hidden magic disturbs the world and if you know how, you can trace it back to the source."

Almost akin to a professional artist at work, he effortlessly wove patterns in the air. After several tense moments of gradual reconstruction, he was finally able to weave the ambient magic into a replication of the original portkey.

And then he cast it upon the bottle.

"Severus, I'm going to get Harry. Make sure no one leaves Hogwarts. Also… take a moment to check up on Minerva. "

The Potions Master gave a curt nod.

Severus wasn't one for pleasantries but he was efficient. Pushing aside his current worries, Albus activated the portkey.

A moment later and he was gone.

What is this place?

The portkey had displaced him from his location to wherever it was supposed to have taken Harry. Albus had expected, nay, prepared to encounter a group of death eaters firing curses at him.

He had expected some form of Voldemort to face him.

He had expected to be forced into an unfavorable fight to save young Harry.

Instead he had found himself… well, here.

This place... It was still within Hogwarts wards. He could still sense its outermost barriers several hundred feet ahead of... wherever this place was.

It was almost as if this place did not exist.

Like an illusion.

He could sense the wards and yet they had no hold here. As such, all forms of apparition and portkey would work without any problems.

This, Albus reasoned, must be how they got Harry and Cedric out.

It was painfully clear.

Whoever had enchanted the portkey must have been brilliant enough to allow two successive displacements without a single break in between. The first portkey must have gotten the two boys to this place, only for it to trigger a second time and transfer them somewhere else before the first ceased to function.

One wave riding upon another.

"What a brilliant mind." He murmured to himself. "A shame someone so prodigious fell into the darkness."

There was the entire question about how Tom might have known about this place. The obvious inference was that it was probably part of the illusive Chamber of Secrets. Albus had tried to go in there after Harry's encounter with the shade of Riddle in the Diary, but powerful spells had always kept him from entering the chamber.

He glanced at the place around him. Everything was blurry, almost like looking through a mist-covered window. He could make out a rocky interior and considering the wetness he could feel beneath his feet, he was standing in the middle of a running stream. The thought that such a place had existed within Hogwarts without his knowledge was humbling.

He should probably consider a deeper investigation at a later time. But for now, there were more crucial things at hand. The traces of the portkey's second activation were already fading.

Without further delay, he began to reconstruct the next portkey.

I have been here before.

Albus Dumbledore stared at the expansive graveyard in front of him that seemed to stretch out for miles. Rows of tombstones surrounded him in a veritable sea of the dead. The writings on the dilapidated tombstones seemed to have faded, indicating age— or perhaps there was no one to care for them?

What is this place?

That was when he noticed the small signboard a few feet away, on a wooden frame hanging limply on a wrought iron gate.

Little Hangleton Cemetery

Even as Albus read those words something around him began to change. It was almost like a veil being lifted, leaving everything naked for the observer to witness.

The misty presence faded and writings on the tombstones began to appear.

One could see the black outline of a church due west, while a solitary house with a tapering roof was visible on top of a hill far south.

And suddenly, everything came to focus, and Dumbledore remembered.

He remembered this place, where he was. This was the graveyard of Little Hangleton, the original residence of the Gaunts. The place where it had all started. Merope Gaunt, Marvolo Gaunt, Tom Riddle… all of the information that he had so meticulously collected now threatened to overwhelm his mind.

How and why this information had vanished from his mind, he had no clue, but Tom probably had something to do with it. That or…

Or something far more sinister was at play.

Not taking any chances, Albus lifted his wand above his head and murmured.

"Solus Maxima."

A wave of bright light burst out of the wand tip, shooting into the air above him, forming a miniature sun, ebbing bright white light, inundating the entire place with its presence. The entire place illuminated, Albus held his wand like a sword, ready to combat any possible threats—

And froze, stupefied at the scene in front of him.

The entire area in front of him seemed to have been rendered grey.

Literally.

Almost like the black-and-white filter from an old muggle camera.

The grass, the shrubs, even the very earth itself, had lost their color. The very air seemed to have grown lifeless and stale. Magic itself seemed to have died in the area. Even the powerful sphere of light he had just cast seemed to slowly get drained into the… the area in front of him.

And in the center of it all, lay the body of Harry Potter.

"Harry!" Albus breathed, worry marring his wizened features as he strode ahead, almost uncaring of the strangeness of the situation. His mind was already in turmoil, waging war against the instincts he had honed back during the war with Grindelwald. He rushed to claim the boy, his old legs sprinting towards the boy and—

Pain seared up his spine as Albus opened his mouth to scream.

The Elder Wand acted immediately, shooting a dome of protective magic outwards, pushing its wielder backward, as something surged in like a hungry shark, wanting to swallow the sole lifeform within its grasp—

"FINITE INCANTATEM!"

Albus screamed those words out, blasting out an immensely powerful magical wave through the wand.

The Deathstick hummed, almost like it was loving the feel of it all, before it sent the spell radially outwards—

And then suddenly everything stopped.

This… This is...

Albus panted, severe exhaustion kicking in. It pained him to even formulate thoughts. Whatever this magic had been, it had drained him.

Completely.

He wondered if he had it within him to cast even a single spell before falling unconscious.

Never in his entire life had he felt so weak, so helpless.

Until now.

He glanced at the fallen form of Harry Potter.

I have work left to do. I cannot give up now.

And he pushed himself to walk ahead. Slowly trudging all the way to the fallen body, Albus knelt beside him and held his wrist.

It was faint, but he still had a pulse.

He's alive. Albus thought in elation. He's alive.

That was when he noticed everything around him. Fallen around the boy, several feet away, were bodies.

Twelve of them were clad in Death Eater regalia complete with skull-face masks. All twelve of them on the ground, unmoving.

All twelve of them were rotting.

Their bodies turned to husk. Their robes frayed and tattered, vulnerable to the slightest breeze. Their masks, broken, falling into pieces.

The thirteenth one looked familiar. The severed arm, not so much. At this point, it might as well have been a rotting tree stump.

But despite it all, the face looked remarkably rodent-like.

Pettigrew.

Albus sighed. He knew the man had been responsible for whatever had happened with the Potters, that the people around him had murdered, and yet, he couldn't help but feel sad at the loss of lives around him.

What… What could have caused this?

A fourteenth attracted his attention. Albus walked up to the cadaver, only to step back in horror. The body was decaying, the elegant robes falling apart, but the face was still, somewhat recognizable.

Cedric.

Albus shut his eyes, but a single tear managed to escape.

He had failed them.

He had failed them all.

He glanced at the fallen form of Harry Potter.

Alive yet unmoving.

He'd need to get the boy back. As well as the others.

It's not safe here.

With tumultuous effort, he rose to his fullest height, channeling whatever energy he could muster into creating a second portkey. Sweeping all the fallen forms together in a strong body-bind, Albus held Harry's unconscious form tighter.

The portkey began to glow.

And even as he felt the familiar tug at his navel, Albus took a final look back.

At the cursed place he was leaving.

A scene that he was sure would continue to haunt him for years to come.

It was a circle of gray, within which death reigned supreme.

An area in which nothing, not even color was allowed to violate.

A monochrome.

We hope that you enjoyed the chapter. If so, please fav/follow us, and more importantly, do review. Feedback gives us the motivation to write.

If you have something to share with us, or just want to talk to us about our stories, join us at our Discord Server - discord .gg/hqWqhtW (Remove the space)

You can also support us and our work on Patre0n at patre0n.c0m/theBlackStaffAndNightMarE (replace the 0 with o)

Thanks once again, and we hope you continue to enjoy our stories.

~The BlackStaff and NightMarE~