Ch. 7

Harry, Draco and Blaise poured over the book Harry had found about Nicholas Flamel and the Sorcerer's Stone. There wasn't much, just that Mr. Flamel had created the stone some time around his five-hundredth and thirtieth birthday with the help of none other then Albus Dumbledore using the note from Mr. Flamel's Youth Potion. Of course that just begged the question: if he already had a Youth Potion, why did he need the Elixer of Life?

Conundrums aside, they now knew what 'IT' was that Fluffy was guarding and why Quirrell wanted it. Heck, at least 90% of the human population on Earth would want something like that. Even, Snape, perhaps?

Harry still didn't know if he could trust the man or not and it was killing him.

Either way, they couldn't let something like that fall into the wrong hands. Quirrell deffinantly counted as a wrong set of hands. But how to get to the stone? Dumbldore wasn't fool enough to believe that a dog, no matter how big or with how many heads, was enough to stop someone who wanted that stone bad enough. So who and what else was there protecting the stone?

The three of them spent the rest of the night going over possible protections and how to get past them.

Blood splattered the walls as the sound of a chainsaw filled the air, making contact with the poor soul's person. A luminiscint film rose from the chest, playing their life's story. Vibrant green eyes that seemed to glow in the dark watched with detached intrest.

Grell used to love reaping with an almost unhealthy relish. Nothing could make him smile harder then harvesting the souls of some pethetic human. Now it was a merical to get him to smile.

It had been eleven years since he had last saw his baby boy. He had long since forgiven Will; he was only following orders after all. It was easer knowing that his son was still alive some where, even if Will wouldn't tell him where his son was.

Cutting the cinematic record and releasing the soul from its body, Grell filled out the report and headed back to the Despatch Society.

The entire school was at the Pitch, eager for the Gryffindor/Ravenclaw match to begin. The entire school except for Harry, Draco and Blaise. Today, they were putting their plan into action; today they were going after the Stone.

They researched, observed and plotted; going through every teatcher they had and deciding who and what might have been used to protect the Stone. Thankfully there weren't many potential threats, but the ones that could and might be up could be fatal. After weeks of working every angle, they felt they were as prepared as they possibly could considering the circumstances.

They slipped from the common room and up to the third floor without incident.

Harry took out a stake from his bag and the vial of Growth Potion. He threw it into the room and watched as it grew as big as he was before Fluffy gulped it down. Harry dosed three meat pies and watched as Fluffy ate them as well. After a few more pies, steaks and sandwiches, Harry was out of amo and cautiously walked inside. When he didn't find his head bitten off, he called for the other two to enter.

As Blaise distracted Fluffy with his own supply of meats, Harry eased the trapdoor open.

Blaise emptied his bag of meat and dosed the rest with potion as followed Harry and Draco down the tunnle. It was dark, a little dank and smelled like mold and dead plant matter. Thankfully it wasn't too long and ended with a soft landing. Their reflief was short lived aas their mattress started to move. Tentacles started wrapping around their bodies, making it hard to move.

"What is this stuff," Harry asked.

"Don't know," Draco answered. "But if I had to guess, I'd say it was Sprout's defence. But there are at least five plants that have vines or tentacles and are dangerus if not deadly."

"Well, we're not poisoned or torn to shredds," Blaise helpfully pointed out. "So it has to be a slow working plant. Squeezing the life out of us like and andaconda or sufficating us in a cocoon, like a spider."

"It's Devil's Snare," Harry said. "There are only three plants that fit that description and the other two's vines aren't as thick as what the Snare's is. Does anyone remeber how to get past the Snare?"

"Fire," Draco spoke up. "Blaise, whould you do the honors? Remeber don't kill it if you can, just get it to let us go."

"Of course."

After some "fancy" wand work and a muttered spell, a bright - almost blinding - light appeared in the chamder, warming it up and cuasing the Devil's Snare to retreat to the edges of the room. The three boys scrambled away; Harry with a bit more difficaulty then the other two. The plant for some reason just didn't want to let him go.

They quickly made their way through tree more obsticles without trouble.

The second chamber held keys with wings, but the door was already unlocked and opened so the boys walked right on through. The third chamber was a giant chess board. None of them could figure out what that was all about but just continued to the next room which held a troll in it. The troll was much bigger then the one at Holloween and was clearly dead which they were thankful for. Even with their extra, after hours study time, they weren't sure if they would have been able to take it.

The last room was completely bare except for a table that held seven potion bottles.

As they walked into the room, fire rose up in front and back of them; one purple one black - traping them. Draco strode up to the table and looked over the parchment there. It was a logic riddle practically tell them wich was the one they needed. Draco took a few minutes to study the riddle carefully before turning to the potions. It was almost five minutes before he pulled two vials from amung the others and help them up to his comrads.

"This one," he held up a rounded squar vial, "will let us go back. This one," he held up the small round vial, "will let us go forward. Unfortunately there isn't a lot of either one, maybe enough for two doses which mean -"

"One of us is staying until a professor comes for us," Harry finished.

"Wouldn't that defeat the purpose of us coming down here in the first place," Blaise asked rather rhetorically.

"Yes."

"Yep."

"So what do we do?"

"You two go back," Harry directed. "You have the magical rope to get back up the tunnle and Draco still has a full bag of meat and potion so you should be able to get past Fluffy. Get back to the dungeons and wait. Both of you have too much to lose by being expelled. I'll find some other way to get out."

"And if you don't?"

"It was fun while it lasted and what a way to end it."

"Cheeky Gryffindor."

Harry stuck his tongue out at his friends and swallowed a bit of the potion that would allow him to walk through the black fire and to the stone before either of his friends could say any more about it. The chamber beyond the flames was huge, open and empty except for an ornaite mirror sitting in the middle of the room; the stone was nowhere in sight. Harry cuatiously walked up to the mirror. It was far from plain, but it wasn't anything to write home about either. It was gold, there was an inscription at the top and it was old, that was about it.

As Harry aprotched with caution, his reflection could finally be seen.

With a start, he saw he wasn't alone. There were two people in the mirror with him. Harry wipped around to confront whoever it was in the room with him, only to be met with no one at all. Harry turned back to the mirror and the two people were still there. It was strange, but something about them called to him. They were both male, at east Harry thought they were. The one on his right was a tall, lithe red-head covered in more red. He had the same unnatural green eyes Harry had and a shark-like shit eating smile with real shark's teeth. Harry could see, practically feel the love and adoration from him though which was just weird as he was looking at a reflection - sort of.

The other one, was more a thing than a man.

It was even taller and muscular then the red-head with deep, glowing, blood red eyes that screamed miliciousness and invoked fear and despaire; a never ending hunger shown in them that made your blood run cold. Long-ish, smooth horns curved elegantly from the top of its head towards the back slightly and curved back up at the ends. They look more like they were for decoration to attrack mates then actual wepons; not like the one-inch fangs poking out from its lips or the three-inch long claws at the end of its fingers. Pointed, elf-like ears poked out from under waist length hair that flowed like an inky waterfall down its back. What Harry thought at first was a fethery cloak he could now see were wings that were setteled around its shouders as a whip-like tail swished lazily back and forth around its ankels.

It had tiny feather, so small they looked more like scales around its face, down its neck and shoulders. It was wearing a sleaveless spandex outfit with leather stiletto boots and elbow length leather gloves. It was like sin and sex at the same time; a dream and a nightmare.

Yet Harry wasn't afraid. He knew he should be. Anybody in their right mind would be. But for some reason Harry wasn't afraid. He felt safe.

The thing masquerading as a man leaned down and gently licked a line from just under Harry's jaw to his cheek. That should have disturbed him, grossed him out and it didn't. Harry acctually whimpered in longing; he wanted that, wanted to be with them.

The red-headed male pulled something from his coat pocket, drawing Harry's attention to him. He winked and handed a stone as red as any ruby if not more so somehow to mirrior-Harry. Mirror-Harry winked at him with a smile that rivaled the red-head and slipped the stone his pocket. Harry felt a weight aganst his leg. Reaching in, he felt the stone. He had the Sorcerer's Stone!

That was good, but he was still trapped and that was bad.

A grinding noise on the other side of the room caught his attention and Harry walked towards the sound. A door appeared in the wall. Wieghing his opptions, Harry took a deep breath and started down the darkened tunnle.