Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach, Harry Potter or any of their affiliates. Anything that you recognise is property of its respective owners. Any relations to persons living or dead are purely coincidental.

Base/s: Bleach, Harry Potter

Title: Book Two: Avaritia

Summary: Second in the Purgatorio series. There are voices in the walls, and stalkers in the hallways. At least not everything is dire; things are getting interesting.

Music used for inspiration: Morning Remembrance - Bleach OST,

Ginny Weasley is not conscious. Not really.

She doesn't remember much either. Only the whirlwind of panic and horror that acted as the prelude for the final scene, which is now playing out on the stage in front of her, even though she can't really see it all that well.

She's awake, she knows that much. She can see the stone floor through blurred vision, and she can vaguely feel fetid, freezing water seeping into her already sodden hair and clothes.

But she can't move. It is like an extreme feeling of lethargy, as though her limbs are too heavy to do anything.

She can hear though.

She wants to cry again as she sees Tom standing over her, a satisfied, cruel smile gracing his pale face. He's looking at her like she's an insect. Something not worthy of his gaze, but has made a nuisance of herself and is now suffering under his attention.

Her inability to move does nothing for the feeling of utter sickness that starts in her stomach and invades the rest of her body.

She can see his feet, ethereal and not touched by the filthy water, as he stands in front of her face.

He squats down and takes her chin on one pale hand. Her head lolls from the movement, but he holds her steady.

He's smiling at her.

Oh, how she had wished she could have seen that smile back then.

She idly wonders though her panic if anything had been real.

He cocks his head to one side.

"Ginny, Ginny, Ginny…" He murmurs, and shakes his head in disappointment. He meets her eyes again. "What would your parents think?"

Has she not asked this question of herself a thousand times?

Has she not known the answer every time, yet still posed the question again, hoping the response will have changed?

"Their youngest, their precious little girl, helping a monster like myself back into the world." He tuts, but his eyes are cold. "They'll wonder where they went wrong, I think. They'll tear themselves apart, wondering what they could have done. Oh, they'll mourn for you, I'm sure. But just think, you'll be remembered as that Weasley."

His eyes glitter with amusement, dark and twisted. She wants to stop listening to him.

"Oh yes." He relishes the word, and there is a hint of sibilance in his tone. "You'll be the one who betrayed them. The Weasley who Fell… They won't blame you though." He says conversationally, and she is begging him to stop talking. Please. "After all, you're too young and naive to understand what you were doing. Too young and stupid. So no, they won't blame you."

She didn't understand. Why was he saying this in that light, conversational tone she wants to never hear again?

He leers at her.

"No, they'll blame themselves. After all, they couldn't have raised you right, to do something like this, right Gin-Gin?" Her brothers call her that, she'd told him so. It feels dirty and poisoned coming from his lips.

His expression softens and he brushes smoky, cool fingertips against her cheek in what seems to be affection. Her skin crawls and she feels dirty for remembering how she'd wondered about what he'd be like, and how his voice would sound.

"Poor, poor Molly." He croons, "Her only daughter, the one who let the Darkness into the world once more… And dear Arthur. He won't last long at the Ministry. Imagine, his own daughter facilitating the murder of Mudbloods!" He laughs, and she realises that it doesn't suit him.

"All this, because of you!" He gestures with his free hand, a manic grin working its way onto his face. "You set the stage beautifully!" He leans closer and she wishes she could recoil. "Soon, the final actor will take his place on stage. Oh yes, someone is coming to rescue you!"

Horror.

No, she cannot believe it. She won't. Whoever it is will walk straight into Tom's waiting arms.

All because of her.

She tries to scream, but she can do nothing.

Tom's eyes are tinted crimson now, and they are wide with excitement.

"Your little hero… Not what I expected, to be sure." He muses. "Much more interesting than I had thought him to be, might even be a challenge. However, I highly doubt it. My resurrection and his death all in one masterful stroke! I could not have asked for more."

Who is he talking about? She doesn't understand. She isn't sure she wants to, either.

He stills and looks penetratingly at her through half lidded eyes, that cruel curve of his mouth giving him a frightening presence.

"So, I suppose I should thank you. After all, none of this could have been possible without you, little Gin-Gin."

He lets her head fall onto the flagstones with a painful bump, and flashes her one last grin before he straightens and, idly twirling her wand, walks into the gloom of the chamber.

She's screaming herself raw in the confines of her mind.

It seems like both an age and barely a minute, as she waits. She doesn't know where Tom is, and feels uneasy at her ignorance of where he is. Her eyes are fixed on the ceiling of the chamber, and the mossy, jagged stone does nothing to calm her.

It's silent, save for the rhythmic, perpetual sound of dripping water.

The she hears footsteps.

They are measured and unhurried, and in her mind, she imagines a figure, identity concealed, cautiously entering the chamber to rescue her. She cannot imagine who it may be. She has no friends.

There is a sudden realisation that turn her stomach to lead and sends a sickness running through her immobile body.

Who could know of her actions? Who was it that she had confided in, who she had spilled her secrets to?

Her brother was walking in here, and he would see her lying on the floor at the end of the chamber. He would panic and run towards her, eyes blind to all else because that was who he was.

Tom would strike him down.

Her big brother was going to die down here, because of and in front of her.

She was going to watch him die, and there wasn't a single thing she could do to stop it.

She felt too many things to name when she realised just who had come to her rescue, and their doom. She had been wrong in her guess of her brother, and despite the thrill of utter thankfulness that he was not here, she felt just a little betrayed. He had not come for her. He wasn't here for his little sister. Did she disgust him that much? Had he already left her by the wayside because of what she had done?

But someone was here. And it was him.

She felt a little light that had never quite been snuffed out burn a little brighter in her chest.

If anyone could ride into impossible odds, defy them and escape with her like a golden prince out of a storybook, it was him. She believed it.

He nudges her with a foot, and she would have almost been insulted had the situation not lacked any kind of humour.

And then; Tom.

They talk, and she finds herself both listening to their words and not understanding them. But the way her Harry speaks with the spirit (for what else could the ghostly apparition be, if not an angry spirit the likes of which she has never seen?) is calm and confident. She wishes that she could have such baring.

It is getting harder and harder to breathe, she notices. There is a soft leaden weight, dense and unmoving on her chest, and she feels cold. Not the chill of the water drenching her clothing and not the cold touch of the chambers pallid air that caresses her skin like so many dead fingers.

The first thing he is aware of is nothing. That vacuum sensation, as though he is naked, floating in nothingness and affecting nothing at all.

It is unnerving.

He opens his eyes and for a moment, he is not sure if he completed the action at all. Blackness. Utter and complete.

He is standing up. It is odd, that he would not notice such a thing, but he can't feel ground beneath his feet, nor the touch of air against his skin that would have told him he was flying.

There is only the darkness, unending and immutable.

He turns his head, made anxious by the absence of any sensation to match the action.

He knows his breathing has increased in speed, and he is aware that his drawing in such quick, shallow breaths is not good for him. He still cannot feel a thing.

Dread is sliding icy, pallid fingers along his spine.

He brings an arm up and, ignoring the disconcerting lack of resistance to the action, gouges his nails into the skin of his other hand. Nothing. He does not hurt, and even though he is clinically aware of the fact he should be in pain.

His breathing quickens and there is no sensation of air filling his lungs despite his heaving breaths.

He cannot hear anything. The silence fills his ears like thick liquid, and holds him fast. There is no sound. Not even the ringing in ones ears when faced with silence. He cannot hear his own breathing.

He cannot hear his heatbeat.

Blind panic.

His memories are slipping away, blurred and faded, drowned in the void that has enveloped him and consumed by rising terror.

Every second feels like an eternity and he cannot feel anything.

He screams.

No sound escapes his mouth.

He keeps on screaming even after his throat should have long torn itself to pieces.

He blinks.

The world has shifted.

He falls to the blessedly corporeal ground like a marionette with its strings cruelly cut, shivering and sucking in air like a drowned man. Tears run unbidden down his cheeks and sobs tumble from bloodless lips. His body is shaking and weak and his terror does not allow him to collect himself.

It is a long time before he can bring himself to move.

He comes into awareness like a sudden snap, going from blissful unconsciousness into harsh wakefulness in a second.

He gasps in a breath and an electric jolt runs through his body, leaving his flesh tingling. He is lying on something vaguely soft.

Sand.

With trembling, shaking arms, he pushes himself off the sand and with a grunt of effort, manoeuvres his obstinate body into a sitting position.

As he raises a hand to brush particles of sand from his face, he blinks the last of the stupor from his eyes.

He sees white dunes.

Rolling, unending white waves of sand, fine and uniform, sculpted into a static ocean that stretches on for eternity. And behind it, a black, fathomless canvas with little feature to distinguish it from the void he has just been in, save a single cold crescent moon that hangs; dead and faceless in the pitch sky.

The air is unmoving, no breath of wind or touch of a breeze to stir a flurry of sand particles into movement, and a dull chill hangs in the air.

His breath comes in faints twists of white vapour that are swallowed by the dense air barely a moment after escaping his mouth.

"Esto no puede ser ..."

The words fall from his lips like dew from a blade of grass, unnoticed and insignificant. The language comes easily to him in this place, and it seems more at home in his mouth than even his native tongue, or the language he has been using for the past decade or so.

His legs feel like they are likely to collapse at any moment, but as he bares his weight waveringly on them, he steadies himself.

He stands; his feet half buried in the soft white sand, and stares out at the featureless expanse in front of him.

His eyes are wide like the moon above and his jaw is loose, his breath shallow. His mouth unconsciously forms words that he spoke a moment ago, in another language.

"This cannot be…"

He has been walking for days now.

He isn't sure how he knows that is has been so long, but something tells him so. There is no passing of time in this place.

He is weary. Tired and sore and dying of thirst and hunger.

He drags his feet through the bone white sand, and it pulls at his feet as though it wants to suck him down into oblivion.

Something is driving him. Pushing him forward when there is nothing left to give.

He doesn't know where he's going, only that he has to get there.

Everything is still and he is the only thing moving save the grains of sand under his bleeding feet.

All that can be heard is his gasping breath and gentle, steady subsidence of sand.

Every step feels like his last, but he still drags broken and bloodied feet through the sand as his lungs burn with thirst.

He doesn't know what he's looking for.

When he stops, it takes him some time to realise that he has.

He barely registers the tiny oasis in front of him, shining like an ethereal mirror, polished to a diamond shine.

The surface is utterly still, and perfectly clear, stretching down into unfathomable deep blackness.

As if watching in third person, he turned his head as though he can't feel the pain and lets half blind eyes settle on the single flower blooming impossibly in the sand on the bank.

It is a beautiful thing, his mind idly supplies. Perfect and untouched and otherworldly like no other flower could ever be. Its petals glow white in the cold, eternal moonlight and fade gently into pale pink like a blush on pale cheeks.

Stumbling, he forces the last few steps from his body and falls to his knees before the flower, looking for all the world like he is prostrating himself in reverence.

There is no wind to ruffle the petals, and even as he lifts a hand to touch them, the flower is unmoving. A small butterfly is sitting, resplendent and shimmering on one petal, its wings slowly moving.

Weak, shaking fingers fail to meet the soft flesh of the petal.

A gasp manages to escape from a parched, raw throat.

He realises that one of the petal formations he has been so intently captured by is not a petal at all.

Against the unmoving flower, a small something makes itself known.

Whatever he has now instead of a heart thrums in his chest, forcing him to breathe deeply and bringing a stinging ache to his body. The butterfly's wings begin to shiver and tremble, as if it is itching to take flight.

A small insect that is no larger than half the size of his palm emerges, delicate and beautiful.

With careful and precise movements, it perches delicately on the edge of the flower, as if waiting.

In a trance, he stretches out a hand, skin worn and rough.

It doesn't seem worthy to hold such a pretty, striking thing.

He feels the tiny pricks if it's little feet as it steps onto his hand with all the poise and grace of an empress.

Its limbs are almost a perfect match for the petals of its flower, delicate and pale, fading into pink and then into rich fuchsia and royal violet.

Front limbs that are serrated and lethal looking are coloured the palest pink. It holds them up in front of its mouth like a shy concubine, demure and inviting.

He stares at the tiny creature with the eyes of a deranged, feverish man, unable to fathom what is happening.

Not of his own volition, his other hand raises and pauses, palm over in supplication. The butterfly, half ignored, takes flight and lands gently in his other palm. Its wings quiver, the iridescent powder shining like crushed diamonds.

The other insect cocks its head and he knows.

He is dead.

This world -this memory- is death.

His mouth tastes like sour bile and defeat.

He looks down again at the insects on his palms.

He looks down at himself.

He doesn't remember this from last time. Either of them. Maybe he isn't supposed to. There is no indication, but he has a choice. He can leave this all behind. Depart. He can leave his sin behind and become something pure. Something whole.

He can move on.

Board the train, so to speak.

He opens cracked, broken lips and tries to speak.

No sound escapes his mouth.

Swallowing, he tries again.

"I have made my choice." He murmurs, the sound like dry paper.

He swallows again, and it hurts.

Ugly. He is ugly.

Disfigured and twisted and hideous.

He is diseased and impure, an amalgamation of countless years of sin.

His soul is set upon worn golden scales and weighed.

Hate and hope war for the right to tip the sides in their favour.

His choice has been made.

With a deft movement of one weakened hand, his fist closes and mercilessly crushes what laid within in an unyielding grasp.

Tom Riddle feels let down.

He spins the stolen wand in long fingered, pale hands and watches the two forms laying as still as death on the stone slabs.

A small smile graces bloodless lips. It is an astute analogy, since one is dead and the other is not far behind.

It is something of an anti-climax, he feels.

It is not the glorious return to his former glory that he had dreamt of while languishing in the prison of the book, pandering to the whims of a foolish little girl with too much trust and too little sense.

Instead, he is sitting in a ruined chamber, perched on a large slab of rock, his living weapon dead and his plan almost complete. All he must do now is wait to leech the last of the life from the girl, something he will take great pleasure in.

His eyes drift over the fallen figure, dark hair covering its face in matted, waterlogged strands.

This will be his first objective once he returns in all his former glory.

It is a mystery, and Tom Marvolo Riddle hated to be left out of those.

With a sigh that no one can hear, he deftly slides from the rock he has been perched on. With idle, languid steps he crosses the wet floor and comes to a halt in front of the girl.

So small and frail, he thinks to himself. So very easy to break.

He knows she can hear him.

The cloudiness of her eyes suggests she cannot see his form, which is a pity. He would have liked her to witness his becoming more corporeal as he steals her life from her. Alas, he has to make do, he supposes.

It is with no great fanfare that he regains consciousness.

There is no plume of otherworldly power, no tell-tale increase in pressure that would signify his return to the world of the living.

He is gone, and then he is back.

A brain that is the sum of all he is begins to process and handle information; the feeling of wet robes against his skin. Cold. The smell of fetid water and the metallic, cloying scent of blood reaches his nose. Unpleasant. His lungs begin to pull in air and there is pain in his chest. Excruciating. His eyes open slowly, like a flower creeping out from its bud. He sees stone. Unsurprising. Taste buds process the taste of blood and stagnant water. Repulsive.

The heart that had been beating in his chest is quiet and cold and it remains that way. Expected.

There is something missing. There had always been a hole, for want of a better word. Now, it is something different. There is no hole, but there is another feeling that he is intimately familiar with.

That gnawing, inhuman hunger.

Overpowering.

It is a curious thing, that feeling that we name 'terror'. For one such as the self-styled Lord Voldemort, such fear is something to be taken notice of and studied, because it means that there is something wrong, and should be fixed.

For others, it might be as simple as a fear of spiders, or the kind of heavy dread of an enclosed space, or the feel of tonnes of water pressing down on you.

For the shade of Tom Marvolo Riddle, horror comes in the form of an innocuous sound coming from a cooling corpse, dead by his own hand.

The small, shuddering sound of something taking a laboured breath causes his blood to freeze in his veins, and the hairs to stand up on the back of his incorporeal neck.

That thing, whatever it is, it breathing.

It is taking steady, shuddering breaths and drawing stale air into cold, empty lungs. It splutters and there is the sound of wet cloth roughly moving over uneven slabs of stone.

He grips the stolen wand in bloodless fingers, aim steady and true. His older counterpart would have incinerated first and asked questions later, but the sixteen year old Dark Lord approaches the mass of sodden cloth and flesh carefully, swallowing his apprehension.

He reaches the writhing heap and speaks, only half of his own volition.

"What are you?" He commands, and his voice is steady and suspicious.

His fingers are numb and white.

The thing stills, and the sound of shuddering, wet breathing can be heard echoing in the cavernous chamber, giving the illusion that he is surrounded by dead-not-dead things.

From under tangled and sodden hair, it looks out at him through baleful irises, the colour of dusky sulphur.

Glassine eyes regard him with no recognition, and the mouth is somewhat open, blood and fetid water trickling down over cracked lips and down a childish jaw.

Monsters of a different sort regard each-other for an infinite moment, before the thing uncoils itself faster than he can comprehend in his current state. Thin limbs, dirtied and lacerated wrap around him and bring him to the stone slabs, where he makes no imprint on the water.

The wand is torn from his fingers with force, and he cries out, the chamber blurring in front of his eyes as his brain attempts to catch up with that is happening to him.

They struggle for a moment, its fingers pressing into his almost corporeal form like the flat of a knife on jelly.

Then it's over. He is pinned by the skeletal thing, his arms held down by long, bony fingers, several of which are bent at an unnatural angle. It straddles his waist, as its childish figure is small.

He looks up through eyes blown wide and he stares into an abyss of glassine, poison yellow. Its grin is stretched wide, and its teeth are stained with blood. Its lip is split and red ichor trickles down its chin, disappearing into the dirt and slime that coats its pale skin.

He is frozen like a rabbit caught in the gaze of an owl, his supremacy forgotten. Here and now, he is a sixteen year old boy, powerful and influential with a mastery of the darkness matched by few, but he is woefully unprepared to confront whatever eldritch horror he has unwittingly unleashed.

He opens his mouth to shout, but it turns to a strangled scream as the thing lunges and sinks its teeth into his ghostly flesh.

He continues to scream as his flesh is torn and ripped and thing holding him continues to devour his essence.

Eventually his screams die away and the body that was once the spiritual form of Tom Riddle begins to decay into fluid wisps that brake off from the miasma like lost aetheric spirits.

The thing snatches at them, effluvial fluid clinging to its jaws.

It catches a few and its teeth make quick worth of the fading fragments, but the rest dissipate and fade quickly, leaving no trace of the shade.

Power crackles along its skin, and a heavy pressure descends upon the chamber. The stones shiver under the weight.

Its head hangs, its skin is smeared with filth and gore, tracks of foul water mixing with the grime and matting its hair.

Broken fingers curl and fractured nails scrape against stone slabs. Bony, thin shoulders convulse with something that isn't power and isn't pain, but is a little of both. The noise that emanates from that filthy, hideous mass is nothing short of inhuman.

It stays there, hunched and contorted like a wounded animal for more minutes than it can count, eerie shrieks of laughter ricocheting off the antediluvian walls.

When Ronald Weasley comes to, he does not remember it afterward. His vision is blurry and the colours are muted, and shadowy figures come and go from above him, as he realises that he is lying down. Voices come to him as though underwater, and he can't figure out what they are saying.

He feels something cold on his leg, and then he slips into soft oblivion once again, and doesn't remember a thing.

The second time he wakes, he is greeted with nothing but blackness. His body is heavy and comfortable, and he decides that he doesn't mind if he goes back to sleep. He finds he can't however, when he realises that his eyes are open, and that all he can see if nothingness.

He begins to panic.

His panic is muted and slow, his voice nothing more than sluggish groans.

"Hush." A soothing voice says from somewhere above him, and a cool dry hand is laid across his forehead. "Your sight will return. Calm yourself."

He recognises the voice and does as it tells him.

Slowly, over the course of several agonising minutes than feel like hours, the world once again come into focus. It is blurry and indistinct, but he can make out what appears to be the hospital wing, and the gentle face of the school healer standing over him. Her face is lined with concern, which fades into warm congeniality when she sees recognition in his eyes.

"M-Madam Pomfrey?" he asks tentatively, his throat feeling as though it is clogged with cotton wool.

The healer nods and raises her hand. He feels a cool tingle wash over his skin, and he vaguely recognises the feeling from when his mother cast diagnostic charms when he had hurt himself.

She smiles. Ron has the strange thought that it looks plastic and fake.

"There you are. You are doing much better now, aren't you? Are you feeling more awake?" she asks, lowering her wand.

"Y-yeah." He manages, his head swimming with the suggestion that this is surreal.

He shifts and realises that he can't feel his limbs.

He feels panic welling up inside him again, but the gentle voice of the healer stops it in its tracks.

"That's the potion dear, you won't be able to feel your extremities for a while yet."

He breathes a sigh of relief. She knows what she is doing. She's a healer, after all.

Pomfrey sits on a stool at the side of his bed, and produced a clipboard and pen from her voluminous skirts.

"Would you mind me asking a few questions to see if you're alright?" she asks, and doesn't wait for an answer. He would have said yes anyway.

"Are you feeling any pain?"

He is not. He just feels kind of floaty. He tells her so.

"Potions, dear." She replies, seemingly sympathetic. "What's the last thing that you remember?"

He has to think about this one. He screws his eyes shut.

"I- I was…" he trails off, realising that divulging this information may get him and others into trouble. He bites his lip.

"I am aware of the events in the Chamber of Secrets." She says neutrally and his mind whirls. Just how long has it been?

"I- I was following H-Harry." He manages, his mouth stumbling over the words. "He-He tried to warn me. I heard him shout, I think. I don't remember anything after that."

Pomfrey nods solemnly, and jots a few notes down on the clipboard.

"Is that all?"

Ron feels his breath hitch.

"H-How long have I been here?" he asks, tentative and wishing he wasn't by himself.

The healer looks sad. That nasty, bubbling feeling is welling up inside him stomach again.

"How l-long, Madam Pomfrey?"

She hesitates. That in itself is damning. His mother does that same thing when he asks a question she does not want to answer. What happened to Beatrix, the tabby cat mouser who had slept in the shed? Why doesn't grandpa Septimus visit anymore?

Those kinds of hesitations never lead to anything good, Ron has learned.

"You have been here for two months, Ronald." She says softy, as though whatever tone of voice she said it in would have made the news more bearable.

Ron Weasley realises that he does not know what to say. The words 'two months' swim around his head and they lose all meaning.

He doesn't understand.

"I-I-" He stammers, and doesn't even realise that he feels grateful that she doesn't interrupt. "Two m-months?" he asks again, finding his voice and incredulity.

She nods, sympathetic. He doesn't care.

"H-How?" He needs to know. He has to.

"You were hit with falling debris." Pomfrey says in that gentle, measured tone Ron knows she has had practise in. "You took a very nasty hit to the head." She lowers her gaze. "You had other injuries too."

Ron is unable to process properly. He is only twelve. He isn't anything special, his greatest talent is chess and making parchment gliders that fly really far like his dad showed him.

How could he get caught up in something like this? This kind of thing happened to interesting, adventurous people, he thinks. It's not fair.

"W-where's my mum?" he asks, mumbling. He can feel tears brimming in his eyes. He wants his mother.

Pomfrey nods understandingly.

"I already flooed her when it was time to wake you up. She'll be here any minute."

Ron doesn't care. He wants her here now.

It is several minutes of answering more of the healers questions before he hears the fire rush and hears the sound of someone stepping through the fireplace. He's heard the sound a thousand time before, and it's as commonplace to him as the sound of a bee against a window, or the rush of wind through the boughs of a tree.

Now, he has never felt such emotion connected with that noise.

He hears his mother's voice.

"M-Mum." He croaks, something large and unpleasant blocking his throat.

His mother bypasses the healer and makes a beeline for him, her face a mix of everything that she is. He dimly hears the telltale sound of the fire igniting again and other people coming through, but pays it no mind. He can hear Madam Pomfrey calling his mother. He doesn't listen to her either.

His mother is embracing him now, smothering him and murmuring words about how she will never let him go. This would have elicited a reaction like pushing her away, an embarrassed scowl on his face. Now, however, he wishes he could feel his limbs so that he could move them and cling onto her for dear life.

He doesn't want her to ever let him go.

Eventually though, she pulls away and she is crying. He is too, but he doesn't care.

His mum is here. Everything feels a little better now.

She is fretting over him, ignoring the calls of the matron.

"Oh, my little boy! I was so worried, it's been simply awful and your arm, oh darling, I'm never letting you out of my sight again-"

He lets her go on, and gives a weak, watery smile as he sees his father appear by his bedside, looking tired and happy.

"Dad." Is all he can say, and his eyes feel hot again. His father looks pained, and pleased to see him, so he gives him a smile.

Then, something clicks.

"W-what's wrong with my arm?" he asks, hoping it's not scarred or anything. That would be gross.

He would look, but he can't move his head. His skull feels like it's make of lead, and even raising his head an inch takes more energy than he can muster.

His parents look surprised and something else that he can't name. It isn't happy.

He hears the matron say something, but his ears are filling with tar and he can't make it out.

"What is wrong with my a-arm?" he asks again, more forceful this time.

His mother looks stricken. His father puts a hand on her shoulder.

His breath feels shallow and he feels a horrible, sickly sensation creeping upwards from his stomach.

He tries to demand an answer again, but his voice doesn't co-operate and instead he lets out a wheezing croak.

The healer is by his side in an instant, wand at his throat and murmuring something under her breath. Suddenly, he can breathe again, but his eyes are stinging and the dread has not subsided.

His mother puts a hand on his bed to steady herself, and eventually sits. The bed speaks and dips as she sits on the side. She reaches out and he assumes she holds his hand, but he can't feel her fingers on his.

"Sweetheart…" she trails off, and he realises that she's crying again. "You- they-" she breaks off and takes a shaky, trembling breath. She looks him in the eyes. He feels sick.

Madam Pomfrey comes over and stands by the couple, her face sad.

"Your arm." She begins gently. "It was buried under falling rubble. You were under for too long, I'm afraid." She can't meet his eyes as she hesitates. "We had to remove your left arm."

Ron realises that even with his mother there, things are still akin to a nightmare. He tries to scream.

He can't get enough air into his lungs to do even that.

It is some time later, when he has finally calmed down with the aid of several spells and potions, that he thinks to ask about the events of the Chamber.

His mother begins to cry again, and his father has silent tears rolling down his cheeks. They cannot speak.

There is something that pushes him to ask.

He doesn't know what it is, but later he will recall that he will never forget that unearthly feeling that tells him he already knows, but forces him to ask again.

"Mum, w-where's Ginny?"

Molly Weasley has lost much in her life. She lost her brothers, she lost her mother, and she watched as her father wasted away into nothing.

When she sees that boy walk through the door to the hospital wing, a look on his face that she assumes is supposed to be concern, she decides that nothing compares.

It's not just grief, hurt, remorse and all the emotions in between that are threatening to let her fall to her knees, it's the overwhelming guilt she feels when she looks at that boy.

That boy who went to save her daughter. That boy who had valiantly dragged her son from beneath the rubble of a collapsed tunnel. That boy who had slain a basilisk to save a little girl he didn't know.

James and Lily's son.

The boy who wore a familiar face, but was nothing like the people she once knew.

She hated that boy.

He was all those things and more, but they were nothing in the face of the one title Molly could never rid him of.

He was the boy who came back when her little girl had not. He was the boy who spent a scant fortnight in the hospital wing, while her son was deathly still and missing an arm.

He was the boy who dared to come into the silent room, looking as though he belonged perfectly in the sterile coldness of the hospital wing, and attempted to talk to her.

He was one thing that she could never forgive him for.

He was the boy who failed.

A statue looks into a mirror.

Skin carved from marble, features chiselled with the steadiest, most delicate hand.

Eyes hewn from what had been emerald, but now appeared to be peridot.

The statue leans forward and examines its reflection.

Peridot shot with citrine stares back.

The statue smiles an awful smile, and its marble skin cracks.

There is no triumphant leaving feast this year.

The house cup is awarded with little ceremony, and Gryffindor are not their usual loud, boisterous selves when they receive it.

The hangings are black, and mood is the same.

There is a low murmur of talk during the meal, but no-one dares to raise their voice.

There is a notable absence of red hair at the Gryffindor table.

Michael is sick.

His food tastes like ash in his mouth, and he cannot stomach anything more than water.

He doesn't want to look next to him.

He doesn't know if he'll like what he sees.

He supposes he should be angry. He's been left out again.

Isn't that what adventurous duos do? Solve mysteries and be an inseparable, well-oiled team?

If this is what adventure gets you, he thinks as his eyes fill with salt and water, he wants nothing to do with it. Nothing.

He is glad he has such a friend that knows when to leave him behind. That knows when it is best to handle things themselves.

He is truly glad.

Professor Dumbledore makes a speech.

It is short, to the point and sombre. He can do nothing less. It is hard, as he is standing before his school – his family- and he knows that there is one who well never return to these hallowed halls, never partake of the leaving feats or cheer for their house team again. It is very hard for him not to shed tears.

He has to take a breath and move them with words.

His eyes sweep across the hall, over the faces of his children. Even the table clad in green is subdued, and the white blond head of the young Malfoy scion is bowed.

His eyes move and are caught by a pale gaze.

He stays steady and nods once, deeply and from the heart.

The peridot gaze blinks and looks away.

The Professor cannot be sure what he saw in those eyes, and puts it from his mind.

This is not the time.

This should have been a happy day. The end of a school year and the awakening of the petrified students should have had the school in jubilant uproar.

He sighs as he once again takes his seat at the table, the weight of a castle upon his shoulders.

It will be remembered as a dark day for Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Michael keeps his head bowed as he shuffles from the hall. The throng of students is quiet, and he finds it unnatural.

When he hears sudden whispers fluttering like moths to an open flame however, he lifts his head and his feet still.

Beside him, his companion does the same.

The faceless figures part like the red sea, and his feels his eyes widen and his jaw goes slack as he drinks in the image before him.

The figure in front of him is grim and uncomfortable. His face is drawn and has an unhealthy paleness. His eyes however –those windows to the soul, he has heard his mother say- are fierce and unwavering.

"Potter." He addresses Michael's companion, who steps forward and cocks his head.

"Weasley." Harry greets neutrally. Michael feels as though he is watching something surreal. He is not here, he is merely an observer.

Ron Weasley seems to struggle with his words, and Michael can see his cheeks colouring an ugly red.

Michael cannot take his eyes off the pinned rove sleeve and all that it means.

Harry stays silent next to him, a figure swathed in black and blue.

Michael is holding his breath. He barely notices.

"I just want y-you to know," Weasley begins, and Michael dimly realises that half the school is crowded around them. "No m-matter what anyone else thinks, I'm glad y-you did what you did."

Michael sneaks a glance at Harry. His expression has not changed.

Ron takes a shuddering breath and raises his gaze to stare piercingly into limpid eyes hidden behind glass.

"T-thank you." He says and Michael is taken aback by how much emotion there is in those two words. It's stifling. "You did m-more than any-" He stops, drops his gaze and starts again. "What y-you did-" He curses under his breath. "Thank you."

Harry doesn't say anything. He takes one step forward and is within touching distance of the other boy.

Michael can see that Ron is shaking.

Harry leans closer and mutters something that Michael cannot catch in the other boy's ear. He sees the redhead go stiff and his face tighten, and he hopes that Harry is not making things worse.

His friend pulls away from the redhead and there is small, serene smile on his lips.

He begins to walk away and Michael barely remembers to catch up with him. A call stops them.

"Potter."

Harry turns his head and regards the other boy out of the corner of his eye.

Ron grits his teeth and his fists clench. The three of them have forgotten their audience.

"Did you kill him?" Ron asks, his voice hoarse. "The one who did this to her. Did you kill him?"

Attention is on the Ravenclaw now, and he smiles. Michael finds it as beautiful as it is repulsive.

"Yes."

There is a pause.

"Good."

It is as they walk away through the crowd of people gawking at them, that Michael spares a look for his friend.

Pale, tired and not a little shadowed.

He sighs.

"Are you alright?" he asks gently, not really knowing his to approach the other boy. Are they friends?

Harry looks at him, and he almost flinches. Had his eyes always been that colour? The dark haired boy cocks his head to the side in askance.

"You look ill." Michael tells him frankly. He decides that politicking and word games are not his forte. He will leave that to the boy next to him. "You didn't eat a thing at the feast." He observes.

He feels an unnatural dread settle on his body, and his blood runs cold in his veins.

Harry is smiling. Michael's breath stops. What is that?

Harry laughs lightly and pats him on the shoulder. This time, Michael does flinch at the pallid, dry touch. The laugh is serene and clear, and it makes him want to pull away.

A word flutters into his head before it is snatched away and scattered on the winds of memory.

Diseased.

Harry regards him over the rim of his glasses. Michael cannot see the cracks in his skin. Thin, long fingered hands twitch and the smile widens hideously.

Michael believes it is supposed to be reassuring.

"I wasn't hungry." the thing next to him answers lightly. He chuckles, and green eyes catch the light spilling from the window and glow soft sulphur yellow. His expression darkens and it's not something Michael wants to name standing next to him. If Michael could have seen behind those iridescent irises, he would have been confused and horrified by the memory of the screams of a little girl, and the howl of a monster as it gorged itself.

"I already ate."

End

Does this make up for the two years?