Chapter Ten: Faded Scars

"Hello" ~ Regular speech.

"Lumos" ~ Verbal Spellcasting.

'Hello' ~ Thought speech.

'Hello' ~ Non-POV Thought speech.

{Hello} ~ Parseltongue.

November 1, 1993

"Aisling? As in Aisling Peverell? But she's dead."

Her smirk gained a certain warmth to it as she answered.

"As of tonight, not so much."

A cry of agony, a flash of pain….

A woman with scaly skin, chanting as wisps of red flowed around her….

A similarly scaled girl, sparring; A hand reaching down to help her up after she lost….

A wizened old wizard, robed in green, looking down in paternal fondness: "You will do well in Slytherin House, Aisling"...

Two boys, experimenting with dark magic, who do not take kindly to being caught; An older student, his robes accentuated with green and a silver badge upon his breast, subdues the boys….

Salazar Slytherin looking down at the boys, his face twisted with fury: "You have abused the sanctuary of this school, and assaulted my daughter. For that, you shall never set foot in this castle again!"...

Two wands, splintered to pieces….

Exploring under the castle, under even the hidden chamber, sister and best friend in tow….

A pool of glowing, sickly green….

Losing footing, plummeting into the abyss of green….

Pain, unimaginable pain, as white fire burns into bones and lungs….

The best friend, dragging them out, the green glow lighting up his eyes….

Looking in a mirror, a face stares back in shock and intrigue. Long white hair frames a sharp-jawed face, and once-dark eyes now burned with green light….

Throwing out a fist, and staring in shock as a bolt of verdant fire shot out, destroying a vase….

From a forge, a shining blade emerging, glowing not with heat, but with its own inner light….

An ambush, the scaled woman slain, their sister cut down….

Carving their hand open, green blood spilling from the cut into their sister's wounds….

A long incantation, hissed out between choked sobs of despair….

The light fading from her eyes as motes of light float up from her heart….

A scream of anguish that shakes the earth and splits the sky….

Darkness on the horizon, blotting out the sun….

A horde of monsters, at their head a being of pure evil; a cloak black as night hides its form, twin points like the devil's horns sweep up from its head, a pair of burning red embers set in a rictus full of sharpened teeth….

A battle cry, and spells light up the red dawn….

Charging through the fray, cutting down anything in their way with steel and fire, until facing the Beast itself….

A duel, unlike any seen in the last millennia, as light and dark fought for dominance….

A loud crack, and their shield is split….

A flurry of strikes, only giving the monster scratches….

A blossom of pain, and a look of malevolent triumph….

A snarl of defiance, as the shining blade plunges into the heart of their foe, verdant fire enveloping it….

A roar of victory, as the blade takes the enemy's head….

A heavy sigh, as all strength drains from them….

Their father cradles them in his arms, violet-grey eyes red with tears….

A promise of vengeance, as the world fades to white….

When the cousins finally woke up, the sun was streaming through the windows, diffused by the sterile white curtains.

Green eyes met blue, and flashed gold, blue involuntarily flaring green in response. It was then that they realized they were not the only ones in the room. The first thing they noticed was the massive black dog resting his head on Harry's bed, also in the room were Madame Pomfrey, Hermione, Ron, Neville, Jazz, and Jack and Maddie Fenton. Standing near the door was Professor Dumbledore, a look of curiosity in his eyes.

"Good to see you're both up, Mister Potter, Mister Fenton. You both gave the lot of us a scare there." Madame Pomfrey stated.

"Yeah mate, it was weird. Middle of the night, and you just started screaming. Then your scar started giving off smoke, and you stopped screaming. Me an' Neville brought you to the hospital wing, when we realized Danny hadn't been in the dorms." Ron told Harry, earning a grammar correction from Hermione.

"Then how did I get here?" Danny asked.

"I was tending to Mister Potter when you just appeared on the bed. Only warning I had was a slight pop, but I'm sure the Apparition Wards are still fully functional." Pomfrey looked at Dumbledore, who gave a knowing nod.

"So, what happened?" Hermione asked.

"I'm not entirely sure..." Harry said hesitantly. "It's all a bit fuzzy."

"Well, when it stops being fuzzy, you will tell us what happened? Won't you?"

"Sure thing." Harry told his bushy-haired friend.

While Harry was being interrogated, Danny was focusing inward, on something that was bothering him. Discreetly, he checked his pulse.

Thump... thump… thump… thump….

The average resting heart rate for someone Danny's age was around 70 beats per minute. Danny's heart was beating once every five seconds. It took all his self-control to only widen his eyes at that.

That just wasn't possible.

Of course, Madame Pomfrey noticed, and quickly bustled over to tend to him.

"I'm fine," Danny protested.

"I'll be the judge of that, Mister Fenton." The matron said as she look his temperature and pulse. Her eyes widened at the results. She quickly glanced toward the others in the room.

"All right, these two still need their rest. You can interrogate them when they are out of my care," said Madame Pomfrey. The look in her eye told them that she would start throwing hexes if they were not out of the room within the next ten seconds. They made the wise choice, and the hospital wing was quickly evacuated of everyone not a patient or nurse.

"Mister Fenton, your body temperature is far before normal, as is your pulse." Madame Pomfrey told him. She started casing diagnostic spells over him, a glow of green-white hovering around him.

"Hmmm, no sign of hypothermia, Frost Serpent venom*, or Arctic Virus**. For all intents and purposes, you are completely healthy. Even the residue in those scars of yours is gone."

Danny instinctively put his hand to his neck, and Madame Pomfrey summoned a mirror. Looking hesitantly, he gasped inaudibly at the sight that met him.

Jagged lines of angry red had faded to nearly white, almost imperceptible against the rest of his skin.

The school nurse turned to Harry, and cast a similar set of charms.

"Mister Potter, if you would drop the morph, please?"

Harry's features shifted, dark hair brightening to a deep scarlet. Madame Pomfrey brushed the untamable mane up to show his forehead, and handed him the mirror.

Harry gaped.

The lightning-bolt scar, which for twelve years had looked as fresh as when it had been inflicted, was faded to a thin white mark.

Harry handed back the mirror with a nod, and Madame Pomfrey quickly banished it back to wherever it came from.

"Now, seeing as you both seem to be in perfect health, you are free to go, though I would recommend you get something to eat as soon as possible." Madame Pomfrey told them. "But if anything unusual happens, do not hesitate to stop by."

After departing the hospital wing, the cousins made their way to one of the many unused classrooms that could found in the castle. Harry shut the door, and turned to Danny, who had a confrontational look in his eye.

"You know what happened, don't you?" He demanded. Harry made a gesture of appeasement.

{Ayla Slytherin.}

Those two words felt like a shard of ice had rammed itself into Danny's heart, memories and emotions not his own being brought to the forefront of his mind.

{Aisling Peverell and Ayla Slytherin were sisters. Aisling got some sort of… ghost powers, and when Ayla was killed, she did something that made it so her soul could live on. Her soul ended up in my mother, and when Voldemort killed her, Ayla jumped into the nearest host, me. When Voldemort's curse backfired, his soul was shattered, and a piece of it followed Ayla's soul.} Harry pointed at the faded scar. {Whatever happened last night, it made Ayla wake up, and we destroyed the piece of Voldemort's soul that was stuck in my head.}

{There was a Horcrux in your head!?} Danny hissed. He could remember the word and its meaning. A vile piece of dark magic, its very mention evoked a deep, primal hatred that set green fire alight at his fingertips.

"Danny…" Harry gestured. Danny looked down, and quickly flailed his hands about trying to put the flames out. After a couple of slightly humorous moments, he succeeded. The moment of awkwardness that followed was interrupted by a hiss from the walls.

{Come down to the chamber. There is something you must see.}

Sneaking down to the Chamber of Secrets, the cousins found Sciath pointing her snout at the passageway that had been a dead end when Danny had visited at the end of the previous term.

{The way can now be opened, my Phantom}

A small shiver ran down Danny's back at the word 'Phantom', but the cousins made their way down the corridor anyway. At the end, they found upon the wall the elusive glyph now clear upon the stone. Allowing the ghostly fire to envelop his hand, Danny placed his palm on the sigil. The emerald flames filled the glyph like molten metal into a mould.

The sound of grinding stone filled their ears as the wall slide aside, revealing the passageway to go down further.

"Lumos." Harry lit the end of his wand while Danny decided to use his fire as a torch.

The two followed the corridor until it opened into a room, almost like a study. A bookshelf was set against one wall, with a decent amount of books. Against another wall was a set of three display cases. In the first one, a shield sat, split in half. In the second, a gleaming silver arming sword was set next to a wand that had been split in half much like the shield. A silvery-black thread poked out of the pale white of the wand wood, and a green gem was set within the handle. The sword was similarly ornate, with pale green gems set in the guard and pommel, the handle patterned like scales. Engraved into the fuller was a single word in runic script: Phantom. In the third display case, a mannequin stood, wearing a suit of eleventh-century armor. A coat of glistening black scale-mail was covered on the torso by a white surcoat. On the breast of the surcoat was the same glyph that had marked the passageway. On the head of the mannequin sat a white helmet, marred with a painful-looking gouge at the top.

Opposite the display cases was a desk and chair, with a closed book sitting squarely atop the desk. Picking it up, Harry read the title.

"The Memoirs of Salazar Slytherin." He read aloud.

Danny wasn't listening. His focus was on the door at the other end of the study. Prodding it open, he looked in before stepping through the threshold. Harry followed.

The two found themselves standing on a ledge in a large cavern. The cavern was filled with green light, the source of which sat less a foot under their feet. A veritable lake of glowing liquid.

"Ectoplasm." Danny breathed. Harry took a step closer to the edge, only to run into his cousin's arm. After a moment of thoughtfulness, he nodded.

"You really don't want to fall in." Danny said, before promptly squatting down to run a hand through it. The incredulous look Harry gave him said more than words.

Danny stood back up, a handful of ectoplasm in his hand, and closed his eyes in focus. A ring of blinding white appeared around his waist, splitting and passing over his body. When the rings faded, Danny had changed. His raven hair had turned platinum white, his skin had tanned several shades, and when he opened his eyes, ectoplasmic green eyes glowed. A smile appeared on Danny's face, and he kicked off the ground. In complete defiance of gravity, he stayed in the air. Without any warning, he soared around the cavern, a joyous laugh echoing.

Circling the cavern twice, Danny landed back on the ledge, and made his way back into the study. Harry followed, and swiped the book from the desk as they left the Chamber of Secrets.

"So, you're saying that Salazar Slytherin wasn't a muggleborn-hating dark wizard?" Ron asked, bewildered. The four Gryffindor companions had gathered in the boys' dormitory, where they could speak without having to deal with the other students, who would most likely be studying since it was a Monday.

"Nope," Harry informed his friends. In his lap sat the book he had taken from the chamber. "He had nothing against muggleborns, and he didn't leave the school because of a disagreement with the other Founders. He did study a lot of dark magic, though he never used most of it."

"And those two dark wizards, Moloch and Gaunt? What happened to them?" Hermione asked. From Salazar's writings, the two brothers were nothing short of nightmarish in their use of the dark arts. Harry had gotten cold shivers as he poured over the records, his passenger confirming their accuracy.

"Moloch died when Aisling stabbed, burned, and decapitated him." Danny answered. Ron gulped, slightly disturbed at the overkill, and Hermione looked a little pale.

"And Gaunt?" Hermione asked hesitantly.

"Slytherin tracked him across Europe for years, until he confronted him at Castle Durmstrang. Their battle leveled the castle, and neither of them survived. The last thing Slytherin did was send his memoirs to the Chamber."

"If Salazar Slytherin wasn't against muggle-borns, why does everyone think he was?" Hermione asked.

"Character assassination." Danny spat. "Gaunt had a son, a cruel wizard named Corvinus. He stole Aisling's granddaughter to claim the Slytherin bloodline, and spread the story that that Slytherin hated muggle-borns and was run out of Hogwarts by the other founders, while suppressing almost all mention of his family's crimes." His voice sounded much older, and he stared at a blank patch of wall. Harry snapped his fingers in front of his face.

"Earth to Danny?" He said, snapping his cousin out of his state.

"Sorry, still coming to terms with all of this." He replied.

"It's a lot to take in, isn't it?" Hermione asked rhetorically. "Almost everything we knew about Salazar Slytherin is wrong, and you have the memories of his children."

"Not just the memories." Harry revealed. Ron and Hermione stared, wide eyed.

"What do you mean?" Ron asked.

"When Ayla died, Aisling refused to let her soul move on. Eventually, she bound her soul to a living host. She bound herself to my mother. She was like that voice in your head, giving you advice and encouragement. When Voldemort killed my mother, she bound herself to me." Harry revealed.

"And she didn't talk to you now?" Hermione questioned.

"I'm still not entirely sure why. I guess it took a lot out of her to do it, and then Voldemort gave me the scar, and some of the magic there must have kept her… suppressed." Harry mused.

"And then my power… woke up," Danny interjected, snapping his fingers to conjure the ghostly flame in his hand. "Whatever connection Aisling made between herself and Ayla, my powers waking up must have overpowered that suppression."

"So, what exactly are your powers?" Ron asked.

"Aisling was exposed to pure ectoplasm; she could hurl bolts of the stuff like fireballs, turn intangible and invisible, fly, and even use some kind of scream that could flatten an army." Danny clenched his fist around the flame in his palm, snuffing it out as it turned into a bead of the green goop he had used to vandalize the trophy room in first year. Rolling the bead of ectoplasmic slime to his other hand, it turned back into a tongue of verdant fire before going out with a snap. "I'm pretty sure I got all of her powers."

"Wicked." Ron breathed.

"I can also do this -" Danny stood up as the ring of light appeared and he shifted forms, earning another exclamation from an awestruck Ron.

"Now we just need to throw a cape on you and we call you Super Danny." Harry joked. Danny ruffled his hair in response.

"Oh please, it's Phantom, Danny Phantom." The newly-forged Phantom stated.

*Frostbite Serpent - A rare snake found in colder climates. Its venom is known to cause frostbite and slow the victim's heart-rate and metabolism.

**Arctic Virus - A magical illness that causes hypothermia in the victim. If left untreated, it is often fatal. Only affects wizardkind.

Authors Note: Sorry for the long delay, the last scene of this chapter simply refused to be written, and then life got in the way with work, college, and drama.