Chapter 13 | Anticlimactic Rescue Missions

"W-What is you be doing here?"

She heard a high squeak ask shakily before the House-Elf spotted the body hovering behind her. "Did you be hurting Master?" This time her voice increased a tad bit at the thought that her master was hurt.

She quickly send the elf her one-thousand-galleon smile and shook her head. Fighting a House-Elf would be quite the challenge, and she was just not in the mood.

"Winky, right? No, I didn't hurt him. He just- suddenly slept on the way so I helped him come home, see?" She said calmly as to not alarm the House-Elf, before taking out her wand and made a show of levitating him onto a nearby chair.

Hedwig tilted her head at the sudden appearance of a wand but didn't make a sound.

"Could you help me tuck him in?"

The elf figure's head nodded eagerly, "Oh yes, oh yes! Winky can be doing that! Master Crouch is always be depending on Winky!" She exclaimed happily.

She watched - through her radar, of course - the man's body being levitated through the hallways. She followed them, purposely lagging behind, and spread her magic further to quickly pinpoint the brainwashed son and end the search. She doesn't know how sensitive House-Elves are to magic so the quicker she found him the bette- Oh.

There you are.

Bartemius Crouch Jr is currently occupying their basement, which stairs are incidentally right beside her. His magic is there, but it was quite hazy and too calm. Probably the effect of the imperius curse - or a long-term one. There was also a thin sheet of magic covering his own that she deduced to be coming from an Invisibility Cloak.

Casting a muffliato spell on her feet, Harry turned and walked down the wooden stairs. She opened the door leading to the basement and made a bee-line towards the unconscious body. The snowy owl lowly hooted in question, to which the child only winked in reply.

"Now, where to smuggle you." She pondered, running her birdcage-free hand through her hair out of habit.

Only when something made contact with her forehead did she remember that she literally had a whole travelling flat on her person. "Oh right, I forgot I had this." She snorted at her own stupidity before enlarging the luggage charm on her bracelet.

Levitating Bartemius Crouch Jr into her flat, she laid him into one of the bedrooms. She casted numerous healing spells onto his body and tucked him in a comfortable position as best as she could.

"That was easy enough." She sighed before waving her hand to let her magic do the rest of the work. The Invisibility Cloak folded on the nightstand, next to a stasis charmed water glass and a note - that she wrote with the help of voximito - that read;

'Please don't panic. Drink, sleep and try to organize your mind. A decade of being under the imperius curse doesn't really do good for the mind. There are books in my personal library to pass time - you were a Ravenclaw, weren't you? - it's just the black door across the living room.

I think I did buy some books on therapy. Perhaps, you should try it?
There's some food in the kitchen cupboard. I promise it's not poisoned or anything.

I have an internal alarm to alert me when you've awoken so hopefully, you won't have to wait for long.

P.s. Please don't try to escape. There are two ways to escape but one of them could get you killed by magical creatures. So please don't.
P.p.s. Please don't provoke my serpents. They're quite venomous.
P.p.p.s. Please don't make a mess.
P.p.p.p.s. My room is to your right. Please don't snoop around. It's locked and there are dangerous wards around it.'

Nodding to herself, Harry walked out of the room, leaving a ward in the room to alert her for when her guest had come to. She then opened the birdcage, transfigured the bottom part to form a stand and placed it by the snakes' vivariums.

"Welcome to your new home, Hedwig!" She said happily, making a grand gesture to welcome her before calling the resident serpents and introduce them.

Mare hissed in distaste, "An owl?! We're going to get eaten, foolish Morrs!" She exclaimed, angered at the fact that their human had taken in their ultimate enemy into their humble abode.

Harry tilted her head and faced Hedwig, who was eyeing the Runespoor in distrust. "You're not going to eat them right?" She asked, smiling when she got an equivalent of an affirmative hoot.

"Great! Then you guys can get acquainted for now."

And just before walking up the stairs, she patted the serpents who were gliding and whining beside her, "I trust you four not to bite our guest, okay? And play nice with Hedwig." She said sternly at them and walked out of the luggage.

Using her acting skills from her other lives and a bit of obliviate on Winky, Harry easily got out of the Crouch estate and apparated back to Little Whinging.

XxXxX

"Harry! Harry!"

As usual, ever since Dudley had been informed about her double life, he seeked her out every morning before going to school.

She was currently reading the first year's Potions book to see whether there are any changes since her last 'visit'. Since her visit to Diagon Alley weeks ago, she'd started reading on the subjects to pass time, courtesy of litterasonus.

The simple mistakes in both its grammars and theories were hilarious. She couldn't wait to finish all the first year's books so she could start on the other books. Perhaps she'd find the story to her next life in one of the fictions she bought.

And though Dudley was quite disappointed that she had gone ahead without him, his disappointment quickly vanished when she promised to take him there next year as she now knew where all the required materials were sold.

She didn't need the names of the stores as she couldn't really read anything with her current state, but once she knew where it is placed, she could just pinpoint the building in her mind radar.

Slipping a piece of paper inbetween her recently read pages, she raised an eyebrow at the approaching shadow. "Yes, Dud?" She said in an amused tone.

The boy seemed to be bouncing all over the place as he stood infront of her. He started waving his hands around, "I can come! Pa allowed me to come along!" He exclaimed happily.

"Come along to where, dear cousin?"

"To King's Cross next week!"

Harry tilted her head at the thought that Uncle Vernon had actually allowed his precious son to come in contact with 'Freakish stuff' and smiled in amazement.

"I hope you're prepared to be blown away then."

She waved goodbye when Aunt Petunia called him to get ready for school. Closing the book with a quick snap, she shrunk it, put it in her pocket and made her way to the cupboard.

Once in her flat, she wrapped Neptune around her neck and called Newt's Runespoor to slither up her arm. Lifting up her other arm, she looked at her last pet through her Horned Serpent's sight.

"Come, Hedwig. I think it's time that you meet the others."

The Snowy Owl gave a questioning hoot but flew onto her hand nonetheless. Piercing yellow eyes watched her with intense curiosity as she walked through the portal briefcase.

"I haven't tried owls yet, but my sister said that they are delicious." A low growl greeted her just as she walked out of the mansion. Neptune's head lifted and she could see Aeolus eyeing the white bird perched on her arm, who was flapping her wings and hooting in retaliation.

Chuckling, she caressed the distressed bird to soothe her ruffled feathers. "Keep your talons away from her, Aeolus. Hedwig here is a new addition to the team." She rolled her eyes when the dragon's mouth curved, resembling a smirk.

"Can you call the others?"

Not a moment later, a loud roar resonated through the forest. Regular birds flew off from the sudden pressure in the air. Aeolus sniffed haughtily when they realized that the nature surrounding them was now dead quiet.

Harry just shook her head, "Show off."

She let the Runespoor down as the surface of the nearby lake started rippling, indicating that the first batch to come would be the water creatures. She felt Hedwig shifting nervously on her hand and patted her, "It's okay, they are not a threat." She assured the avian.

The Sea Serpent appeared first, followed by the Kelpie and two Hippocampus. Soon after, came the sound of wings flapping through the air strong enough to produce a sound, gallopings and hisses.

And though she had been assured by Harry, Hedwig's owlish eyes couldn't help but widen even more as she hooted in puzzlement. Surrounding them were all kinds of creatures, Hedwig was pretty sure some of the were extinct and quite hard to come by.

Harry smiled happily at her creatures, "Hey guys, this is our new addition. Say hello to Hedwig." She said, lifting up her right arm to show said owl perching there.

Hisses, neighs and growls greeted her.

"Alright, you guys introduce yourselves to her. I know that for some indefinite reason, you guys can understand each other so I'm going to leave you guys for the day while I rest in the mansion, m'kay?"

Neptune slithered down her neck as Harry cut off their magical connection, and she heard Hedwig hooting a goodbye to her when she walked into the huge dark grey building in the middle of the mountain.

She made her way around the house without any hindrance. Well even without the use of expandi noscito, she could still easily made her way up and down the house as she had had the same house ever since her first life and nothing had been changed since then.

She plopped down her favorite couch and leaned back so that she was laying horizontally, with her head on on of the armrests while her feet on the other. Her small frame made it so that none of her limbs were hanging off the edge.

"A week before Hogwarts." Harry mused, remembering what Dudley had said a few minutes ago, and raked a hand through her already messy hair.

And as usual, her friend appeared uninvited, "Yes, yes. A week. What of it?" Death asked bluntly.

Turning around so that she was sprawled on her stomach, she rested her chin on the armrest. "I was just thinking if I should make a move right now." Her head bobbing up and down on her hand as she talked, glasses in the verge of falling off.

"What are you talking about?"

"Aren't you omniscient? Shouldn't you already know what I mean?"

She felt him approach her and stopped once he was right beside the couch. A sudden pressure appeared on her back, heavy enough to hold her in place even if she pushed back with her child strength.

Harry muffled her groan through the cushion and flailed her limbs in return, "Don't sit on me with your virgin arse!" She huffed before giggling at her own joke.

"Just answer me before I obliterate yours, o' friend of mine." The entity deadpanned.

Instead of answering, she snickered, "Death. Oh, my dear Death. Did you not hear yourself? What would Time think- ack!!" She yelped suddenly when the pressure worsen. "Alright alrig-! I'll talk-!" She heaved when air started escaping her lungs.

Taking a huge breath when the pressure - if only a bit - finally lighten, she ran her fingers through her hair and tugged on a couple of strands, "As we know, Sirius Black was chucked into Azkaban when he was actually innocent-"

"Yes, so you have said for a couple of times now."

"And this is what I was thinking," Harry continued, content on ignoring the entity's - very rude - behavior.

XxXxX

A shaggy haired man groaned softly on the ground, making no move to get up as it would just serve as another excuse for those inhumane creatures to feast on him, or rather his soul.

Everything in Azkaban seemed repetitive. It was always wake up, eat just a miniscule amount of chocolate, get feasted by Dementors and pass out. He had been going through this cycle for so long that he didn't know how much time has passed.

His cousin's insane ramblings and cacklings didn't help ease his sanity.

But something- he wasn't really sure if he was hearing things or he was in the end of his ropes but he heard a voice. A voice different from the usual screams, nor the usual guards' smug laughter.

No, It sounded like a kid's voice.

"-Yes yes, I'll give you your favourite goat souls. Just don't feast on the prisoners anymore alright?-"

As the voice grew louder, a familiar uneasy feeling came upon him. He held his breath as he prepared himself for another round of nightmares- but nothing came up.

Instead he heard the footsteps stop infront of his celldoor as the voice called "Sirius?"

He cracked open an eyelid to see a boy behind the bars and took inhaled sharply. There were Dementors surrounding him, giving the kid an eerie aura. But that was not the thing that made him caught his breath, the child looked similar to his late best mate, James.

The child had the infamous unruly Potter hair, yet his features were softer than James'. His eyes glowed green in the dark hallway, much like the Killing Curse, but the feel of them felt like Lily's.

The boy looked like what their spawn would look like had they had a child. Wait- Did they have a child, or was it just one of his delusions? No, he was pretty sure there's a boy in their lives. What was his name again? It was something like Sally? No, Barry? Oh-!

"Harry?" His voice was so scratchy that he didn't even recognise it. How long had it been since he talked?

The child sighed in relief and smiled happily, "Thank Death, you're still sane." He said happily before reaching out to the bars.

Sirius tried to lift his hand to prop himself up so he could warn the child that there were Dementors behind him but suddenly his elbows bucked, making himself fall on the floor.

His vision was filled with darkness.

XxXxX

-On The Way To Sirius's Cell-
Dementor 1: "Death Mistress!"
Dementor 2: "Welcome, Mistress!"
Harry: *Smiling* "Thank you. It has been a while, hasn't it?"
Dementor 1: "Yes, Mistress. Oh, you just have to get us goats."
Dementor 3: "GOATS!! PLEASE!"
Harry: *Chuckling* "Well, I'm currently on a mission but after I retrieve someone, I suppose I could conjure up a couple of goats for you guys."
Dementor 2: "If you'd be kind enough to give us goats for each of us, we would be thankful."
Dementor 1: "Indeed, Mistress."

Harry: "Alright, alright, geez. How long has Death not check up on you guys?"
Dementor 3: "A few centuries now."
Harry: "That lazy bastard. Just tell me how many of you are here so I could prepare them."
Dementor 1: "Oh Mistress is better than the Master."
Dementor 2: "Yes yes!"
Dementor 3: "We adore the Mistress, indeed!"
Harry: *Laughing* "Flattery gets you nowhere, my Dementors."
Harry: "But I suppose it does get you those goat you wanted."

J Out!