Harry sat up clutching at his throat, trying desperately to breathe. He felt as if he was suffocating, that his air ways were completely blocked. It took him what seemed like forever to convince his starved lungs to drag in air. When he finally managed it, he sounded like an old man breathing his last as he gasped down the humid air of his dingy bedroom. Breathing hard he reached for his glasses, hoping that with clarity he could convince his body that it had only been a dream.

This was not the first time he had dreamt of the stifling darkness that surrounded him and filled him and tried to drag the life from him, but each time it was as if he sank further in. It was increasingly more difficult for him to wake up. He was scared to close his eyes.

This time he had not slept for two days until, eventually, it had been too much and he had had to lie down. He knew he should write to Dumbledore asking for help, but he was still hurting from the feelings of betrayal. He could not bring himself to do it, so he suffered alone.

They were only nightmares after all, he had had worse with Voldemort in his mind, but these were not coming from Tom Riddle. Harry knew what he was dreaming about; he understood all too well the horrors his mind was conjuring up. He was having night terrors about The Veil. Terror filled him at the idea that he had condemned his godfather to an eternity of inky blackness.

Pushing the covers back he swung his legs off his lumpy mattress and stood up. His chest still hurt from where he had literally stopped breathing as his subconscious took over, but it was passing. Sleep would not return tonight, so he dragged himself towards the bathroom.

For once the Dursley household had adapted to him, rather than the other way around. At the beginning of the holidays his nightmares about the Department of Mysteries had caused him to wake screaming, and no matter how Uncle Vernon yelled, Harry could not stop them. Hence, the Dursleys had taken to sleeping with ear plugs. This meant that Harry could move around without waking them.

He dragged his tired body into the bathroom to take a shower.

Glancing in the mirror he wondered absently if he had died and just not realised it, after all he was a wizard and Binns had not noticed. His skin was so pale it was almost grey and there were large, dark circles around his red-rimmed eyes. Somehow, he had managed to grow some over the holidays. How he didn't know since his appetite was virtually non-existent, but it seemed that whatever Aunt Petunia had been forcing down his throat had kept him alive and healthy enough to gain height. His Aunt had taken the warnings from the Order seriously and she made sure he was fed if nothing else.

It was only as Harry stared at his blank reflection that it slowly dawned on him; it was the 31st, he was sixteen, but he looked as if the life had drained out of him. Unable to summon up the energy to even be pleased that it was his birthday, he slowly began to remove his clothes and climbed into the shower.

The water did little to help drag him further from his dream. The darkness lurked just behind his eyes, waiting to swallow him whole.

Usually, the longer he was awake the further away he could push the nightmare, but tonight it faded only a little. As he let the shower run over him it kept trying to come back. It was almost as if the dream was trying to take over his conscious mind and he had little with which to fight it. He turned the water to cold, willing the night terrors to leave him, but he found himself leaning against the shower wall, with starving lungs, not knowing how he came to be there.

A cold spike of adrenaline gave him the strength to move as he realised this was no simple nightmare, but even as he opened the shower door, he felt the darkness reaching for him again. As the water splashed off his back and through the opening onto Aunt Petunia's immaculate floor he began to fall. There was nothing he could do as his dream smothered his conscious mind and he collapsed to the ground.

Harry never felt himself hit bottom as sensations of the real world ceased, to be replaced by the stifling blackness that poured down his throat when he tried to scream, taking the air away from his lungs. He was dying as the airless mass of darkness squeezed him and stole everything from him, including precious oxygen. It surrounded him, filled him, took away all sight and sound, leaching the life from his body. This was the end, and in a moment of complete clarity Harry knew he could not escape. He would cease here; the blackness would consume him. Still he fought, but he knew it was hopeless. He would die, just like Sirius.

His mind screamed its rebellion, but he could not free himself from the nightmare.

Even the sensations of suffocating began to fade as his senses began to shut down. Harry knew there would be no waking from this dream. He felt as if he was suspended in a giant, airless mass of oil and life was about to escape him.

Then something touched him.

The something was alive and real, and it sent electric shocks through his whole body.

[I have him,] a voice said, more in his mind than in his ears.

Suddenly air was rushing back into his lungs.

The suffocating blackness retreated just as the darkness became the blissful blankness of true unconsciousness rather than the horror of before.

~*~

"Wake up, Harry," a voice coaxed him, and he reluctantly followed it.

He moaned and tried to move as consciousness brought with it an ache so pronounced it was almost a stabbing pain. It was as if his whole body had been subjected to a blasting hex. He wished for the emptiness of oblivion again. Hands touched him and increased the ache where they met his body and he shied away, which hurt even more.

"Take it easy, Harry," the voice said this time and it was a startlingly familiar voice that his mind refused to believe, "you should lay still."

Even in his incredulity Harry's eyes flew open to see for himself what could not possibly be true. His heart missed a beat. He sat up despite the pain and found himself pushing away from the figure before him. Yes, this thing wore Sirius' face, yes, it had his voice, but where his godfather's eyes should have been there was blackness, broken by ever moving tongues of iridescent fire. This had to be more of the nightmare.

Harry squeezed his eyes tight shut again and willed himself to wake up.

"Harry," the mockery of Sirius said gently, but he refused to look at it. "Harry, I know this is strange and you're afraid, but it really is me."

Nothing in heaven or earth was going to make Harry open his eyes again. If he could not see it then just maybe it was all in his mind.

"I need your help."

Except that.

Almost at the point of panic those words dragged Harry back from the edge, and very slowly, he opened his eyes just a little bit. The only thing he could see was Sirius. Wherever they were it was completely black and the only things that seemed to exist were himself and his godfather.

Sirius was wearing the same clothes he had been when he fell through The Veil, but he looked different somehow, other than the obvious. His skin was very pale and his hair inky black, and he almost seemed to glow in the darkness. The lines of suffering from his years in Azkaban seemed to have lessened, although they were still there, and his face seemed to be clearer than Harry had ever seen it, except in pictures of the Marauders.

"I know I look different," this copy of Sirius said gently, crouching down to Harry's level, "but it is the only way I can survive here."

It suddenly occurred to Harry that if his godfather had been changed by here then maybe so had be and his hands went to his face. He was not wearing his glasses and yet he could see.

"You're still the same, Harry," his companion said reassuringly, "you're not fully here. Most of your body is still out there in our world, but I went through the Veil."

"They told me you were dead," Harry replied, not quite willing to believe this version of his godfather yet, but feeling the hope begin to grow.

[And he would have been had his lust for life not been so strong and called us out of the darkness,] a voice said in his mind.

The fear jumped back into his mind to consume him again.

"I said I would explain," Sirius sounded annoyed and Harry knew he was not being spoken to, "you're frightening him."

[It is far easier to demonstrate,] the voice replied, [we have limited time.]

"What's that?" Harry demanded before his fear could take over.

He stared around into the darkness, but he could see nothing.

"It's a who, not a what," Sirius said gently and slowly lowered himself into a sitting position.

[I am Facis,] the voice said in a much more conversational tone. [Your race once knew my people as the shadow dwellers, but it has been many generations since our races have interacted.]

Harry still could not see anyone but Sirius.

"Where are you?" he asked, his curiosity overcoming the fear of the strange method of communication.

"In me," Sirius said simply, "Facis is why you cannot see my eyes. It joined with me to keep me alive or the substance of this place would have consumed me."

"The darkness," Harry said, his mouth going dry and his voice almost failing.

His godfather appeared suddenly very remorseful.

"I'm so sorry you had to experience that, Harry," Sirius apologised earnestly, "but you were the only one we could reach. I would never have asked it of you if there was any other way."

There was such pain in his godfather's voice that Harry found himself reaching out instinctively. He placed a hand on Sirius' arm.

"I know," he said, and for the first time he was sure that he was speaking to the real Padfoot.

[You were even louder than Sirius,] a voice said in his mind and it sounded almost exactly like Facis, but not quite. [I am honoured to meet a soul which burns so brightly.]

Harry did not really know how to react to that.

"Umm, thank you," he said eventually. "Who are you?"

[My name is Ignulus,] the second voice replied politely, [I am at one with your soul energy, to prevent you from harm. I must apologise for the discomfort, but it is unwise to exist in two places at the same time and your physical body is suffering for it, which is mirrored here.]

The whole idea made Harry uncomfortable, but he did not object as the memory of the touch which had caused the darkness to retreat came back to him. Now he recognised Ignulus' voice.

"Why are you helping us?" his life to this point had made Harry suspicious, he had to ask.

[Combining with physical beings gives us great pleasure,] Ignulus said openly, [it is more than enough reward for assisting you to survive in our place.]

[However,] Facis' more stern tone interrupted, [your kind cannot remain here and in your world for long, and those who exist here physically will become as we are in time. Hence our wish to return Sirius to your world.]

"How?" Harry did not even hesitate.

Those were the words he had been longing to hear from anyone all summer. His heart swelled as he realised that his godfather could be restored. He was so filled with joy that he almost burst into tears, not that he was sure that was possible where he currently was.

[The Veil is a one-way door,] Ignulus explained, [for spirit energy it leads to the other side, for physical energy it leads here. It was someone's mistake. To return a body which has gone beyond the Veil another door must be opened from your world, one which leads from here to there. This may only be done by one of us. We may create doorways from there to here from this side, but we must be there to create those from here to there.]

Harry was confused; he did not understand why he was here.

"What do I have to do?" he asked, not sure what his role was to be.

"You have to take Ignulus back with you," Sirius said quietly, "and allow it to use your body while it creates the doorway."

Harry looked into the fiery gaze of his godfather and felt a little trepidation. It was not that he would not do it, he knew he would undertake any task to undo the tragedy he had instigated, but the idea caused the smallest stirring of fear.

"Like you and Facis?" he asked, not trying to hide what he was feeling.

[Almost,] Ignulus said gently, [but it would seem to you as if you were outside your body. It would be unsettling, but only one soul may reside in one physical shell in your world, without the direst consequences.]

The ideas and foreboding that this revelation caused flowed round and round Harry's thoughts for a while, but slowly he nodded.