Unofficial Portkey Archive

by Nathan Crossland

Disclaimer - All characters are copyright of J.K.R. excluding Linden Xiloscient who is an original character by Nathan Crossland. I take no responsibility for my overactive imagination and it's actions because of what it is under the influence of. HeH

Chapter One - Sea of Mist

The mist rolled out across the dark moor. Between the clouds the small sliver of the moon peeked out but barely spread any light across the bleak landscape. Here and there trees broke up out of the floor of mist. Dark, gnarled pinnacles of rock amid a slow moving, tranquil sea of white mist. The dark feathered birds flitted here and there, their shadows barely seen in the dark clouds, just blacker blots upon a black background. Slowly the mist floor begins to be broken, a dark figure disturbs the sea of mist. A man slowly climbing to his feet off of the floor, his hooded cloak flickering slightly on the wind and his dark, long hair being thrown about slightly. His figure looking like a stranded victim of some shipreck unknown, cold and in need of rescure. Slowly he reaches up and rubs his eyes then slowly brushes some hair out of his eyes and surveys the landscape around him.

"Damn, I really hope that I'm not missing my Friday night just to be stranded out here in the mist for a while," said the man, his eyes deep and old yet he looked young, maybe in his 20's.

"I assure you Mr Xiloscient, i brought you out here for a reason. You are here to die!" said a cold voice, alerting the man of someone behind him.

"Wow, that's the first time I've heard someone threaten me politely. They usually just call me "Oi!" or Linden." Linden Xiloscient calmly said as he slowly turned around, his eyes flashing with blue light, to face a dark robed figure.

"Well you are in much more danger than your were in when others threatened you, i can assure you," said the dark figure, from a mouth unseen in the mists.

"And I can assure you that you seem to have underestimated here, I'm going to leave here alive you, on the other hand, have a very low survival rate." stated Linden, smiling slightly.

Then suddenly both the figure and Linden launched backwards a few feet, energy and light blazing from both the figures wand and Linden's hand. The figure muttered an incantation under his breath and suddenly a blast of black energy flew straight at Linden but Linden managed to see it coming, rolling to the side and launching a counter attack by firing a ball of blue energy at the figure, catching him off guard and knocking him to the ground.

"Voldemort's Death Eaters seem to be lacking in strength these days," laughed Linden as he floated up into the air, suspened by a spell.

"Or maybe I'm just not fighting at the best of my abilities!" hissed the Death Eater, trying to fake confidence while getting to his feet then suddenly he fired another blast from his wand at Linden knocking him back a few feet in the air but not overcoming him.

"Sly, but you're going to have to try better than that!" he said, laughing slightly, as he reared up, his eyes blazing with energy and then suddenly he threw out his arms and a huge blast of white light launched from his chest, striking the Death Eater almost instantly, and almost ripping his body to shreds.

"You.. won't.. succeed!" Stuttered the Death Eater with his last few breaths.

"And who'll stop me? Voldemort? Hah, I'll get to Harry Potter first whether he likes it or not!" he laughed, compltely cool and confident. Then with that he turned and was gone with a flash of blue light.

Slowly the mist returns to normal returning back to how it was before the recent fight. Calm returns and all is the same, waves upon waves of unchangeable mist unweathered by the time and passing events.

**

The dark room was silent other than the snores and shallow breaths of the people laying in the beds set orderly around the room. Dim rays of moonlight crept through the window illuminating a small square of wall with cold, ghostly white light. Then a figure in one of the beds stirred, his sleep suddenly disturbed by something unknown to anyone, even him.

Harry woke suddenly after feeling something, for once it wasn't his scar hurting, which was a strange tingling in the back of his head. He didn't know what it was, why he was feeling it or what it ment but he knew he was feeling it and it wasn't normal. It was as though someone was jabbing the surface of the back of his brain with needles.

"I'm sure you can't get pins and needles in your brain," he thought to himself, then shook his head but it didn't go away so he stood up. He knew he wasn't going to get any sleep tonight, not with that tingling going on. He decided that he might aswell go and sit in the common room for a while so through the door and down the steps yawning as he went. As he neared the bottom of the steps he noticed that the fires were still all burning in the common room.

"Strange, nobody could be up at this time but why else would the fires still be lit?" he muttered to himself, still half asleep. He got to the bottom of the staircase and looked around and saw a head of bushy hair laying on one of the tables. He slowly walked over to the table.

"Hermione?" he said, but she didn't answer so he presumed she was asleep. Gently he brushed her hair away from her face.

"Wow.. she actually looks cute sleeping. But that's about the only time she looks cute." he laughed to himself and then suddenly Hermione woke up.

"mmmf?.. Harry? is that you?" she mumbled, lifting her head and rubbing her eyes, clearly still on the border of sleep.

"Yep, it's me. I just came down to try and clear my head after I woke up," he replied.

"Your scar isn't hurting again is it?" She said, concern clearly present in her voice.

"No, no. It feels perfectly fine. But anyway, what are you doing down here this late?" he replied, half musing over what the feeling at the back of his head could mean.

"Um.. well I was reading this interesting book last night and I guess I just fell to sleep on it." she said slightly embarassed but relaxed when Harry just laughed and dismissed it as something anyone could do.

Harry sat down next to her and yawned then rubbed the back of his head.

"If your scar wasn't hurting what woke you then?" Hermione said, still not trusting that he really came down here just to clear his head.

"Well.. I guess it's this strange feeling.." he replied.

"What sort of feeling?" she asked, with still that same tone of concern, as she straightened her clothes and closed the book she'd fallen to sleep on.

"Sort of like... pins and needles.. but at the back of my head." He tried to explain, but somehow it fell short of the full feeling. It was something more than pins and needles. It was telling him about something. Of course he had no idea what it was telling him about.

"I think I might have heard something about that sort of thing." Hermione stated "It's part of telepathy I think. When someone is trying to tell you something then you get that tingling feeling. It's sort of like a phone ringing, you just need to know how to pick it up."

"Telepathy?.. who'd want to contact me?.. except.. Voldemort...." he thought. The thought of Voldemort caused his head to cloud with anger. He hated Voldemort for taking away so much. If only he was strong enough.. if only..

"So how would I pick up this ringing phone then?" he asked, managing to put aside his thoughts for a second.

"Well, for once, I don't actually know. We'll have to do some research about it. Well, in the meantime I'm going to go and get some sleep. I suggest you do the same," she said then stood up "Goodnight Harry" she smiled at him and slowly climbed the stairs to her dorm.

"Well that's shed a bit of light onto this.. whoever wants to contact me must be up to no good. I'm going to have to be cautious about this. Well, I guess that's this weekend's time spent then.." he thought to himself then sighed, he hated spending long time researching but it seemed that it was what he spent most of his years here at Hogwarts doing. He got to his feet and yawned then returned to bed too, his rest peaceful and undisturbed.

A/N - it feels strange writing again after such a long break.. I think I'm getting better again.. When I wrote the original version of this chapter (originally 2 chapters) I hated it and everything it stood for.. now I feel it's atleast a bit better.. well tell me what you think with a review, heh