The Half Blood Prince - Harry Potter Male Reader Insert

3: Changes In The Prison System

I'm afraid of sleep.

Because every time I close my eyes.

Every time I let myself go down into that place.

All I can see is their burnt faces.

Accusing me.

Cursing me.

Sometimes I can feel them clinging to me with their small, burnt bodies.

'Why did you let us die?' they say.

'Why did you do this to us?'

'We had our whole lives ahead of us.'

'You destroyed us.'

It's my fault.

I don't sleep anymore.

I don't think I've slept for weeks now. This must be the first time in a while.

Don't ask me how I'm still alive.

Must be an immortal thing.

No - that's not right, is it?

I can still die of natural causes after all.

What's keeping me alive then?

Does it all just boil down to magic?

Magic. What a disgusting word.

If only I'd never accepted Dumbledore’s Hogwarts letter.

If only I chose my family over my friends.

It's my fault they're gone.

It's my fault.

Hey - who's that?

He's much too old to be one of them...

He shouldn't be in my dream... this is a place only where my siblings come to repay me for robbing them of their lives....

I can see his stubble from here - he's obviously not a child like the rest of them.

Oh - I remember now.

He's that Death Eater who did it all.

The one Umbridge hired to set my home ablaze.

What is he doing here? He looks angry.

Oh.

I see.

He's come to repay me too.

Repay me for killing him.

* * *

Azkaban prison had seen the most change it ever had in three centuries.

Merely a few months ago, it had been a desolate, quiet and miserable place that housed no joy or happiness, only despair, fear and total, utter obedience.

It's residents, stripped of their basic rights as human beings, nevermind wizards, had endured the stench of Dementors for what felt like their whole lives. Trapped behind iron bars for so long they'd forgotten what it meant to be free. Sucked dry of their emotions for so long they'd forgotten what it meant to be happy.

Azkaban had never been a pleasant place.

And so when the Dementors left. When they were removed from the great Wizarding prison and replaced with Aurors and guards, it was the first bit of sheer release the prisoners had endured in years.