A Briar Amongst the Lillies

The Maze and The Portkey

A week later and all of the other two schools are still talking about his being a parselmouth.
Two things came with the new wave of bs, one is that his little admirers numbers diminished.
The second was that more than a few people from Hogwarts started throwing hexes at him in the halls.
Suffice to say that those people were in the hospital wing for awhile afterwards because of something called self defense.
Briar had been unfortunate enough to be right next to Viktor when they had decided to open the eggs, one was bad but they had opened both of them at once.
The medi witch wasn't to happy about having more work on top of the idiots who had tried attacking Briar that morning while he was in a bad mood.
Briar tried to look up screeching magical creatures in the hogwarts library and when he had come across mermaids his hair gained a flash of white.
His emotions to many and to complicated as he started planning for the possibility prior to noticing his hair and trying to calm himself down.
Briar couldn't tell if anyone had seen the clear sign that he is a metamorphmagus or not but he decided to ignore what anxiety was trying to creep up his spine.
He had listened to the egg sing its ominous tune underwater and found his anxieties returning with a vengeance because they were taking people.
He had no idea who they would take to stand in as his treasure and that only increased his worries.
The only thing he wasn't worried about was how he was going to reach the hostages, Briar was planning to just give himself gills.
When the second task arrived, they all gathered on a structure in the middle of the black lake so the schools could stare at the scenery while the champions froze their asses off down under the lake.
Thirty minutes in, Briar sees Fluer swimming back to the surface at a hurried pace.
'Shit.' Briar follows a mermaid he had spotted in the seaweed and found where they were keeping the hostages.
He waited for Viktor and Cedric to get there before he grabbed both Gabriel and some red head girl in Gryffindor robes.
Once he broke the surface of the water, he got rid of his gills and Viktor threw a towel around his shoulder.
Fluer kissed him on the cheek and her little sister hugged him.
Briar had passed the red head off to a set of twins who thanked him for saving their sibling.
Two weeks later the yule ball was announced, Briar was going to skip out and place himself in the medi ward the night of the ball.
But Viktor in all his shy antisocialness, had asked Briar to play wingman.
Briar reluctantly agreed to help his friend as moral support and started his search for a date.
After no less than ten people had asked him to be their date, he was seriously thinking of just going with a golem of his own creation.
A few days before the ball Fluer cornered him and asked if he would escort her sister to the ball as it would solve his having to find a partner and she would have help watching Gabrielle.
Briar barely had to think on the matter before agreeing to Fleur's request.
Briar had more fun than he'd expected at the ball, Gabrielle was a good dance partner and he got Viktor to actually talk to the Granger girl.
Over all it was nice to destress and mingle with the others but he couldn't help the itch telling him that something was going to happen soon.
After the ball Briar hung out with the Delacour sisters more, his motive was to build a friendship with them that's all.
And so the last task came and all of the champions waited while Dumbledore gave a speech.
They were released into the maze one at a time and what was probably two hours later, Briar saw red sparks fly into the air.
He was getting restless and that itch was back, screaming at him that their was something waiting for him.
Briar picked up his pace and found Cedric Digory face up, being pulled under the maze wall by thorny vines.
He sent up sparks and the maze started collapsing in on itself, Briar running as fast as he could as to not be the maze's next victim.
Ten minutes of what felt like eternity to him, found Briar in front of the Triwizard cup but the itch as he'd been calling it, had become almost painful now.
He grabs ahold of the cup's handle and feels himself get pulled forcibly through the void, landing roughly against a stone slab.
When he gets his bearings, he takes note that he is now in a graveyard.
His false wand lays broken beside him "Great, now I have to make another one. This just isn't my day."
Suddenly he finds himself at wand point, a warty hand with unkept nails weilding said wand in an unfortunate stance.
The body language of the man in front of him screamed coward but knowing the man thought him to be defenseless, he easily disarms him.
Quite literally, with an evil grin "Hmm, I haven't been able to play like this in some time. Are you going to make this fun for me or should I call your life forfeit for threatening mine?"
Briar twirls the wand the other had wielded moments again between his fingers, acting thoughtful.
"P-p-please, my m-master he requires y-your blood to c-complete the ritual!"
Briar glances toward the bundle laying on the ground and a buzz runs over his skin causing the hairs on his neck to stand on end "Is that your master?
The cowardly man nods his head frantically "Please, H-hee must be r-reborn!"
Briar picks up the bundle and looks down at it, only to make eye contact with the emaciated looking owner of two huge ruby red eyes.
"Potter" The creature husks "finish the ritual." Briar shrugs "Alright. Hey, you. Walk me through what you were doing here." He points at the cauldron.
The cowardly man from before then continues the ritual but Briar willingly supplies the blood needed instead of following the cowards original plan.
Briar steps back as the cauldron begins to dissolve into smoke, a man rising in its place.
"Robe me!" The coward hurries to do as ordered while Briar observes.
"You look good for someone who just came back from limbo." The man Briar figured to be Voldemort spun around to meet his gaze.
"Why thank you, I wasn't really thinking of vanity when I created this particular ritual." Voldemort smiles in an almost predatory fashion.
"Would you mind giving me my wand Harry?" Voldemort asks nicely.
Briar raises an eyebrow "You get the wand after we talk, not before. I'd like to straighten some things out before you try to kill me again as is everyone's goal nowadays."
Voldemort frowns, narrowing his eyes "Fine. Wormtail, you are dismissed."
The coward apparently grew some stones in the last fifteen minutes cause he stayed on the floor groveling.
"But master, you promised." Wormtail holds up the stub where Briar had cut off his arm.
Voldemort growls at the coward, turning towards Briar and waving a hand toward the groveling man in a similar sign to
do you see what I must deal with?
Briar sighs and waves his free hand, creating a flexible, golden arm where the other one used to be.
Wormtail stands from the ground and thanks his lord, completely ignoring that it was the supposed light savior who had fixed his arm.
"Be gone Wormtail!" Voldemort reiterates his prior order and the man scampers away.
Briar steps foward, catching Voldemort's attention "Before we begin, I would like to introduce myself. I was once Harry Potter but now I go by Briar Foxtail, it is nice to finally meet you lord Voldemort."
He bows slightly to show some respect to the older, more experienced wizard.
The dark lord watches him with a calculating expression "Yes, lovely to meet you. What is it that you wanted to speak with me about?"
Briar rises from his bow, an unreadable gleam in his eyes "I want to call a truce between the two of us, nothing fancy just a simple vow to not try and kill each other."
Voldemort looks contemplative "How would I benefit from this?"
Briar's air of seriousness lightens "I don't want any part in this war. So the vow would just make it where we couldn't follow whatever plans that shady headmaster has in mind."
Briar holds Voldemort's wand out to him.