Authors note:
Thank you all so much for reading my story- I plan on going back and editing the chapters in a couple weeks so some chapters earlier are a little easier to read. This chapter is one I'm sure you've been waiting for for quite a while- I know I sure have-. Also pls don't kill me :)
WARNING: mild to bad torture. Couple innuendos. Gore
Disclaimer: this is fiction. None of what I write is real. Sorry to burst your bubble. And you know what's also fiction? The money I'm earning with this. That is to say, it's nonexistent.
Enjoy!
Harry scratched his chin, looking at the riddle presented to him in the scroll. He was in the last room, and the only challenge left was for him to solve Snape's riddle. Then, he could finally confront Quirrell in the main room at the end of all the challenge rooms.
He focused back on the parchment with the riddle. So, the two big bottles must be the nettle wine... that meant the smaller black bottle was the poison. That left him with the tall bottle with the silvery fluid. It looked vaguely like unicorn blood, Harry though as he uncorked it. With a hint of apprehension, he poured the contents down his throat.
He shivered. The liquid tasted like how he imagined quicksilver or liquid mercury would taste: almost like the smell of dried blood with a hint of sterile hospital equipment. It felt like it coated the inside of his throat with some kind of silver film as it sunk down into the pit of his stomach.
He cleared his throat. Behind him, he heard more than he saw his clone slowly catching up with him. He nodded. The thing would have crashed through all the wards so far, alerting Dumbledore in the process, so Harry himself could have some valuable minutes alone with Quirrell. He would just rig the wards to think that when the clone had burned in the fire, Harry had gone through them.
Laying down some wards to cause exactly that, Harry slipped through the fire.
Inside the main chamber, he saw Quirrell study the mirror, just like last time. Quirrell looked his way.
'Ah, Hadrian. Or should I say, Elias. How quaint of you to join me.' He smiled. 'This will only make it easier for me, you understand right? I will grab the stone and tie you up nice and tight, and you will both be a lovely little present to my Lord.'
Elias shrugged. 'Usually when there's tying up involved I'm the one tying up the other person, but I'm sure we could work something out.'
Quirrell stiffened and turned to Harry to glare at him. 'Sure, Potter. Keep that smart mouth on you. I assure you you'll be singing a different tune when I'm done with you.'
Harry swallowed but maintained the cocky smirk plastered on his face. 'Oh I really think it's going to be the other way around, my dear "professor". You're going to be begging, begging me to stop when I'm halfway through with you.'
Quirrell frowned and checked the time with a lazy tempus. Harry chanced a quick glance as well, and determined that he had about twenty, maybe twenty-five minutes left.
'Well...' he said softly, 'no time like the present, am I right?'
At Quirrell's mildly apprehensive nod, he grabbed his trusty Holly wand from its holster. If all went well, this would be his last time using it for Harry, ever.
'Displodere!' Quirrell yelled. Whilst Harry had been thinking about his wand, Quirrell had taken the moment's hesitation to deal out the first blow.
Harry ducked. 'Sectumsempra! Diffinido!'
Quirrell put up a shield charm barely on time and fired back: 'confringo!'
'Expulso!'
'Reducto!'
'Bombarda! Bombarda maxima! Crucio!' Harry cast, finally getting a hit on Quirrell.
Quirrell fell to his knees and grunted. 'You goddamned little nuisance!' He yelled at Harry as the pain flowed through him like burning oil.
The boy in question held the curse steady. 'Yeah...' he said with a sick smirk on his face, 'that hurts, doesn't it?'
With a yell, Quirrell managed to send a petrificus totalus towards Harry, forcing him to drop the Crucio.
With a muffled curse, Harry blocked the petrificus totalus. It was immediately followed by a Cruevo and a Tongue-Tying curse, forcing Harry on the more defensive side.
'Circe,' the boy cursed, 'confundo! Finestra!'
None of his spells hit mark, and even worse, he got a cutting spell straight to the ankle. Glancing down, he spotted it spurting blood. Fantastic. He'd nicked an artery.
Diving behind a pillar, Harry assessed how much blood he'd lost so far. He frowned. Maybe a quarter liter by now.
That was fine. He'd be ok. He didn't have much time left though until Quirrell'd be able to hit him again, so carefully his pointed his wand at the wound.
'Episkey. Ferula.' He cast softly. As an afterthought he added a numbing charm too.
That was all the time he had until the next curse was heading his way. He clumsily blocked it with a 'protego'.
He coughed. This was not as easy a fight as he had intended it to be.
'Ah!' He grunted as a bombarda hit him square in the chest, smacking him into another pillar.
He heard Quirrell mumble a dark levitation charm. 'Oh no...' he whispered.
'Yeah that's right.' His teacher said gleefully. 'A little difficult now, isn't it Potter?'
The spell hit him straight in the chest. Harry couldn't hold in a scream. The spell was made to feel like there were hooks in your muscles holding you up in the air. It was... excruciating. Honestly the only reason it wasn't an Unforgivable Curse was because it wasn't very well known- like so many other torture spells.
Harry thrashed in the air, held pinned tight. 'Let me go and fight with honor, Quirrell.' He said spitefully.
'Oh no,' Quirrell said with a mock-despairingly look on his face. 'I don't think so Potter. We're going to have a lovely time together, just the two of us.'
'I don't think so,' Harry gritted out after a moments thought, as he forced a blast of magic to expel from his body, destroying the Mirror in the process and thereby any access to the Stone.
Quirrell swerved around to look at it. Furiously, he turned back. 'Now look what you've done, Potter! That stone was for the Dark Lord! You really think he's going to simply let that slide?'
'He doesn't have to know about that,' Harry said whilst slowly trying to undo Quirrell's curse. 'If you were to just disappear from the globe, like I'm planning on doing, he'll never know.'
Quirrell glared at Harry. 'Are you trying to let me stray off my path? I am a devout follower, you cockroach! You'd never understand the love I have for my Master! I'd never flee from his reign like that.'
Harry shrugged for so far that was possible underneath the bindings and winced. 'I'd say better fleeing than dead, but I suppose I don't see your side very clearly.'
'No, Quirrell said, 'no you don't. But you'll not live long enough to think differently.'
Harry blinked and frowned, not exactly able to completely focus through the pain. 'I thought we were going to Voldemort?'
Quirrell smirked. 'Well, change of plans. You are going to die, little Potter. Right here, right now.'
Harry swallowed as he repressed a scream as the levitation curse definitely ripped some muscle in his back. 'Are you sure that's what you want to do? I mean I'm sure we could work something out...'
'No, no, no.' Quirrell said with a weird little smile playing on his lips, 'we're going to do this right now.'
With a smack, Harry was released from his bonds and fell to the floor. He groaned. The dark levitation curse was known for being painful, but as a Harry had never really been under it before, he had slightly miscalculated just how much it hurt.
'Come in then,' Quirrell said, sending a stinging hex to Harry's arm, 'up you get. We're going to have a nice little duel here, and you are going to go down in all your glory, standing off against your better.'
Harry glanced around. 'Who's that? I don't see anyone I consider above me in any way here.'
Quirrell snorted. 'Yeah, keep up the false bravado, boy. Come on. Stand up.'
Harry glared at Quirrell but stood, albeit it on unsteady legs. He wiped some blood away from his nose, that had started to bleed when he was hoisted up against the pillar, and grabbed ahold of his wand in a slightly better grip.
'Avada Kedavra!' He yelled.
Quirrell stepped out of the way from the spell. 'Come on, Hadrian, that all you got? I barely even had to move!'
Harry pursed his lips. 'Avada Kedavra.'
His aim was off. His professor didn't even have to move to get out of the way of that one. Quirrell laughed.
Swallowing past the lump in his throat, Harry let out an unsteady breath. 'Avada Kedavra! Avada. Kedavra. AVADA KEDAVRA!'
Shaking his head mockingly, Quirrell didn't even attempt to fire anything back. 'And this is all the "powerful, invincible" Elias Riddle has to offer me? Please.'
He calmly took his wand and showed it to Harry. The boy in question leaned his head back and squeezed his eyes shut in an attempt to vend off his nausea.
'Tut, tut Harry,' Quirrell said. 'Eyes here.'
Elias opened his eyes. 'My name, he said through clenched teeth, 'is Hadrian, Quirrell.'
'Harry, Harry, Harry,' Quirrell singsonged. 'Come on. Take a close look here...'
Again, he showed Elias his wand and slowly pointed it at Elias' leg. Elias felt like he was paralyzed. Quirrell smiled a malicious, ugly smile.
'Smile at the birdie, Harry. Sectumsempra.'
'Aarg!'
Elias let out a throaty scream. His spine curved and he saw blood flowing down his leg. He sunk back down onto the ground. The muscles in his leg were trembling. With the hand that didn't hold his wand he slowly edged towards the wound. He attempted to put pressure on the cut, but it seemed futile. Blood was running through his fingers and pooling on the floor beneath him. It was so much blood. Too much.
He looked up at Quirrell. The man was closely following Elias' movements. Elias gave him a tired, but toothy grimace.
'What.' Quirrell asked flatly.
'Avada Kedavra.' Elias said softly, his voice trembling with hope.
As the spell flew through the air time seemed to slow. Elias was staring at Quirrell desperately, hoping for the man not to move. Quirrell saw the spell coming, the destructive energy crackling in the air. Suddenly time seemed to speed up again. Like it was going faster than that it actually goes.
Quirrell swerved desperately. 'Accio!' He yelled. Barely on time a large piece of glass sailed in between him and the deathly spell.
On impact, small glass particles flew all around. Quirrell was hit right in the face by a large swarm. He moaned in pain, eyes closed. Fumbling a bit, he pointed his wand at his face.
'Evanesco. Episkey.'
With those spells his face was all but restored to how it previously looked. He wiped off some blood with his sleeve and looked back at Elias.
'Nice try, Harry.' He coughed a bit of blood into his hand. 'Too bad that you're the one bleeding out on the floor right now, and I'm the one bringing dead you to my master in a second.'
Elias' lips trembled, his hope gone. 'MY NAME IS HADRIAN! PLEASE! DON'T DO THIS TO ME!'
Quirrell shook his head. 'No, no, Harry. Harry is the name your parents chose for you, and the name by which I'll call you. Though I suppose that doesn't matter anymore, does it? You're dead meat as it is.'
'No.' Elias shook his head. 'No, no, no. My name is Hadrian. I'm not dying.'
Quirrell came closer. He reached out to Elias' cheek with one bloody hand and stroked it carefully. 'But you are, Harry. You're dying already. Can you feel it coming closer? Death?'
Elias closed his eyes and tried to move his head away from Quirrell's hand. It was surprisingly difficult. Quirrell must be holding on tight.
'No. I'm not dying. Not again.' A single tear rolled down his cheek.
Quirrell sighed. 'This is getting tiring. Sometimes it's better to just roll over and accept it, Harry.'
Elias clenched his jaw and lolled his head back to get a look at Quirrell.
His voice was tinged with desperation and yet fierce determination. 'If I'm going down-' he coughed and turned a bit to spit out blood onto the floor next to him- 'then at least you're going down with me.'
Quirrell raised an eyebrow. 'And how are you going to do that, little Harry?'
Elias fumbled with his robes, his wand discarded on the ground next to him. It was a little difficult, as Quirrell was almost on top of him.
'Like so.' He whispered as he finally found what he was looking for.
A small dagger in his hand, he slammed his arm upwards to Quirrell's abdomen and, once the dagger was up to the hilt in Quirrell's intestines, pulled upwards into his chest.
A small chocking sound came from high in Quirrell's chest. Surprised, he stared down at Elias. Elias brought Quirrell's head closer to his ear.
'My name,' he whispered, 'is Hadrian. Or Elias. But never, never Harry. Not since I came back.'
Another tear rolled down his cheek. 'Never.'
From the potion riddle room, he heard some noises. Elias smiled softly. Just on time.
He closed his eyes.
I'd like to repeat that this is fiction. Please don't show up to my house and murder me. Comments are welcome though :)
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