231 ~*~*~*~* Chapter Fifty-One: The Choir Invisible Harry heard the screaming in his dreams. He opened his eyes slowly at first, certain he would find himself in another vision of Voldemort torturing someone. He wondered grimly how bad the vision must have been to have broken through his Occlumency barrier—or if Voldemort had managed to find some way through the grass that sealed off their link, just to show him these special visions of pain. But, to his surprise, though he found himself standing in a dark, misty environment he knew must be a dream, he didn’t see Voldemort anywhere. He felt slick grass beneath his feet, and, a moment later, noticed the thick lash of rain that must have been falling all the time. He tilted his head up, blinking, and brushed his fringe back from his face when it tried to cling. He made out a huge shape arcing overhead, but it refused to resolve into anything he knew—a dragon, for example, or a hippogriff. It turned in circles, maddeningly elusive, and screamed, and screamed, and screamed. The screaming began to prick up and down Harry’s spine. He could feel his magic responding to it, which was not something he would have expected. He swallowed and crossed his arms over his stomach defensively, readying a shield in case the creature should swoop down and try to rend him open. He had no idea why he was viewing this scene as yet, and no idea what shields he might be able to conjure—or what damage he might be able to take—in this dream state. The screaming grew louder and louder, and abruptly died away, like a crack of thunder that had reached the limit of its roll. Harry squinted determinedly upward, wondering if he could see the creature now. He made out what he thought was a spiked tail, swaying lazily above a taloned paw. Then the paw came down in his direction, powered by a leg like a crushing pillar. Harry dropped to the ground and rolled out of the way; there was no point in trying to keep his feet on unknown terrain, made worse to balance on by the rainwater. The leg made the ground shake hard enough as it came down to throw him a few feet in the air. Harry tucked his arms around his head as he landed, and probably saved his glasses from being broken. He scrambled into a kneel, and stared at the thing as it turned its head towards him. It was still unformed, or seemed so, in the rushing rain, but he thought he could make out glinting eyes and teeth. There was a familiarity about the creature, but the only thing Harry could really compare it to was a dragon, and he knew of no dragons who sounded like they were screaming. Dragons sang, in Acies’s terms, and roared, in everyone else’s. And he really should have recognized a dragon’s shape, after such close acquaintance with them during the Triwizard Tournament. He tried to calm down, and to make his voice calm when he spoke. “What is your name? What is your kindred? Do you need help? I am vates, and I think that I might be able to—“ The creature screamed at him, its breath deep and rotten with various horrid smells. Harry choked, and went with the blast of sound that bore him further into the dark place, wherever they were—it felt flat and grassy, at least. He wouldn’t question the dragon, the thing, if it didn’t want to be questioned. He hit something, probably a boulder, and this time came up with a shield sparking around him. The creature snaked a long neck towards him, bending at odd angles. It paused when it saw the shield, and Harry saw something in the hovering golden eyes—he still couldn’t see the face that supposedly encased them—which might have been doubt. Harry switched to Parseltongue, concentrating on the snakelike curves of the neck. If it was a serpent of some kind, then of course it wouldn’t have understood English and his offer to be vates to it. “Are you hurt? Do you need help? What are you? Why have you brought me here?” The creature held absolutely still. Harry waited, holding his breath until he couldn’t do it any longer and let it out with a whoosh. As if that were the signal it’d been waiting for, the creature lashed out, smashing him in the side with its heavily muscled neck. Harry felt himself fly over the obstruction at his back and land in another grassy path. He gasped in pain, and then again when his hand flew out to catch him too late and he hit his face in the mud. 232 He sat up, swiping at his mud-covered glasses, until he realized it was useless and he had to pull them off. The creature was right in front of him when he could see again, its mouth open to reveal teeth longer than his arms. Harry concentrated desperately on trying to wake up. The creature drew in its breath and screamed, even as the dream shattered. ******* The scream pursued Harry into waking light, provided by Fawkes, who sat near his head on the pillow and chirped in concern. It took Harry a long moment to realize that, rather than the creature screaming into his ear, he was hearing thunder. He shuddered and turned to face the phoenix, stroking his feathers and breathing harshly. Wait. He felt pain when he inhaled and exhaled, not just the terror of the dream. Harry pulled up his pyjama shirt and moved to the side, so that he could see his own ribs in Fawkes’s light. He grimaced when he saw bruises, already turning purple and green like night- blooming flowers. He listened critically to his own breath and felt his own pain, then shook his head. No, he was fairly sure that he didn’t have any broken ribs. He’d felt that when Quirrell cursed him with Crucio in his and Connor’s first year, and this pain wasn’t as sharp. “What the fuck,” he murmured, for lack of anything better to say. He sat where he was for a time, rubbing Fawkes’s head absently, shifting so that his movements wouldn’t disturb Argutus, who lay curled up beside him with his head on his tail. He searched his mind for references to a creature who could do this, and came up with nothing. There were, Merlin knew, dangerous and wonderful fantastic beasts in the world, especially ones that Harry didn’t know much about, but he had not heard even a rumor of one like this. And it had seemed to have a personal enmity against him, as though he had done something that hurt it. That screaming— He was still hearing the screaming. Or something like it. Harry closed his eyes, concentrating. The screaming faded as he listened, though, faded into the thunder that shook the castle. The thunder. Harry felt his eyes flare open. The creature was connected to the storms. It had to be. It had been raining in the dream, hadn’t it? And the screaming had faded into the thunder when he woke. Perhaps this was Voldemort’s plan, to conjure a beast to hunt him in his dreams. It seemed indirect and wasteful, but then, Voldemort had never made sensible plans. There was only one way Harry really knew of to get answers. He would have to go outside, which he hadn’t been since the storms started, and try to sense what magic might be stalking him. He slid across the bed, wincing as twinges from his ribs announced themselves, and made it to his curtains without trouble. When he opened them, though, he jumped. Draco stood there, his eyebrows raised. “And you were going where?” he asked. “Just outside,” Harry said, flushing and not understanding why. It wasn’t like he had been doing anything dangerous, after all. The beast that had come stalking him in his dreams wasn’t his fault. “I think I might have a clue to the magic powering the storms, whatever Voldemort is going to do on Midwinter that’s stirring the weather up so much. But I haven’t been close enough to the rain and the lightning to see if there really is magic behind it. I should recognize his magic, if it’s there.” And that would explain why my magic in the dream responded, too. I am his magical heir, and it might have sensed the familiarity of his power. “So I’m going outside to see what I can feel.” “Alone?” 233 Harry gave him an annoyed glance. “Well, yes. It’s just a walk on the grounds, Draco, and I thought you were asleep.” “You woke me up with your little groans and complaints,” said Draco. Harry was glad that he’d dropped his pyjama top in time to hide the bruises. “And there’s no such thing as a little walk on the grounds with you, Harry. You’ll find a mad murderer lurking with a knife under the Whomping Willow, or one of Hagrid’s pets escaped and trying to find a way to get into the castle. I’m coming with you.” He turned to fetch one of his cloaks, presumably, from his trunk. “Draco,” Harry whined, and knew he was whining. But it was bad enough that his own sleep was disturbed and he had suspicions of Voldemort’s magic riding the storms.