Soulscreamed

               Harry Potter looked at his sister, his little twin sister. Where Harry had always had messy black hair, Haven’s curls were normally neatly pulled back not, the scattered, wild disarray she currently sported. Under his bright green gaze, Haven’s grey eyes were wild and frightened, but so determined. He would never be able to convince her to go back for help.

               “Are you ready?” he asked instead.

               “As I’ll ever be,” she said before jumping down the trap door.

               They landed in a squishy tangle of vines with the smell of fresh dirt and fertilizer. To be honest, it smelled like greenhouse three. Haven froze, remember Neville’s excited talk about Devil’s Snare when he had spotted it in the greenhouse. Professor Sprout had just planted an off shoot, and Neville had talked about how this plant was deadly- a strangling carnivorous plant. Haven remembered though, that Neville said it tracked its prey based on movement. Once their prey stopped moving, the plant assumed it was dead and would drop it on the ground where the body would provide nutrition to it as it decomposed. But, the plant was also afraid of light and sunlight. It interfered with its senses and left the plant unable to detect the motion of its prey. Haven freezing had caused the plant to let her slip through the plant to the hard stone floor where the plant was held at bay by flaming torches.

               Harry had already called out to Hermione and Ron that the landing was soft, when Haven had disappeared. Ron and Hermione had groaned when they landed and began to struggle. Hermione, like Haven, froze when she recognized the plant and slipped down to join Haven.

               “Harry! Ron! Stop struggling! It’ll only kill you faster!” Hermione called out.

               Haven spun around with an appalled look, “Hermione! Not soothing!”

               “Oh yeah, kill me faster! That’s just what I wanted to hear!”

               “Harry stop moving! It’ll release you down here with us! Ron! Stop moving! When you do, you drop through the vines down to us! No plant down here!”

               Harry listened and slipped through the vines to land on the stone. Ron did not. He tried to twist and turn while calling out for help.

               Haven grabbed a torch from the wall with a wince, she really hated being this close to flames, and moved under Ron and lit the plant up. She passed the torch to Hermione and told Harry to help. She moved on to the next room.

               High ceilings with winged things flying over head and two brooms set hovering near the entrance. The brooms were old, likely school brooms, and probably could barely hold an adult. She skipped the brooms and moved over to the door on the far side of the wall. “Alohomora!” she tried to cast the unlocking charm. It failed, and she frowned.

               Harry, Ron, and Hermione made their way into the room. “The unlocking charm didn’t work! But there’s probably a key charmed to open it! We just need to find it!”

               Hermione rushed over to study the lock. “It’ll be an older key! Silver to match the lock.” Hermione looked closer, “it’ll have blue wings! I found a feather!”

               Harry looked up and spotted a key fluttering slowly, high above the other keys. “I’ll catch it. If you all wait by the door, I’ll toss the key to you and you can unlock the door.” The second Harry’s hand hit the broom, keys started to come down at him and peck him.

               Haven and Ron were away from the door, ready to catch the key whenever Harry dropped it. Harry tossed it to Ron and continued to lead the keys away from them while Ron unlocked the door. Harry sped through the door just before Ron slammed the door shut.

               An even bigger chamber awaited them. Dimly lit with large statues, and a lingering sense of dust, they walked in to what seemed like a graveyard. Ron gasped, “Merlin, it’s a chessboard. Look,” he pointed, “there’s the queen, the king, the knights… We have to play our way across!” He said after two swords blocked their path of walking through the pieces. “Hermione, you can take the rook’s spot, Harry, the bishop, and I’ll be a knight!”

               “Why on Earth must we take the place of these pieces? We could just play, could we not?” Haven asked. “I’m not playing as one of them. I can wait here until you’re done.”

               Ron nodded, clearly still attached to the idea of playing in chess. Haven rolled her eyes and stood back near the door. She did wince however, when they realized that it was wizard’s chess they were playing. Once the board was cleared, Haven moved Ron to the entrance near the door before joining Harry and Hermione near the next door. “His leg is broken but, he should recover. Not sure if he got hit in the head or not, so one of us should stay with him, keep him awake, just in case it’s a concussion.”

               Hermione rolled her eyes and said, “just because I’m the daughter of dentists, doesn’t mean I’m a medical professional. But, I probably know the most about it. But, it should be you two who go. Voldemort and Snape have targeted you, not Ron, not me. I’ll stay with Ron and try to go get help.”

               Harry and Haven nodded and watched as Hermione levitated Ron through the door back. “You with me?”

               “Potters against the world,” solemnly, Haven opened the door. She gagged on the stench. Harry grabbed her hand and they ran passed the dead troll to the next door.

               Both were green as they entered another room. This room had a long table with several bottles of various sizes lining it. A piece of parchment was sat in the middle. They took a step forward only to feel a roaring heat behind them and large flames sealed the entrance. Black flames were blocking a second entrance.

               Haven jumped towards the table and snatched the parchment. Haven began to read allowed:

Danger lies before you, while safety lies behind.
Two of us will help you, whichever you would find,
One among us seven will let you move ahead,
Another will transport the drinker back instead,
Two among our number hold only nettle wine
Three of us are killers, waiting hidden in line.
Choose, unless you wish to stay here evermore,
To help you in your choice, we give you these clue four:
First however slyly the poison tries to hide
You will always find some on nettle wine’s left side;
Second, different are those who stand at either end,
But if you would move onwards neither is your friend;
Third, as you see clearly, all are different sizes,
Neither dwarf nor giant holds death in their insides;
Fourth, the second left and second on the right
Are twins once you taste them, though different at first sight."

She pushed the two wines back- the second from the left and right. Then the bottle directly left of those two back. She pushed the one on the right forward and said, “this one would take us back to Hermione and Ron.” She had two bottles left, one poison, one the potion to let them move on. She had the smallest one held in her hand, with maybe two small sips. “But this one takes us to the next chamber. There’s enough for both of us if we have a sip each.”

               “And rush through the flames?” Harry asked.

               “Of course. We’ll sip right in front of the flames- no need to risk it.” Haven looked at the dark flames with apprehension. She did not like fire in general, something about it made her skin crawl and everything in her told her to run. But these flames felt worse. They were oily and made her skin feel tacky.

               Haven looked at her brother and at the bottle in her hand. She frowned as she thought about giving him the bottle first, but she knew he would drink both sips and leave her here. She thought about doing the same, before she raised the vial to her lips and took only the one sip. She handed the vial to Harry. She felt a comforting coolness wash over her, saw Harry shiver as the same happened to him, before they both walked into the flames.

               It wasn’t Snape in front of a large ornate mirror. It was Quirrell. He had his purple turban on but, he was lacking his normal garlic smell. Unfortunately, he smelled like death. Haven sneered quietly, “I think he smelled better with all the garlic.”

               Harry snorted, which drew Quirrell’s attention. Haven and Harry were bound quickly and sent slamming into a wall. Haven groaned from the impact of her head into the wall.

               “But, it was Snape! Why are you here?” Harry sputtered out.

               “Severus? Oh, he does seem the type, doesn’t he? He was ever so useful, swooping around like an overgrown bat. Next to him, who would ever suspect p-p-poor st-stuttering Professor Quirrell?”

               Harry, still shocked that it was Quirrell and not Snape, “But, that day, during the Quidditch match, Snape tried to curse me off my broom!”

               “No, dear boy. I tried to kill you! And trust me, if Snape’s cloak hadn’t caught fire and broken my eye contact, I would have succeeded! Even with Snape muttering his little counter-curse.”

               Harry, still confused and in disbelief that the dungeon bat would have tried to save him, intelligently said, “Snape was trying to… save me?”

               “I knew you were a danger right from the off. Especially after Halloween. You and your sister were menaces. Always interfering. I cursed your broom. I let the troll in.”

               Harry, still not quite caught up, “but Snape, he threatened you?”

               “Snape wasn’t fooled by the troll. While everyone else was running to the dingeon, he went to the third floor to head me off. He, of course, never trusted me again. He rarely left me alone.” He spun back to the mirror. Harry flinched in pain as his head lit up in a burning radiating pain from his scar. “But he doesn’t understand. I’m never alone. Never. Now… what does this mirror do. I see myself holding the stone but…” He promptly spelled gags into their mouths and went back to pacing in front of the mirror.

               Haven and Harry both stared at him pacing in front of the massive mirror. And then they stared at the mirror. It hit Harry first. That this was the Mirror of Erised. His eyes widened a little at the sight of the mirror that Dumbledore told him had been hidden away. He remembered seeing his parents standing behind him, and his grandparents and a massive family. There was a man who he assumed was his uncle, because he looked identical to James.

               Haven took a minute to recognize the mirror. When she did her eyes filled with her surrounded by family and friends in a home that no one could take away from her. She had grandparents, parents, a bunch of siblings, and friends. She swore she could feel someone cuddling up to her.

               But they couldn’t stay focused on what they had seen in the mirror. Quirrell was mumbling and pacing- “the stone. It’s in the mirror. But I can’t get it out. Master, how do I get it?”- but then they heard it. A quiet voice hissed replied in a voice totally different from Quirrell. “Use the boy.”

               Quirrell summoned Harry over to the mirror, dragging him roughly across the floor. He released the ropes with a flick of his wand. “What do you see? Tell me!”

               Harry stood silently in front of the mirror. His mum held a finger to her lips while James slipped a red stone into his pocket with a wink. A sudden weight in his pocket made him flinch back.

               “Tell me! What do you see!”

               Harry knew he couldn’t tell the truth. “I-I’m shaking hands with Dumbledore. I’ve won the house cup.”

               “He lies.” the same voice hissed.

               “Tell the truth! What do you see!” Quirrell shouted at Harry.

               “Let me speak to him,” the voice hissed again.

               “Master, you are not strong enough.”

               “I have strength enough for this.”

               Quirrell grimaced as he unwrapped his turban and turned away from Harry. A face was unveiled. A face with slits for a nose, red eyes, and the thinnest invisible lips was slightly protruding from Quirrell’s skull.

               “Harry Potter. We meet again,” the previously disembodied voice that had been hissing had been found.

               “Voldemort,” Harry grimaced.

               “Yes. You see what I have become? See what I must do to survive? Live off another. A mere parasite. Unicorn blood can sustain me, but it cannot give me a body of my own. But there is something that can. Something, that conveniently enough, lies in your pocket!”

               Harry turns and books it only to be stopped by flames erupting from around the room. Haven yelped as the ropes holding her hands caught fire, burning her with it. She put it out and ran to Harry with her wand out.

               Quirrell sneered. Voldemort called out to the stuck kids, “don’t be a fool! Why die a horrific death when you can join me and live?”

               “Never,” the twins called out.

               “Bravery,” Voldemort spat out. “Your parents had it too.” He sounded like they had a disease. “Tell me, Harry, Haven, would you like to see your mother and father again. Together, we can bring them back.” Their faces appeared behind him. “All I ask for is something in return.” Harry lifts the stone out of his pocket, his face filled with longing. “That’s it, Harry. There is no good and evil. There is only power, and those too weak to seek it. Together, we’ll do extraordinary things. Just give me the stone!”

               Haven knocks his hand down. “You liar! You can’t bring people back from the dead!”

               “Crucio!” Voldemort raised Quirrell’s wand.

               Haven screamed and screamed. Every nerve was on fire and burning. Haven felt like she was dying. Her brain felt like it was melting and something inside of her was breaking.

               Voldemort stopped after a moment, “give me the stone!”

               Harry looked at Haven who was exhausted but she shook her head. Voldemort cast the torture curse again and something snapped.

               Harry charged Voldemort while he was relishing in his sister’s screams. He launched himself at Quirrell, intent on nothing but, getting him away from Haven. His hand made contact with Quirrell’s throat and something started to burn under him. Quirrell died as Harry burned a hole in his throat.

               Haven, on the other hand, was in agony as wings forced their way out of her back. Claws replaced her fingernails and scales forced their way through her skin. Her wings had a slimy film, but they were a soft peach color with blue and silver swirls. The tops were tipped in soft cream. But the biggest change was her skin. It was blue! An icy pale blue that made her look frozen.

               Harry fell off Quirrell as he fell down. And then he scrambled over to Haven, as Quirrell’s body started spasming.

               “You won’t be rid of me that easily, Harry Potter!” Voldemort forced Quirrell to get up and walk backwards to the Potters.

               Harry split from Haven who was collapsed on the ground still. He was hit with the torture curse while Quirrell awkwardly approached. While Haven had been hit twice, it only took one rage filled casting to cause something in Harry to snap.

               Harry didn’t even notice when the curse had stopped. Peach wings with cream and blue specks with a dusting of silvery gray feathers forced their way through his back. Scales erupted near his eyes and down his arms. Claws forced their way through his fingernail beds. But Quirrell was still coming.

               Harry opened his mouth and screamed. He was so sure he was going to die but he wanted to live. Haven opened her mouth a second later and screamed. Both were screaming from their soul- a call to arms, a call to defend them, a call for help, and a desperate call begging to live.

               A full thirty seconds of scream later, Quirrell was on top of them. “Quirrell can no longer sustain me. But, dragel blood will let me survive!” His hand wrapped around Haven’s throat and his teeth were in Harry’s shoulder.