66 Harry Potter : Chapter 65: The Rule of the Hunt I

Admittedly, my first thought when I processed what I was seeing, was something like 'Fuck Yeah!'.

In a single instant, the unthinkable had happened, and Tom was dying.

The boy because of whom I had almost turned grey with worry, was the only element in my life that I was unsure about. He represented that one conundrum that I seemed unable to solve: I knew the pros and the cons of either having him live or having him die.

Time and time again, I went over them as logically as I could despite my personal preference for 'letting' him live, exploiting the benefits of his existence in a way that would change my life and the world for the better despite whatever damage he'd ever grow up to cause.

The Diadem had exposed my own ruthlessness several times: that contraption had hammered again and again the point that the option of 'killing' Tom was only fueled by my fear.

Fear of feeling guilty over the crimes he'd commit, fear of being unable to oppose him if the time came, and most worringly, fear of being irrelevant. Maybe it was a stupid reason to act as I did, but... I just couldn't help it.

That fear of irrelevance was that which pushed me towards dreaming what should have been impossible back at Ollivander's.

That fear had basically fueled my conscious choice of raging against the odds since day one, to push and dig and thunder and scream as I tried to reshape the world to something that pleased me.

With the Hydra dead, and Minerva already running forward towards Riddle, who was truly helpless for the first time since I knew him, I was left, for a handful of incredibly long seconds, completely reeling: it could end here.

Zero effort on my part, or a token of it to fool Minerva, and I'd be done. I'd be free to just live my life, to leave Dumbledore to take care of everything, and... What then?

Tom hadn't even tried to make it look like he saved me for the sake of it: I knew that he had already thought of leveraging my life to better his own.

That was just how he operated: everything in the world was there on a scale of how much useful it could be to him, and on that basis he took decisions. I knew that in my place, he'd be as calculating as I was.

From over the shoulder of Minerva, who had already set his arm in a straight, conjured cast, Riddle's eyes met mine, and I felt incredibly cheated.

I stepped forward while my mind took a completely different direction, my focus already on the consequences and possible gains of the decision I had made.

And even as I felt myself slipping a bit more into the megalomania that never stopped growing under the surface, I couldn't help bu think it: If he dies, it will be because he needs to. 

And since I was going to be potentially directly responsible for any disaster he commited, I knew that if he'd had to die, it'd be by my hand.

With that resolve clear in my mind, I thought furiously about the possibilities, and by the time I reached Minerva, I knew what to do: it'd be hardly the worse thing I'd ever done, and nor nearly as dangerous as running around with werewolves, at least for me.

"Riddle." My curt tone snapped Minerva out of her panicked fretting while I could visibly see Tom using all of his skill in the mind arts to keep himself from falling unconscious.

I pressed firmly against the cloth folded on his bleeding wound: "If we do nothing, you'll die."

I talked over Minerva's Scottish burr while Riddle inhaled sharply, his mind warring between the pain and the fear.

"If I take the time to brew the necessary antidote, you'll die before it can help you." This part has the added value of being true.

And concluding my brief speech, I spoke once more: "Or I can do the impossible, but you'll both have to trust me, and not waste my time by asking endless questions: frankly, it's your only chance at survival."

Before my life as Rubeus Hagrid, I once read about how the mind could take two different directions when pushed to the breaking point: it could either stop, sending the victim into catatonia, or it could operate full-throttle, making use of everything it had to find a solution. 

Probably Dune, it is always Dune when it sounds so smart and concise. And under my attentive gaze, I saw Riddle's mind ravenously tear through what I said him, what I meant, almost as fast as the words fell from my lips.

He raised his unwounded arm to stop Minerva while his eyes never left mine: "Do it."

I could feel it almost physically: trust born of despair.

His exceptional brain immediately picked up what the options were, recognized that I was the only one in a position to help, probably realized that I was being as calculating as he had been when he saved me, and decided. That was all there was to it: the cold, inhuman logic that had historically allowed humans to survive the impossible.

And then I began giving orders like I had done it a hundred times before, it was only theory, but an extremely solid one, and frankly, I had done more with less: "Minerva, collect the nine heads of the Hydra, bring them here, then transfigure the clearing: we need a flat surface at least 3 meters by 3."

I conjured a strap and secured it around the cloth I had been keeping pressed against the wound caused by the Hydra.

"Riddle, you need to breathe slowly, and do everything in your power to keep your heart from hammering in your chest. Talking makes it beat faster, so just focus on your breathing, and swallow this."

While he forced himself to swallow a bezoar, which wouldn't be enough to fight off the venom, but would keep him alive for a little while, I tapped just below his hip, and a numbing charm reduced the tension in his muscles as the pain he felt lessened.

I repeated the process over his broken arm only to rise to my feet and stride quickly towards the main body of the creature we had just killed.

It was a pity losing one of its most valuable parts, but it was the optimal course that I could see now that I had decided to save Riddle. This had an enormous potential, on several levels, and I didn't have the time to consider every implication, only the most immediate ones, and it was already too late to stop.

Once more I fell into the mindset necessary for the spell I had improvised successfully to save Minerva from the Hydra, another thing that I'd need to truly think about, and once I used my size to roll the body of the magical creature on its side, my wand was thrust forward and dragged across its hide.

The work was rough, and it was far from how I thought I would conduct my first rendering: my spell wasn't made for delicate, precise work, and the dead flesh that had been still warm under my fingers cracked angrily as it froze over.

With a bit of finagling, I carved out the misshapen lump that was the Hydra's heart: it was an ugly, scaly thing with a form that I could barely make heads or tails of.

It seemed to follow the classical snake's heart anatomy: three chambers only, and while that would have been interesting and worth investigating in another context, I instead quickly settled it over the ground while I summoned a nearby basketball-sized rock.

It left the ground with a slight tremor, dragging after it lumps of dirt and splintered pieces of roots, and landed in my outstretched palm: I immediately began with targeted gouging charms: Transfiguration wouldn't be adequate, I needed a bowl made of rock, not something with a Shape that suited my needs.

The surface of my target cracked and splintered away, while I worked, and I stopped only when Minerva arrived by my side.

"By Morgana's..." I saw her almost physically restrain herself from going on a tangent, only to keep talking as her practicality took over: "I did what you asked, what now?"

"I need water from the nearest creek, and my satchel of ingredients: apparate back to the shack, get me the satchel, and pour the water in a transfigured bucket, four or five liters will be enough." my eyes met hers before she could Apparate away, and I stared into her pupils, blown wide with fear, only to add.

"The water mustn't be conjured, understand?"

After her nod, I walked over to Tom with the stone that I was slowly carving into a bowl, and looked him as he kept his eyes closed and tried to do as I asked him: "I'll need you for some creative Mind Arts when the moment comes."

His breath quickened for an instant as he looked at me, only to regain control of himself with the absolutely inhuman precision and ease that I expected of him.

At his quirked eyebrow, I explained: "I need you to keep to the forefront of your mind the concept of a predator's success: what I need is for you to take the cat within Minerva's hunter's mindset, and align it with my understanding of the ritual we're going to perform."

I set the complete stone bowl by his side before striding across the smooth transfigured stone that Minerva prepared: by hand, I took each of the Hydra's heads, and in groups of threes, I described as many equilateral triangles as vertices of a bigger triangle, of course, it was still equilateral.

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