Harry Potter : Chapter 54: Rich Hunt I

The sun had finished setting while I completed my preparations: "It's time."

In the small clearing that I was sharing with the two muggles I had rescued in the french countryside, there was also a simple, wooden cage containing a rather large stag that I had previously cajoled into drinking a rather complex brew that had a single purpose: make the creature a harder target for transformed werewolves. 

I didn't think to ask Minerva if there was a way for Transfiguration to give a temporary 'humanity' to the stag, it would have made it a better target.

Both Paul and Marie drank their respective vials with a slight grimace, only to toss them on the ground hardened by the cold under the trees of the Forest of Dean: the full moon would rise soon, and I followed their example by downing a potion myself.

It tasted of rushing winds and the quiet footsteps, immediately it steadied my heartbeat, which turned from fast drumming into a slow, deliberate hammering.

Stalking Shadow was a potion I had to link through the use of silver of the stag's prongs to the creature's life, with the 'mirroring effect' to the moon itself, and with a drop of blood to myself.

Sadly, its esoteric nature meant that it could be brewed only by the one destined to drink it, could be used only with the full moon under the open sky, and its effects would die either with the stag, or with the first appearance of the dawn.

Going against any of those conditions would immediately invalidate the story that the potion was meant to be telling, as such nullifying the effects. It had taken more or less an hour of care each night for all the previous month, and it had consistently needed adjustments on the fly.

While not as complex as the Felix, and undoubtedly less useful as a general-purpose brew, I felt that the many experiments I had conducted since I first awoke in this world were somewhat coming together in the unholy combination of Ritualism and Potion Making that felt do natural to me.

On Paul and Marie, I had tried before potions meant to either restrain the transformation, oppose it outright, or simply shift the human mind of the muggles into something more capable of accepting the hunting instinct of the werewolf.

I had used a multitude of properties in my many attempts: I had ranged from my own original 'mirroring effect' that I had discovered when treating the wounds responsible for turning Paul and Marie in the first place, to highly experimental combination of unusual ingredients that I had often been unable to collect personally to reinforce selected characteristics with some small ritualism.

Ultimately however, my attempts to work against the transformation proved themselves ineffective: the curse was simply too deeply rooted in werewolves to be simply broken from outside forces.

Since pushing back against it didn't seem to work, this attempt was meant to exhaust the curse upon a single, successful hunt.

At least for a single Full Moon... let's see if there is any hope for this. I breathed in deeply as the potion I drank primed my body just slightly beyond its capabilities for the trial that it'd have to endure, and as the full moon started to rise, Paul and Marie started to change.

The transformation itself was as always horrifying, but where before it had always been characterized by absolute agony while the werewolf's instinct took over, now there was some sort of excitement, an eagerness that accompanied each snap of bone, each warble as the human throats turned into something capable of deep growls and snarling madness.

With the speed borne of experience, a selected sequence of charms masked my presence, leveraging the concept of Shadow that I was so familiar with because of my father's sacrifice to heights never achieved before: with my wand of holly, I simply tapped one leaf that I had taken from the Shadow Tree.

And it burned alight in a dark smoke that fell backward on me, covering my form with the unimportant, and easily dismissed nature of every shadow that had ever been cast.

The stag bellowed in fright as the previously unthreatening humans in the clearing became apex predators, bloodlust and need for something to chase filling them to the brim as the transformation ran its course.

Just as the werewolves completely took over, the cage I had kept their prey in opened, and their target ran away in the dark with all the speed of a potion enhanced creature that feared for its life.

And it was on that primal fear powering the prey's run that the werewolves' attention snapped onto. The smaller of the two cursed creatures, Marie, chuffed as it started sprinting directly after the stag, while Paul took off at an angle.

Neither had noticed my presence, and after a second to make sure they wouldn't suddenly manage to pierce through my newly enhanced cloak of shadows, I ran after them, my long leg and half-giant's blood granting me a speed through the wilderness unheard of in a mere human.

I breathed regularly under the empowering effects of the potion that would leave me with the conclusion of the hunt, and with the full moon shining above the Forest of Dean, I could make out the way between dark patches of blackness under the trees and silvery curtains that showed me the barest hint of the deep gouges that a werewolf's claws cut into the hardened ground.

I was of course quickly left behind: the simple potion that I had prepared to power-up my body couldn't raise me to the heights needed to follow creatures cursed into being one of the most deadly predators of the world. I'd need a ritual for that. 

I didn't need the recurring image of my father turning into a tree for me to discard that option: besides the inherent difficulty in finding someone or some creature that would genuinely wish to freely sacrifice themselves, I had my fill of improvised magics that required blood and suffering as a price.

Of course, the stag that the two werewolves were hunting might find my thoughts a tad bit hypocritical, but I couldn't truly consider deers on the same level of the much more complex, and more importantly aware, magical creatures, nevermind humans.

If this experiment of mine had success, the two werewolves would return human immediately after the killing blow on the stag.

It would mean that the potion I used to loosely link the prey with the predators had survived the effects of the transformation, and that the death of the stag would release enough power in this hunting ritual not to push back the transformation, but to more or less trick it into believing that enough blood had been spilled.

After all, no animal hunted without reason: once food had been provided, there would be no need for the werewolf, and that should allow the intrinsic human nature of Marie and Paul to emerge once more under the full moon.

I ran straight against a branch hanging at shoulder height, only for it to bend in the direction I was going and return to its original position without a sound, my foot slammed onto the bed of a small course of water that hadn't frozen yet with the winter without making a sound, and my boot remained dry as I kept moving forward.

Ultimately my potion had been aptly named, even if its many effects would all come to an end with the stag's life.

I kept following the faint, but unmistakable in their freshness, tracks of Marie under the moonlit trees, and I distractedly appreciated the crisp, nightly air in a way that I had until now discarded as unimportant: I was stalking behind a couple of werewolves, conducting an experimental ritual that came at no cost of innocent lives, and I had as the final purpose an actual cure for something that plagued mankind for thousands of years.

I reached a clearing just as my ears registered the snapping of bone, followed but the intense, metallic tang of blood being sprayed in the air: the effects of Stalking Shadow abandoned me as I briefly stumbled, righting myself in time to see the two werewolves feasting messily on their prey.

I took an exasperated sigh. Another failure.

With no warning and a snarl, both werewolves turned towards my position: their eyes burned of molten gold with dissatisfied bloodlust, and as they started sniffing the air, their hackles rose.

I apparated away before they could start sprinting towards me. Another failure, I repeated in my head, yet, they followed the prey I had prepared before looking for anything else, maybe I'm onto something there...

I walked tiredly into my home, my eyes glancing briefly at Aragog's egg that was still waiting in stasis for me to hatch it, only to sprawl myself on the giant-sized bed that I had more or less clobbered together with trees I had taken from the Forest of Dean since my father's death.

Immediately, the tiredness caused by my failed experiment claimed me, and I fell asleep.

...

A lots of people are finding it difficult to read the chapters after 49 and they had to go into my profile to see the new chapters.

This problem happens because this is a new fanfic, I deleted the old one and Re-upload the chapters in a new fanfic with The same name and cover , don't worry I didn't change anything.

All of this just to fix some problems, if you still have the old one in your library, just delete it and the new one.

That should solve the problem.

PS :

Hey guys I really need you to throw some power stones, since it's like a fresh start for the fanfic and to keep the story going.

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