Inside the Blackest Heart (Edit, Not Update)

Disclaimer: All recognizable characters belong to JKR. All situations are mine. No $$$ is being made from this fanfic.
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Chapter 49 ~ What Greed Will Get You or “Oops!”


Harry had quite a time ditching Ron. The red-haired wizard was still feeling guilty about fighting with Harry and wanted to make it up to him, which meant sticking to him like glue for the whole day. It was only when Harry hinted that he was feeling a bit peckish and couldn’t wait for supper, Ron offered to nip down to the kitchens and get something to nosh from the elves. Harry gave him an extensive list of what he’d like and promised to wait for him to return.

As soon as Ron was out of sight, Harry sped upstairs to his room and scrawled a quick note on a piece of parchment, folded it, and left it on Ron’s pillow. Then he headed out of Gryffindor tower, down the shifting stairwells and out the main doors. He walked across the grounds to the main gates, where he would meet Malfoy Sr.

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Hermione and Snape spent the afternoon in Hermione’s rooms. The Potions Master served as an unwilling guinea pig for Hermione to practice sending her powers to. Snape was an excellent subject, simply because he didn’t really want the powers, so Hermione deduced that desire was not a factor in sending the stream of magic to another.

Hermione stood facing the stubborn Snape and willed her power to stream from her to the Potions Master. Snape’s eyes widened as the power rushed through him. It wasn’t unpleasant except when she ended the stream, it made his stomach drop as if he were falling from a great height.

“Are you finished, Miss Granger?” he said, holding his stomach after about the fifth test.

Hermione smirked at him.

“Yes, Professor. Gods, you are such a whiner,” she commented as he walked slowly over to the armchair and sat down. He was glad he had time to digest his lunch or he was positive it would be all over the bedroom floor by now. He glowered at Hermione.

“Miss Granger, you may enjoy being a conduit for raw magic to roar through, but I assure you I don’t,” he said evenly, his pale hand going to his stomach again.

“It doesn’t roar through, it streams through. Nice and easy,” Hermione retorted.

“Maybe for you, but trust me, it is a very powerful rushing sensation,” he replied.

Hermione thought about this and decided the Professor was correct in his description. When she first felt the magic, it did roar through her like a mighty waterfall. She would have to warn Voldemort before they started. She looked at the clock. It was five minutes to five.

Her everyday robes materialized around her and she took a deep breath. It was time to go see Voldemort.

“Are you ready?” she asked the chair-ridden Snape. He nodded and rose slowly, still feeling queasy. He was a bit paler than usual.

Hermione looked at him with her hands on her hips.

“Oh, honestly Professor!” she said irritatedly. In a moment his queasiness was gone. He raised his eyebrows at her.

“If you ever quit being a Primordial, you would be an excellent healer,” Snape observed.

“Who says I can’t be both?” Hermione replied, heading for the door. Snape followed.

The couple walked into the throne room to find an excited Voldemort pacing in front of his throne. The Dark Lord looked up and saw them, a broad toothy smile breaking out across his reptilian face. His red eyes were glittering.

“Ah, Primordial. It seemed as if this day would take forever to pass. I felt your power quite a bit this afternoon,” he commented, looking at her curiously.

“I was practicing sending the stream of magic through Professor Snape. It worked very well,” she said.

Voldemort looked at Snape.

“Yes, I can feel the residual magic wafting from him. There were no ill effects?” Voldemort asked Snape.

“A feeling of discomfort when the stream stopped my Lord, akin to falling from a great height,” Snape replied.

Voldemort waved his scaly hand dismissively.

“Nothing to fear,” he said, then his red eyes turned on Hermione, “can we begin, Primordial?”

“Yes my Lord, however I should warn you that the rush of power may be extremely strong and unsettling,” Hermione said, rolling up her sleeves.

“I am used to powerful magic flowing through me, Primordial. I have been subjected to quite a few alterations in my being over the past years, and most of them involved powerful forces. I should be able to handle the force of your stream,” the Dark Lord said.

“Very well,” Hermione said, positioning herself about ten meters in front of Voldemort. Snape walked over to the wall a safe distance away, leaning back on it with his arms folded. He didn’t want to accidentally get caught in the stream again.

Voldemort stood in front of the Primordial. The wizard cleared his mind and opened it fully, ready to accept the flow of Hermione’s force.

Hermione stood, willing the magic to flow through her. It started as a trickle of power, then intensified, the force of magic increasing into a powerful steady stream. Hermione let it rush freely through her for several minutes. Then she focused on Voldemort, seeing him in her mind’s eye as another conduit, bending the flow of magic toward him. She felt it begin to shift.

“Be ready, my Lord!” she warned.

The Dark Lord stood still, ready to receive her power. He felt a small shifting within him, starting at his feet, a strange upward motion trickling up his body. He shuddered as he tasted the first faint pulses of power.

“Yessss!” he hissed as the flow increased, adding its power to his own. He willed it to continue, and instead of letting the flow pass out of him, he retained it, willing for even more power.

Hermione, who had been controlling the flow, gasped when suddenly she felt an increase of magic. She wasn’t doing it.

“Voldemort! Are you pulling power through me?” she called to the wizard, who was standing there, his arms extended upward, his eyes closed, a great, wicked smile on his face.

“Yes, you are strengthening me,” he gasped, reveling in the forces filling him. He was swelling inwardly with the new influx of strength.

Hermione felt the rush of magic increasing into the waterfall like rush of her earlier experiences.

“My Lord!” she called, “You need to stop! It’s too much power!”

“No! There is no such thing as too much power!” Voldemort shouted back, pulling even more magic from the Primordial’s conduit. He began to glow, a white pulsing aura surrounding his thin body.

Snape watched, mesmerized. He had a bad feeling about this.

Hermione was forcing herself to remain standing. Magic was rushing through her so powerfully she felt as if the flow were dragging her down to earth. This was not the effortless flow she was used to, this was something different.

Voldemort was surrounded by power now. It swirled about him angrily as he absorbed more and more, power crackling from his extended fingertips.

“Yes! Yes! I will be invincible, truly invincible!” he cried in his high-pitched voice. His body began pulsating with power.

“My Lord, stop! Stop!” Hermione cried, but Voldemort was lost in an orgy of power. It crackled from his eyes, his mouth, even the small ear holes in the side of his scaly, bald head.

“I shall be the most powerful wizard on earth!” he exulted as he throbbed with raw magic. The glow around him was so bright, Snape and Hermione covered their eyes.

“Yes! Yes! Y…no. No! No!” the Dark Lord began to scream. The white aura began to darken, swirling tightly around him, seeming to smother him.

“No! No! NOOOOO!” Voldemort screamed in a horrible voice as the magic wrapped around him tighter and tighter. He looked like a mummy wrapped in pulsing gray strips of light.

Hermione was frozen with horror to the floor, unable to move and unable to end the stream as she watched the wizard writhe horribly as the magic looped about him, tightening. Snape was staring, also unable to move. It was highly doubtful he would have gone to the Dark Lord’s aid even if he could.

Voldemort’s thin body became thinner, and his voice, more distant. The magic tightened around him until all they could see of him was a thin line of power. Suddenly the flow stopped, and Hermione gasped, stumbling forward. The thin line of power disappeared.

Voldemort was gone.

Suddenly Snape let out a howl, clutching his forearm and stumbling forward. He ripped his cuff and yanked the sleeve upward. His mark was red and bubbling.

“Gahhhh!” he screamed, clutching at the mark and falling to his knees. All around the wizarding world, wizards and witches were in the same horrible state as the Potions Master. Finally, after several minutes he stopped writhing. He looked down at the Mark. It was gray instead of black. He rose unsteadily to his feet. Hermione had watched him with horror in her eyes. Suddenly she sucked in a large, gasping breath. She had held it for quite a long time without knowing it.

Snape and Hermione stood face to face, both panting. Hermione’s eyes were wide as saucers.

“Did we just kill Voldemort?” she asked the Potions Master, her voice quavering.

Snape looked around the throne room. There was no sign of the Dark Lord.

“I think Voldemort killed himself,” Snape said, “But no matter. We will be blamed for it as soon as the deatheaters get here.” Snape said.

“Shit,” Hermione said, looking around desperately.

Then her amber eyes fell on the Potions Master appraisingly.

“Hold still,” she said.

The minute she said it, Snape started to flee. Call it intuition, call it a sixth sense, call it what you want. Snape just instinctively knew he had to get away from the Primordial. Unfortunately he wasn’t fast enough.

Suddenly he felt very strange as her power washed over him. Snape held up his hand. It was thin and scaly. He was dressed in scarlet robes. He touched his face. It was scaly, hairless and lipless. His big, beautiful nose was gone. There were only slits where his nostrils should be. His red eyes widened in horror.

Hermione had transformed the Professor into the spitting image of Lord Voldemort.

“Miss Granger, are you fucking crazy?” he lisped, drawing his scaly brows together and scowling at her.

“Just get up on the throne, Professor! Hurry up!” she hissed at him.

Not knowing what else to do, Snape grabbed Voldemort’s wand off the floor and sprinted for his throne. Just in the nick of time too. Peter Pettigrew came barreling through one of the doors, holding his mark and grimacing.

“My Lord, what has happened?” he panted, bowing low to the transformed Snape.

The wizard cast his red eyes toward Hermione, who gave him a little shrug. He’d have to wing it.

Shit.

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A/N: Whoops. That didn’t go too well, did it? Hmm. I guess it all depends on how you look at it eh? Please review.