The Darkness That Lives Within

He woke up slowly, relaxed fully. He was mildly surprised as he realized that he wasn't in pain; he was comfortable, though it shouldn't have been possible. He could remember going to sleep in the darkness, having given up fighting the lure due to pain, the pain of abuse and malnutrition alongside the pain of loneliness.

Looking around, he noted that he couldn't see a thing; the place he was in, wherever it was, was filled with dark so thick he couldn't have seen his hand if he poked his eye with it - which, of course, he didn't do, as he thought that it might be too painful. Sighing lightly, he sat up slowly, as though getting reacquainted with himself. Noting several movements of his body that hadn't happened before, he frowned lightly.

"Hello?" he asked, looking around the dark place. Hearing his voice echo, he frowned slightly again. Noticing footsteps - or what sounded like footsteps - getting closer, he didn't try another question.

"Good, you're awake," the other said, without the raven-haired male actually hearing the words. Jumping slightly, he shivered in the suddenly cool room. "Do not be afraid, my love. I told you before, we aren't here to hurt you," the voice said again; with a slight start, Harry realized that the voice was in his head. It seemed distinctly genderless, which made him wonder for a few moments before he just shrugged, deciding to just "go with the flow," and ignore the fact that he had no idea where he was.

"Who are you?" he thought-asked, letting curiosity tint his voice. "And why can't I see?"

"Don't fear, my love, never fear. Release your fear, and you will see," the voice said simply, avoiding his first question completely. Caught up in trying to release his fear, Harry didn't notice that his question had gone unanswered.

"How can I release the fear I feel?" he asked, hoping to get an answer from whoever or whatever had been talking to him.

"Believe in yourself, in what you can do, and that will help. Don't think about the trials you have gone through; remember them, of course, but distance yourself from them. It will help if we could tell you exactly how to release your fear, but the rules say we cannot help unless you specifically ask us to. We are your servants, my love, but we still have to follow the rules."

"Who are you? I know you're my servants - you just told me that - but what exactly are you?" Harry asked, looking around curiously. He was trying to do as the voice had said, but it hadn't been working very well yet.

"We are you, my love, and we are the shadows that grace the world you once thought you knew. We are darkness, and you, my love, are our master," the voice replied, causing Harry to sigh lightly in annoyance.

"But...what if I cannot let go of my fear? It's just so hard, so very hard..." Harry said, inner voice soft.

"If you cannot release your fear, you will be stuck here for eternity. We are sorry, my love, but we cannot let our master fear what he has had, and will have, to do."

"Oh," Harry said simply, sighing lightly. Sitting down, he thought hard upon what the words that had been thought-spoken to him. He came up with a few answers to his problem, and presented them to the voice. "Do you mean for me to ask you for help, or would you rather have me do this myself? And, if you mean the second one, how can I exactly do something that I've never even heard of being able to do?"

"We would rather have you do it yourself, my love, and you can do it because it takes belief to do anything, whether you have done it before or not," the voice answered, sounding slightly sad. "If you ask it of us, we will help, but if you do not do this on your own, you will have questions later that we cannot answer."

"Oh," Harry said again, sighing softly. Shrugging lightly, he thought on the way his own mind looked to himself. Looking into his mind after he had achieved a slight trance-like state, he was startled at what he saw.

Glancing around, he noted the rather expansive darkness that he was suddenly engulfed in. Silver sparkles disturbed the otherwise total blank darkness, with the occasional green line lazily drawn from one sparkle to the next. Looking around, he wondered, blankly, where the fear he was feeling was at.

As soon as he thought that, he was whizzing through his mind, drawn to the area that he wanted. The room he suddenly appeared in was blindingly bright, so bright after the darkness that he had to shut his eyes and blink several times before he could even try to see. Looking around the overly bright, almost clinically clean room, he noted golden strands and red strands, interwoven into a web, clinging tightly to the walls. Looking at them tried to blind him again, but, now that he knew what they looked like, he wasn't going to forget.

He carefully walked, no, oozed over to the wall with the most webs, reaching out slightly to run a slender finger over it. He blankly wondered why, if he reached out his hand to touch it and could feel the slightly stickiness of the web, he couldn't see the hand he had stuck out. Shrugging, he studied the structure of the construction. He noted that there was far more gold that red, and wondered, absently, why.

"More gold than red...that has to mean something. What does it mean, though?" he thought to the voice, wondering.

"It means that the feeling that you see can be safely destroyed, my love; that it will hurt for a while, but it won't destroy you," the voice thought back, with a slight anticipatory feel to it.

"If I destroy this web, then what will happen? I know pain, as you said, but will it hurt my mind very badly? And what about this room?" Harry asked, looking around slowly. "I mean, I don't want to hurt my mind, but I do want to do as you wish."

"All that will happen is that your fear will disappear, along with this room...until you start feeling a feeling we don't want you to feel, or that the rules say you can't feel. Fear is the only feeling that you feel right now that we cannot allow you to feel," the voice replied, seeming to shrug. "It shouldn't do anything other than make you feel pain."

Shrugging lightly, he reached out a hand and carefully detached as much of the webbing as possible before pulling gently. Wincing lightly as he felt the rips, he pulled as much of the web off as was possible. By the time he was finished eradicating the web, he was panting softly with pain. Looking at the walls in the room, he was glad to see that he had gotten every inch of the web off of the walls.

"All right. Now what am I supposed to do with it?" he asked the voice, head tilting to one side absently.

"Whatever you want, just make sure it's gone," the voice replied, with a mental sigh.

Picking up the surprisingly large ball of web, he watched as it automatically started burning. Watching the silver-green flames licking the web as though entranced, he was happy to see that whatever it was that was killing the webs made sure there was no trace of the feeling left.

"Good. Now, exit your mind," the voice coaxed, seeming to smile as Harry quietly left his mind, settling back into the darkness. Sighing happily, he noted that there was, once again, no pain. "Good, my love, very good. Quicker than we thought you would figure out what we were telling you. We are very glad that you, my love, are able to realize what we mean so quickly and effortlessly," the voice said, the darkness almost petting the raven-haired male.

"What now?" Harry asked, stretching lightly.

"Now, my love, we wait. You should be able to see in a few moments, and then we will talk to you more. And, don't forget, we are bound to answer any questions you have."

"Oh, all right. I don't have any questions that need answering right now, though," Harry thought-spoke, relaxing into the gentle caress of the dark. He could feel the darkness lessening, and was glad to see that it was a gentle fade instead of an abrupt changing of dark to light.

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Looking around, he noted areas that had thicker shadows than others, places where, he supposed, his servants would be hiding. He gently coaxed the shadows to wrap around him, sighing happily as he felt the gentle way they clung to him. Looking around the bedroom he had been left in, he sniffed experimentally. Licking his lips, he looked around for whatever it was that smelled so...good. Frowning, he sniffed again.

Tilting his head to the side, he noted that the smell was coming from rather red stains on his sheets. Shrugging lightly, he didn't seem to realize that it was blood; or, perhaps he did, and didn't mind. He realized suddenly that he felt sort of...detached from the world, as though he was only half awake.

"That is because, my love, you are not used to the world you see now. You are not the human that you slept as, my love, now you are so much more. We remade you into the image of what we wanted, though we did take the image from what your mind gave us. You will still be able to go to school, but you will have to be careful, my love, very careful.

"And you will have to be resorted; we cannot let you live with the Gryffindors in your current state. No way can we let you do that; they may kill you because they will never understand you.

"You have friends in Slytherin, whether you believe us or not. We, my love, have been here the whole time; some saw this with pleasure and, no matter what they tell their friends or the public, they allied themselves to you. You are powerful, my love, and beautiful, and people love power as well as beauty. They saw what you might become, what you have become, if you only didn't fight us," the shadows whispered to his mind, causing him to shrug again.

"If I have friends in Slytherin, do you know if I have friends in other Houses?" he asked, head still tilted to the side in thought.

"Of course, my love, of course. Almost everyone in Ravenclaw will be your friend, as well as Hufflepuff. We don't know if you have any in Gryffindor, though; those you call friend in that House have only been using you," the voice answered, seeming proud of their master for taking these sudden revelations so calmly.

"You said I am not what I was before; do you know what I am now?" he asked, stretching lightly and feeling, as well as hearing rather clearly, his bones crack as they shifted themselves back into their right positions.

"Look in the mirror, my love, and you will see what we mean," the voice whispered, gently urging him to look into the mirror that was suddenly conjured in the room.

Standing slowly, Harry stretched again, eyes closing lightly in pleasure. Sighing happily, he walked to the mirror. Gasping softly, he stared for a few moments, lost.