Harry Potter and the Bucket List

Year 5 - 4

Beta: Cloudy

(≖‿‿≖)ノ⌒●~*

In my mind palace I sat beside Tom as I watched him redraw the ritual circle for the homunculus body. I had become better at reading the runes, finally able to understand a lot of the ground work.

Tom's fingers waved in the air as he used his magic to draw glowing lines. "Hm. I think—I think in a month or so I'll be ready to try again. Maybe."

"What's the hold up?" I asked him.

"Some ingredients... I'm trying not to use anything that would be dangerous," he said after a moment of consideration.

"What kind of things do you think you'll need?"

"Cadavers," he answered. "As close to the body type as I can get."

"I can send out some feelers for that," I said. "Ooo, will this be my first Dark ritual since cadavers would count as a Dark ingredient?"

"Yes, congratulations on your first step into the evil realm of Dark," snarked Tom. "Although you did already attempt this last year, so it's really your Dark second ritual."

I giggled. "Thank you. A dead body isn't so bad though, is it really that dangerous?"

"No. Blood, bones, and other such nonsense rarely perturb a ritual. No, no. What might make this dangerous is if I can't find a substitute for a life-binding," answered Tom, dark eyes closing in a moment of thought.

I tilted my head, unfamiliar with the term. "What's that?"

Tom frowned. He ran his fingers through his thick dark hair before answering. "It's—it's a—you get it when you bottle someone's dying breath. Depending on how they died will change the breath. Someone in a lot of pain would create a breath that would be used as a binding ingredient. Someone passing in peace would create a breath that would be freeing."

"And you need a binding?"

"At the moment, I think so," he said, continuing to peer at his ritual. "My soul wasn't able to bind properly to the body which caused it to rapidly decay and send me back to you."

"Hm." I tapped my chin. "Hm. Yeah that'd definitely be considered dark. That'd, uh, literally require torturing someone to death."

"Yes."

"Hm. Hm. Not something one can buy off the market, is it?"

"Not normally, no. I certainly never found a buyer," answered Tom with a shrug. "Malfoy had some spare that I experimented with over Christmas, so I am vaguely familiar with what it should look like."

"Do you know how to—er—make it yourself?"

"I know the steps, but I can't say I've ever done it myself," came Tom's eloquent response. His shoulders lifted up into a small shrug.

Scratching at my cheek, I asked, "How much does it go? Like, if I were to do the ritual to obtain the item... would it be a one time use thing, or can we get some mileage out of it?"

Tom did not respond for a minute as he considered my question. "The more pain the subject is in prior to death, the stronger the binding it can create and therefore the less we'll need for my ritual."

"Hm. Hm."

Am I ready to cross that line?

I emotionally and mentally knew I was capable of murder, but could that stretch into torture? Could I do what Voldemort did to me?