The Emerald Terror

Deciding Magic

The Emerald Terror

Summary: It wasn't supposed to end like this. The light was supposed to win and everyone should have continued on living peacefully. Too bad the muggles don't believe in happily ever after... nor coexistence it seems. "Goodbye Magic." Time travel fic.

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.

Chapter Eight: Deciding Magic

--- Metus Peverell ---

Ignoring the tug in my mind that was my wards telling me that someone had just entered my shop I continue to cough up blood into my toilet. My throat feels raw and if I had the energy to feel worried I would have but I had given up on finding the cause two years ago or so. Me. Give up on something? Impossible!

Complain to me after spending three years trying to find out why you are coughing up your insides frequently and discover nothing but dead ends.

After a few more lung-fulls I'm able to wipe my mouth off and get into a fight with my glamor in an effort to make it stay up. Throwing on yet another layer I grab my elder wand from next to the blueprints of the Potter wards and head down the stairs, today was obviously going to be one of my bad days and I wasn't looking forward to it.

What meets me in my storefront both confirms my suspicions and sends shivers through my body despite the many layers I currently have on.

Rushing to the seventeen-year old's side I don't realize the fact that my glamor has fallen again nor do I notice the innocently insane chocolate orbs that run off quickly afterward. All I see is the fallen injured boy lying in a pool of blood, my body moving in automatic practiced movements born from years of experience.

Finally, I am sitting in the chair next to my bed, my hands shaking as they hold my head up, memories and emotions battling for prominence in my brain. A groan calls my attention back to the present situation and I look up emerald meeting obsidian.

--- Tom Riddle ---

Lucien's laughter rings out around the room, clearly amused by his young namesake. I could see why obviously, Lucius had a problem with how Abraxas acted around me so it wasn't far-reaching for Nott to throw him for a loop. The man's actions made all the worse due to the blond's low exposure to him and the fact Lucien acted like this about 95 percent of the time.

The marriage had killed most of the characteristics in him that the boy's mother emphasized on.

"Are you quite finished?" I ask, refusing to direct more attention than I already had to the ex-Slytherin currently occupying my lap. All my trouble earned me was a kiss on the cheek and a smirk which was but a pale shadow of the one in my memories.

"Marvolo will like what Lucy has." was purred into my ear before, much to my annoyance, he nips at my earlobe. The scream from little Bella that he is fishing for finally manages to surface from her throat and his Godson looks about ready to faint. Had it been anyone else (Besides Abraxas... maybe...) they would have been on the floor the minute they had burst into my office uninvited let alone touched me, but this wasn't anyone else and despite how utterly wrong it felt to have any type of human contact on my skin I don't push the man off of me.

"I'm glad Lucien, please move to your own seat before you give my Death Eaters a heart attack." Frowning the brunet relents, moving instead to sit on my desk. Let's just say that Lucien Nott was my reason for limiting my torture curses to the Cruciatus.

If only that wife of his had been so considerate.

Improper scene over, Lucius clears his throat in an attempt to regain some dignity. Only managing to make more of a fool of himself and conjure my ire with the pure disgust he sends Lucien's way. The blond was lucky Abraxas was his father, he'd have been dead a long time ago otherwise.

"Leave, come back tomorrow around two." Little Bella looks like she is about to protest, seeming to have decided that my present company was a threat to my virtue (and her, non-existent, claim on it), but is dragged out of the room with a Lestrange on each arm. The door closes softly behind the quite shaken group and Nott starts laughing again.

"Lucy feels sorry for Roddy, putting up with that one. Apparently, he was engaged to that Black boy who recently defected but dear our The marriage Screech would hear nothing of it."

"Loose lips sink ships." My words, as was the case with most of my muggle sayings, simply put a look of confusion on the pureblood's face before being tossed aside haphazardly.

"Pity really, Siri was actually half decent before she decided to end that arrangement. Star lost a lot of respect for that too."

"Your report Lucien?" It was hard, seeing this overexcited blunt child who learned everything he could in a quest for approval in front of me and remembering the proud sadistic young man who had once held the ability to twist even a Goblin into a legal knot. All because Tabitha needed someone to place the blame of her son being a bastard onto I had lost one of my best (and only) friends.

"Muddy looked sad about who placed the potions order this month, but we already knew he would be right Marvolo?" At my nod, he continues, making people run in circles around him seemed to be one of the only joys that woman couldn't rob from him, that and little Theodore. Entertaining his outlandish ideas about Knockturn Alley's Mudblood was a small price to pay for him to have it, and it got me the info on the blond I wanted from him easier.

"But Marvolo doesn't know that Muddy wears another appearance." The proud declaration snaps every bit of my attention onto him. Metus Smaragdus Peverell wore a glamor? He did look young but Lucien, even now with his current state of mind, would not have mentioned to me something so common as using glamours to appear younger. Those with magic, specifically pureblood witches, were particularly fickle about their appearance. So maybe polyjuice, no, there were too many complications with that and despite everything, I don't think he's capable of keeping a live prisoner for so long.

"He's wearing a glamor?" My question receives a rather enthusiastic confirmation before the blond suddenly looks confused.

"Why is Muddy younger than Sevvy Marvolo? Muddy should be around Lucy's age right?" Younger than the Prince boy? Should it not be the other way around right? People use glamours to appear younger than they truly are, not older.

"What does he look like? Under the glamor of course." This was why I had sent Lucien to find out about the mudblood after Lucius had failed, no matter how dull his brain his eyes remain sharp.

And with his rather childish description, I know...

....It's about time I place our potions order myself.