You? Voldemort?
Harry and Aster ran to the brewing class to make Wiggenweld for Aster and Hagrid.
It was well past midnight.
The bubbling cauldron hissed gently, green vapor curling upward as Harry carefully stirred the Wiggenweld potion.
"For Hagrid," Aster muttered, inspecting the heat with a quick flick of his wand. "This should help Norbert's burns. You sure he didn't touch venom?"
"No," Harry said, though he looked unsure. "Just flame marks."
The door creaked.
Both boys froze.
Professor Snape stepped into the room like a shadow with a voice.
"Well, well." He looked between them with narrowed eyes. "Not terribly surprising from a Potter." His sneer deepened as his gaze settled on Aster. "But a Black brewing something unsupervised? Stealing ingredients for a prank, perhaps?"
Aster didn't flinch. "I bought the ingredients. Still… sorry for using the room after hours."
Snape blinked once. That wasn't the response he expected. No stammering, no finger-pointing. No betrayal of Potter to earn favor.
"Sorry?" he echoed, voice curling with disdain. "Ha."
He lingered in silence, clearly debating how to punish them.
He couldn't only punish Gryffindor, he had to punish both.
Then, tightly: "Fine. You have ten minutes to finish this. Or both of you will serve detention."
He turned on his heel and vanished into the hallway, robe trailing like smoke.
They managed to complete the potion on time.
"Bravo," said Snape. "I won't be giving either of you any points, be thankful I'm not punishing you both."
Harry, standing beside Aster, muttered, "He's definitely Voldemort's ally."
Aster then said, "Maybe, but to me he just seems mean."
It was time for final exams, the whole group had to give their all, and so they let the mystery of the Philosopher's Stone behind on their mind.
Aster raised an eyebrow, pushing a few exam scrolls aside as Harry collapsed at the table, panting and flustered.
"You ran across the castle to tell us that again?" Aster asked dryly, though not unkindly.
Harry huffed. "It's serious! I know Snape's going after the Stone tonight. I saw him sneaking out after exams, and he's been asking Quirrell weird questions!"
Ron, halfway through biting into a piece of toast, muttered around it, "Didn't we say we were gonna let it go for now? We've got final marks coming up."
Hermione looked up from her study notes, clearly torn. "I believe something is going on," she said carefully, "but we don't have any solid evidence. Even if you told Dumbledore, without proof, what can he do?"
Aster rested his chin on his hand, watching Harry closely. "He won't listen because he can't act on suspicion alone. McGonagall's probably under orders to keep us out of it. She's not ignoring you to be cruel, she's trying to protect you."
Harry slammed his fist lightly on the table. "But we're the only ones who know. If they won't stop him, we have to!"
Ron looked nervously between them. "So what? Are we gonna break into the third-floor corridor? Get past that massive dog?"
Hermione hesitated. Then, softly, "We said we were done… but if Harry's right, and someone is trying to steal the Stone… we can't just sit here and do nothing."
Aster's eyes narrowed. Something was clawing at the back of his thoughts. The unicorn blood. Voldemort in the forest. He couldn't shake the feeling that it wasn't over.
"Tonight," Aster said finally, his voice low but firm. "We're going tonight."
The others turned toward him.
"We go tonight," he repeated, "before someone else dies."
And just like that, the Stone was no longer a mystery they could ignore. It was a storm building, and they were already inside it.
The four of them slipped into the corridor, they knew what to do. Hermione clutched the flute Harry had gotten from Hagrid. It was one of the talents she had that Aster didn't.
Soon enough, Fluffy fell asleep.
They rushed to the trapdoor, jumping in one after the other.
Aster could only sigh as they all dropped into a dark room.
"Stop touching me!" Hermione shrieked.
"Hmm... 'Hermione... I don't think anyone's moving," said Ron, with Harry half-sprawled on top of him.
"I–It's Devil's Snare?" Hermione asked, her voice tight with realization.
Before anyone else could react, Aster raised his hand. "Lumos Maxima!"
Light burst through the room like a sunrise, flooding every corner. The darkness vanished, and they dropped straight through the writhing plants below.
"Shouldn't fire work on it too?" Ron asked as they got back on their feet.
Aster didn't look at him. "Our robes would've burned. The room could've gone up in flames… a lot of things could've."
"Well, I hope the next challenge won't be that invasive…" Hermione muttered, still shuddering slightly at the memory of Devil's Snare slithering across her skin.
The next room was vast, echoing, and filled with a chaotic storm of flying objects—keys, glittering and sharp, zipping through the air like angry wasps.
"There!" Hermione shouted, eyes narrowing as she pointed toward a rusted key with a crooked wing. "That one—it matches the door!"
The boys followed her gaze, tension crackling in the air.
"How are we supposed to get that?" Ron asked, ducking as a key shot past his head.
Aster stepped forward, wand raised. "Accio!"
The target key jolted—then froze in mid-air. With a mechanical hum, it snapped back into the swirling cloud.
Aster blinked, his shoulders sinking. "It's… protected against Accio," he said quietly, frustration flickering across his face. "Of course it is."
"
Before anyone could answer, Harry was already moving, snatching a broom from the corner with grim determination.
"Harry—wait—" Hermione began, but he was already in the air.
The sound of wings and metal clashed around him. Keys sliced past, some missing by inches. The one they needed darted away every time he got close, as if it had a mind of its own.
"Come on…" Harry growled, eyes fixed. He dipped, twisted, then lunged.
There was a metallic snap and a shout of pain. Harry winced, one hand clutching his arm, but the key was in the other.
He landed hard, skidding a bit on the stone.
Hermione rushed to him. "Are you—?"
"I'm fine," Harry breathed, holding out the key. "Got it."
Aster's eyes lingered on Harry's scraped arm. "You did better than I would've," he said, his voice quiet, part impressed, and proud.
"No time to argue," Hermione snapped, already unlocking the door. "Let's move before the keys decide to get revenge."
The door opened into a vast stone chamber, lit only by flickering torches. The floor stretched out in a massive checkered pattern. Towering statues stood in formation, rooks, bishops, knights, all motionless, yet humming with quiet magic.
"Wizard's chess," Ron whispered, stepping forward slowly. "But… life-sized."
Aster's eyes swept the field warily. "They're enchanted."
"They're waiting for us," Hermione said, voice tight.
A black knight turned its head toward them with a grinding snap and pointed its sword at the trio. The message was clear.
Ron squared his shoulders. "They won't let us pass unless we play and win."
Aster started to speak, but Ron held up a hand.
"No. This is mine. I know how to play better than anyone. I've trained with my brothers since I could hold a piece."
The confidence in his voice was unshakable. For once, Aster didn't argue.
"We'll follow your lead," Hermione said, her tone somewhere between anxious and awed.
Ron gave a single nod. "Hermione, take the rook's position. Aster, the bishop. Harry, you'll be a knight. I'll command from the queen's side."
The moment they stepped into place, the game began with a shuddering rumble. Pieces moved like giants across the board, and every clash was a violent explosion of stone and force. Taken pieces were crushed, swept aside like rubble.
Ron's voice rang out, calm and commanding, guiding every move. "Knight to E5. Bishop, hold your line. Wait for their mistake."
Aster followed his orders, watching Ron with quiet admiration. Even Hermione looked shaken, but trusted him completely.
The match grew tighter. One wrong move could end it.
Then Ron's face went pale. "There's no way forward unless I sacrifice myself."
Hermione stepped toward him in horror. "Ron, no. There has to be another way."
"There isn't," he said firmly. "It's the only way to break their defense. Harry will be able to checkmate on the next turn. I have to do this."
He turned to Aster. "Keep them safe."
Aster didn't argue. He simply nodded.
Ron took his place in front of the white queen.
The stone blade came down in a brutal arc, and he dropped like a puppet with its strings cut.
"RON!" Hermione screamed, bolting forward.
"He's breathing," Aster said, already kneeling at Ron's side. "Barely, but he's alive."
Harry, wide-eyed and shaking, followed Ron's final move.
The white king toppled.
The board fell silent.
The remaining pieces backed away, granting them passage.
They had won, but it didn't feel like a victory.
"We can't carry him through the next door," Harry said, guilt bleeding into his voice. "But we'll come back. We swear it."
Aster walked to Ron's side, pulling a small bottle from his robe and gently tipping it to Ron's lips.
"Don't worry, mate," he said quietly. "This will keep you alive until we get back."
Ron swallowed, eyes fluttering but steadying.
Aster gave him a firm nod, then turned back to Hermione and Harry.
"We can't afford to lose anyone now," he said, voice low but resolute. "Let's finish this."
They stepped into the next chamber—and froze.
There, sprawled flat on the cold stone floor, lay the troll's massive body, unmoving.
"Someone already defeated it," Aster said, eyes narrowing as he took in the scene.
"Snape," Harry muttered, a mixture of awe and unease in his voice.
Hermione's gaze sharpened. "Whoever did this… they're powerful."
A heavy silence hung in the air.
Without another word, they pressed forward, toward the next challenge waiting in the shadows.
The next door opened into a smaller, colder room. A line of black bottles stood upon a long stone table, glowing faintly in the dim light. At the far end of the room, a wall of fire crackled—a magical barrier, violet and deadly. Behind them, another wall of flames had already roared to life, sealing their path back.
They were trapped.
"Potion riddle," Hermione breathed, already scanning the note beside the bottles. "Snape's logic puzzle."
Aster's jaw twitched. "Of course it's his."
Harry leaned in beside her. "Can you solve it?"
Hermione didn't answer immediately. Her eyes danced across the lines, reading fast, then again, slower. The flames cast shifting shadows across her face. Time felt like it was slipping.
Finally, she pointed. "This one lets you go forward. That one takes you back."
Harry nodded and reached out for the forward potion—but Hermione grabbed his hand.
"No. I'm going. You have to be the one who faces him."
"Hermione—"
"She's right," Aster interrupted, voice sharp but steady. "You're the only one he's marked. You're the one he wants. She'll go back for Ron. I'll stay here."
Hermione looked at Aster. "And if you're wrong?"
"Then I'll burn with you," he said flatly.
She stared at him for a long second, then passed him the backward potion.
"Don't get yourself killed," she whispered.
"I'll do my best to disappoint him," Aster said with a half-smile.
Hermione drank and vanished through the fire.
Harry took the forward potion. Before stepping through, he looked back once at Aster, who stood still and watchful, like a sentry in the dark.
"Don't let it win," Aster said.
Harry nodded and walked into the flames.
The next room was brightly lit, an eerie contrast to the dark corridors they had just passed through. At its center stood a figure facing the Mirror of Erised, the very mirror Harry had discovered during winter break.
Harry squinted. "Snape?"
But the figure turned slowly, revealing the pale, nervous face framed by a twisted turban.
"Snape? Ah, I see... He does fit the profile, doesn't he?" Quirrell said with a cold smile.
Wand in hand, Quirrell's eyes gleamed. "Sadly, I can't attack you directly… that's why I brought them."
From the shadows, two cloaked wizards emerged, their expressions hidden but their menace unmistakable.
Quirrell's voice dropped to a chilling whisper. "They're very good at their job. Unfortunately for them, Hagrid beat them to the Stone."
One of the dark-cloaked wizards raised his wand toward Harry.
But before he could utter a single word, his wand jerked violently from his hand and snapped mid-air with a sharp crack.
Aster stepped forward from behind Harry, his eyes gleaming with restrained power. "Sorry, brother," he said casually. "Felt something odd happening. Hope you don't mind."
Harry blinked, still catching up. "Right. No—yeah. Thanks."
Quirrell's gaze shifted, narrowing. "Ah… the Heir of the Noble House of Black. Come, boys, take a good look at the mirror. Perhaps it'll show you something useful."
His voice had gone cold again, hollow with something deeper behind it.
Aster's eyes drifted to the tall mirror. "What is that?"
Harry hesitated, then answered, "It's called the Mirror of Erised. It shows you your deepest desire. Dumbledore told me."
Aster's head tilted slightly. "And you didn't mention it?"
There was no anger in his voice, only a strange glint of approval, even pride, like he was impressed Harry had secrets of his own.
Quirrell stepped closer to the Mirror of Erised, his voice slithering now, almost detached. "It shows not just dreams, Black… it shows obsession. That which the heart craves above all else."
Harry stood frozen, his breath shallow, unsure if he should look.
Aster's eyes flicked from Quirrell to the mirror. "So it's useless," he said flatly. "If you're trying to find the Philosopher's Stone with this, good luck. Wishful thinking doesn't move mountains."
Quirrell's lip curled. "But it can reveal. For those with the proper guidance."
Then… came the second voice. Harsher. Ancient. Disembodied. "Use… the boy…"
Harry flinched.
Aster's body stiffened.
Quirrell stepped aside with reverence, like a puppet letting the strings tug. "He doesn't know… how to take it from the mirror. But you do… don't you, Potter?"
Harry stared into the glass. His own reflection looked back, then changed.
Aster was behind him, watching.
"Don't tell him what you see," Aster murmured sharply.
Quirrell turned to Aster now, eyes narrowing. "And what would you see, boy? Glory? Power?"
Aster tilted his head slowly, eyes flashing violet in the mirror's surface. "Myself," he said evenly.
The voice hissed, cold and sharp. "Kill the boy."
Quirrell raised his wand, his hand trembling slightly, whether from fear or ecstasy, even he couldn't say.
"Avada Kedavra."
The green light burst forth.
Aster didn't think. He moved.
A flicker of instinct, no, not bravery, pulled him forward, apparating between Harry and the curse.
The light swallowed him whole.
No pain.
Only the sensation of being unmade.
His body hit the floor with a finality no one could question.Eyes half-open. Pale lips.
Still.
Harry let out a sound that wasn't quite a scream.He crawled to Aster, shaking him, whispering, pleading.
No breath.
No pulse.
Dead.
Quirrell laughed sharply and, with a theatrical flourish, tore away his turban.
A face emerged from the back of his skull, white, snake-like, grotesque.
"See?" Voldemort rasped from the mouth that wasn't his."That is what happens to those who stand in the way of Lord Voldemort."
He turned his twisted head toward Harry.
"Come, boy. Tell me what you see in the Mirror."
Harry hesitated, still kneeling beside Aster's body.
"...I see myself... winning the Quidditch Cup. And the House Cup."
"LIES!"
The voice thundered like a storm breaking through glass.The reflection in the Mirror of Erised flickered. Twisted.
And then—
Aster's body stood.
Lifeless, but moving.
His head tilted at an unnatural angle, his vacant eyes glowing faintly, deep red and violet flickering within.
The voice that came from his mouth was not Aster's.It was smoother, more eloquent, laced with venomous mockery.A dark echo of Tom Riddle.
"Still using the same spell?" the voice asked, lips curling into a smirk.
"Your past experiences haven't taught you to rely on something else?"
Harry stumbled back, confused, terrified.
"Avada Kedavra. Again. And again. And what did it do this time?"He gestured at his borrowed chest. "Kill me? Or simply make room for me?"
Voldemort's expression twisted.
"I am the original," he hissed, voice high with fury.
The smirk deepened. "Original?" he echoed softly. "To me... the one standing before me now is no original, just a failure."
Voldemort froze.
"Perhaps," Aster-Tom murmured, circling slowly, "I've finally realized what you never could. That division wasn't salvation. It was ruin."
He looked Voldemort up and down through Aster's eyes, brimming with disdain.
"This one," he said, nodding toward Quirrell, "you failed to kill a child. Repeatedly."
The air grew colder.
Quirrell screamed, not in pain, but in fury. He raised his wand toward Aster once more—
But it snapped. Split clean down the middle by an invisible force.
Aster, or rather, Voldemort, lifted his hand. Quirrell was flung backward, slammed into the wall.
The two wandless wizards could do nothing.They fled.
"Hm... Fine. I don't have much time," Aster murmured.
He approached the Mirror of Erised."You want to know what I see? Me."
The real Voldemort staggered to his feet. "What...?"
"I don't know about you," Aster-Tom said, studying his reflection, "but I see myself in this body. So much talent. So much power.Did you know it was meant to be a gift? For you and me.But now... It's mine."
Then Voldemort, softly, with bitter envy, "I will fix what I broke. I will take what is mine."
Tom, in Aster's body, laughed.
"You'll try," Aster-Tom said.
He stepped closer.
"How can you call yourself Lord Voldemort... when you couldn't even kill a child?"
Aster's body shuddered.
And collapsed, again, lifeless.
Voldemort's voice pierced the room once more:"Take the boy!"
The moment Quirrell's hands touched Harry to shove him aside, they began to decay.
The flesh on his fingers blistered and blackened like burnt parchment. His eyes widened in terror. He stumbled back, his arms turning to ash. Then his face, crumbling like dried clay, his final expression locked in disbelief and agony.
Thud.
Quirrell's cloak fell empty to the stone floor.
A silence followed, cold and fragile.
Then the wail of fury, Voldemort's disembodied voice, high and piercing like a knife scraping glass.
His spectral form surged like black smoke, a whirlwind of fury and desperation. He screamed, a sound that wasn't entirely human, rushing toward Aster's body again—
—and nothing happened.
He passed through Aster's still form like mist.
Then he lunged at Harry, shrieking in anger.
But again, nothing. As if an invisible barrier blocked him.
"No…" the voice hissed, thinned and fraying. "No—NO—NOT AGAIN!"
He whirled like a storm of shadows and fled, ripping through the ceiling like smoke torn by wind.
Harry dropped to his knees, breathing hard.
Aster was still. Pale. Unmoving.
But then—a breath. A weak, hoarse one.
—————————————————————————————
There was no sound.
No scream. No wandfire. No Harry.Only stillness. Unforgiving and eternal.
When Aster opened his eyes, the world had changed. It was not a place, not really, more like the absence of one.A desert of ash-colored nothing, flat and endless.The sky above was colorless. The ground beneath him was smooth and pale, damp like stone, like it had once been a floor in a room long forgotten by time.
And under his feet—
Cold water.
It was shallow, just above his ankles, still as glass, with no ripple, no sound of movement, no source. It covered the entire land like a sheet of sorrow. The kind of cold that didn't chill your skin but crept into your bones, like it had been there before he was born.
The water reflected nothing, not the light behind him, not the void above, not even his own form. It was anti-light, a mirror that swallowed meaning.
He moved. Slowly.
Each step sent faint disturbances in the water. But no sound, no echo.
The water clung to his feet, each step pulling against him. Like it wanted to remember him. Like it didn't want him to leave.
Somewhere behind him glowed the outline of the place he'd died, a faint golden haze that flickered like candlelight in fog. But when he turned back to look, it felt... far. Less real. Already forgetting him.
Ahead: nothing. Silence. Infinity.
And then, movement. Behind him. Around his legs.
At first, it felt like weeds in the water. Then fingers.Thin. Boneless. Dead.
They tugged. Clutched.
It wasn't fear. Not panic. But finality, the seduction of surrender. The river pulling at the soul, like the Lethe asking to be drunk. A promise of stillness. Of forgetting.
But Aster didn't speak.
He walked.
Dragging those ghost-fingers through the water, footsteps sending ripples like echoes through unremembered graves.
And slowly, the grasp weakened. The thing holding him loosened, not because he overpowered it, but because he refused to stop walking. Because he had purpose.
And then he saw it.
At the edge of the nothing, where light and shadow knotted like a wound, stood a figure.
It looked like him. But taller. Thinner, like stretched parchment.Its hair floated in the air like smoke, ash-grey, Its skin was pale. Its eyes were black voids.
Then it raised its hand and touched his chest, and Aster felt the chill flood into him.
He gasped as light broke through the water, the world shaking like a pond hit by thunder.The light behind him roared forward.
And the cold water—
Was gone.
——————————————————————————————
Aster opened his eyes.
His hair was ash-grey.
"…Ow."
Harry let out a shaky laugh, half-choked with relief. "You prat," he whispered. "You died."
"I got better," Aster murmured, voice strained but steady. "I think I punched a ghost."
His hand lifted slightly. The ash-grey streaks in his hair shimmered faintly with silver, and beneath his skin, veins of subtle light pulsed and faded.