Harry Potter - Series Fan Fiction ❯ Harry Potter and (the rest of) The Beast Within ❯ Chapter (IDEFK): Happy Birthday, Sapphire! ( Chapter 6 )

You know the drill. I don't own shit. I don't even own a decent pair of shoes, let alone Harry Potter.

**************************************************************************

Chapter (IDEFK): Happy Birthday, Sapphire!

Saturday morning, Sapphire awoke in her room. She looked over her shoulder. Still clothed, Harry lay under the covers behind her, his slight frame molded to hers perfectly, and his arms wrapped around her. His unruly black hair was a mess, sticking up in places, and he had a soft, contented smile on his face. He still slept. She glanced over at the clock on the wall, and relaxed, realizing that it wasn’t even seven o’clock yet. She sighed softly, and nestled back against him. She had no idea how they even got under the covers...The last thing she remembered was lying there in his arms, talking about their future together.

For a while, she just lay there in Harry’s arms, dozing off and on, reveling in pure bliss. After about ten minutes, she felt Harry’s lips brush the nape of her neck. She gently rolled over to face him, and breathed in his unique, masculine scent, letting her breath leave her in a half-sigh. “Good Morning, Love,” Harry murmured next to her ear, his breath rustling the fine pale golden hairs at her hairline.

“Good Morning, Harry,” Sapphire answered softly, snuggling in closer. Suddenly, the door flew open. Harry pulled the covers back over Sapphire, and looked up.

“Hey Sapphire, is Harry in...OHMYGOD!” Ron raced back out of the room. “I’M BLIND! I’M BLIND!”

“Oh, give it a rest, Ron,” Hermione chided as she came into the room. “They slept in their clothes. Sapphire and Harry aren’t the kind of couple to have sex and wake up late for breakfast, still stark naked!” She turned around to look at them. “Are you?” They shook their heads and said nothing, though Sapphire was aching to say, “No, we’re the kind of couple to wake up, screw each other senseless in this very bed, and come down to breakfast reeking of sex.” After all, they HAD done that on Christmas morning!

“Is there a reason you brought him up here, Hermione?” Harry asked, rolling his eyes as Ron banged his head against the door, trying to rid himself of the mental image of Harry and Sapphire ass naked in one another’s arms.

“He followed me. I came to see if you two were coming down for breakfast.” Sapphire nodded, and pulled herself to a sitting position, her satin-clad legs hanging over the edge of the bed. “Well, we’ll see you at breakfast. Oh, and Sapphire?” She looked up. “Peridot suggests that you LOCK THE DOOR next time Harry spends the night.” Hermione finished smugly. Sapphire’s cheeks darkened greatly and Harry paled. With that, Hermione left, shutting the door behind her. Harry climbed out of the bed and began pacing frantically.

“Harry, what’s wrong?” Sapphire asked nervously.

“She’sgonnakillme, she’sgonnakillme, she’sgonnakillme...” he whimpered, wringing his hands.

“Who?” Sapphire asked bewildered.

“PERIDOT!” he exclaimed, throwing his arms into the air. Sapphire laughed softly as he began pacing again, and walked over to him, taking him into her arms from the back.

“Relax, Koibito,” she purred into his left ear. “She’s my SISTER, not my MOTHER!” His eyes widened in fear.

“She’s gonna tell your MOTHER, and SHE’S gonna kill me!’ Sapphire’s smile faded, and she sat down on the windowsill, fighting back the tears. “Uh, Sapphire?” Harry asked, noticing her sudden change of mood. “What’s wrong?”

“My mother can’t kill you; neither can my father or my stepfather.” He looked confused.

“Why not?”

“My father died when I was an infant. Mother died in the war, and my stepfather, Iris and Azalea’s father, died of grief. The only direct family I have left are Peridot and Crystal. Iris and Azalea went through something similar...their mother died when Azalea was born, their father married my mother, and he died when Mother died.” A tear finally leaked down her cheek, and Harry smoothed it away. She couldn’t think of anything to say. Finally, she settled on asking a question that had bothered her for quite a while.

            “Harry?” she asked as he sat down in the window beside her. “When we first met...You were hardly surprised when you found out that I wasn’t human. You weren’t afraid, or shocked, or even confused, whereas most people in your situation would have had me drummed out of town. Why?” He shrugged.

“I’ve seen PLENTY of weird stuff over my lifetime. A Salzain woman who’s more beautiful and more perfect than ANY of the women I know is not among those things.” He smiled. “I could tell from the start, Sapphire, that you would be the one I’d live my life with, come Hell or high water.” He traced along the curve of her quivering jaw, and pulled her close. “From undead winged horses, to a school for witchcraft and wizardry, to a woman blatantly refusing to go out with Draco Malfoy...” he grinned. “...the weirdness never ends.” She giggled for a moment, and allowed him to pull her into his arms. “Now I’ve got a question for YOU.” He fidgeted nervously. She looked up at him. “The other night...at the dance...were you nervous?” He turned to the door so she couldn’t see the worry and blush on his face. She smiled softly at him, and pulled him close for a short kiss.

“More than you could imagine. You?”

“I nearly passed out!” he chuckled.

“You didn’t need to, Koibito. No matter what you do, I’ll never be able to regain the part of my heart I gave to you.”

“I wouldn’t give it back if I could,” he murmured, inching his lips closer to hers. “I keep it with me at all times.” His soft smile became a smart-assed smirk. “I’m holding it hostage until YOU return MY heart!”

“You talk too much,” she purred, closing the distance between their lips, just as Ron walked back through the door.

“AHHH!” he screamed, racing blindly down the stairs. “I’m blind! I’m blind!”

**************************************************************************

(NM)MNK – This chapter was unfinished and will remain unfinished, but I can give you the gist of it, and the next few that languished unwritten.

A few months pass with little excitement. Crystal took the first dose of antidote under the supervision of Snape, Pomfrey, and Flitwick; Flitwick and Pomfrey studied her body’s reactions to the antidote and were able to determine which hex was combined with the poison. Armed with that knowledge, they wove a counter-curse into several more doses of antidote, each to be delivered once weekly. Over the months following that first dose, Crystal grew progressively sicker and weaker, but strangely, her non-physical symptoms began easing. Although she tells no one and no one can tell, she also began recovering scattered fragments of memories although they didn’t make much sense to her.

Meanwhile, Harry and Hermione begin noticing Sapphire exhibiting behavior that doesn’t quite fit her. She starts getting aggressive, snappy, and overly protective of Harry, and seemingly getting lost in thought at strange times. Hermione insists they should tell someone, but Harry, like a dumbass, says she’s fine and swears her to secrecy. No one has gotten hurt, so they decide to wait it out…because children make excellent decisions like that.

After months of Crystal growing progressively sicker, Sapphire gets it into her head to cheer her up with an offer to beat her senseless. (“Spar with me! Hitting me makes you happy, right? I’m a selfless Mary Sue who just wants to see you smile, especially if I suffer for it! :D) Crystal’s response? “As much as I love the idea of vomiting blood on you at Mach 12, I’m not in the mood. Go bone your boyfriend.” Harry comforts the patron saint of Sue-ness in secret. Meanwhile, Crystal sits out by the lake with Blaise and wonders why she feels like she just hurt someone’s feelings and why she feels sorry for it. (I don’t know, maybe because she’s your sister and you’re not a sociopath.) Not long after this, her physical symptoms begin improving by leaps and bounds.