Hi there (^^)/, here I am, keeping my tradition of starting a new story for my birthday (a week too late). The sixth one already. Time flies by, huh.

Warning: Slash, Mpreg, Mentions of abuse, Me ignoring parts of canon... I will add more tags along the way. The rating will eventually go up.

Disclaimer: I don't own any part of the Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts universe, J. K. Rowling does... I just have the books and some merchandise. *sigh*

~ Waterbound ~

Prologue

At first, there was only darkness.

Deep. Black. Encompassing everything. For years upon years, for millennia, it was the only thing in existence.

Then came the light.

Bright. White. Taking over part of the realm of darkness, pushing it back some.

It seemed threatening to the dark, limiting its existence as it was.

However, it was not too long before those two fundamentals of the universe found a satisfying middle ground. Before they came to form an ever-present balance.

Light and dark.

Day and night.

The Sun and the Moon.

At all times either light or the dark was a bit more prevalent than the other, but neither was ever lost.

There was nothing that could snuff light out completely. That could destroy the last flicker that was hope.

There was nothing and no one who would think the darkness wrong, as would later come to be the case.

The thing was, the problems did not start with light.

They started with the Light.

The Light which started profiling itself against the Dark.

The Light which created its own rules.

The Light which did not care much for the balance tried and tested by thousands of years.

The Light... which did not care for anyone but its own.

...

1. The Oasis of Dark in the Sea of Light

That fateful day had started out just like any other.

The sun was shining.

The birds were singing.

Lucius Malfoy was starting his day with a cup of tea.

However even though for the majority of the day that normalcy had remained, by the time the sun was leaning towards the horizon a loud sound made it clear that the day was going to be anything but ordinary.

Something was happening.

"Lucius? Why is the Net wreaking up havoc but nothing is showing up on the map?" a voice echoed throughout the Malfoy manor, most likely enhanced by a Sonorous charm.

It was not a voice one could dare ignore, much like its owner.

However important or not, loud or not, by the time the voice rang through the manor, Lucius Malfoy was already on his feet. Having by-passed the image of never hurrying enough to run, it took the lord only a minute to reach the place both the sound and the voice had come from.

The library.

The library of the Malfoy Manor, where the centre of the so-called Net was.

The Net - or to be more accurate, The Network of Endangered Creatures - was a magical net, which encompassed the entirety of the United Kingdom. The Net itself was rather simple, compared to the difficulty the Malfoy lord had to go through to set it to work and it could be used in several ways; Searching out a specific, known creature; Finding a lost one; Keeping track of one sent on a mission...

The most important role of the Net, however, was the one that had given it its name.

Searching out creatures, who had found themselves in danger.

To aid said purpose the magical net was projected onto a map which was located in the aforementioned Malfoy library.

And in front of that map, Lucius Malfoy found the source of the voice which resonated through his home, waiting for his most trusted follower.

The Dark Lord Voldemort himself.

"Lucius?"

"Immediately, my Lord."

There was no time to be wasted and the Malfoy Lord quickly set to work on several complicated spells to use on the map, the expanse of parchment flashing colours which were everything but clear to understand.

"Given the tone of the alarm, someone had just come into their creature inheritance." Lucius started off his explanation, even as his wand still worked over the map. "The fact it continues to beep and the urgency of it means that the creature is in danger from their transformation. That means they either changed shape which does not agree with their current environment or that are in an environment which is directly harmful to them in their new form."

Lucius wished there was more he could say, but not only were there limits on how much he could get from the map's readings, there was a time limit as well.

The clock was ticking.

"The source of the problem is that they are behind wards. Strong wards. But their location is kept from the Net, and it is sending false locations all over the map."

The alarm kept on beeping, on getting more and more urgent with each minute that passed.

"My Lord if you could call upon Severus," the Malfoy lord asked, his movements harried much like his speech. "While not exactly amiable with most his students he should have general knowledge of who could be coming of age right now. If we had at least an inkling..."

"Rabastan! Your arm!" Voldemort cut the rest of Lucius' sentence off and it was only at the Dark Lord's order that the blonde realised that the continuing sound of alarm drew one more person into the library. It was a good thing really, given he was in the middle of a process where more hands would be helpful, rather than having to relinquish the use of one, if only for a moment.

It took but a minute for the Potions Master of Hogwarts to appear.

"My Lord, what..."

"Severus! How many of your students are of the right age to be coming into their creature inheritance today?"

The man in question was efficient enough to not waste time in asking for a reason for such a question. The alarm which echoed through the manor still, combined with the map he landed in front of and had seen put into action many times, were both more than enough of an answer.

"The earliest some creatures present is at twelve years old. Not all of them turn precisely on their birthday but within a span of a month around the date. That being said, age-wise it would be about forty."

"Non-age-wise?"

"Thirty-four. Six muggleborns."

"Any not in England?"

"Two in Northern Ireland. Three in Wales. One in Scotland."

"That doesn't narrow it down any!" Lucius bit out angry as his movements swept in wide circles over the map. If he could narrow down the area, he'd be able to apply more of the energy of the Net on it and thus be maybe able to see through the wards which were keeping the creature fighting for their life hidden.

"Twins from Northern Ireland just turned thirteen. Unlikely. Girl in Scotland. Fifteen. Less likely, but more than the twins, definitely. Only one of the three in Wales is turning sixteen during the holiday. Most likely of the six."

Even with being able to narrow down the area some - after a quick sweep through those less likely locations - the joined magic of the four countries of UK was still having trouble with pinpointing the newly turned creature somewhere in England.

... and the alarm only kept getting more and more insistent.

...

He couldn't breathe. He couldn't breathe. WHY COULDN'T HE BREATHE!?

He was trying to. So so hard.

To no avail.

Why was the door so far away?

...

"Nothing in Northumberland. Nothing in Durham..."

There was something nerve-wracking on listening to Lucius Malfoy systematically going through the counties of England one by one. Severus couldn't imagine what it was like for the man. Being the one in charge of solving the situation.

"Lincolnshire. Nottinghamshire..."

The Malfoy Lord was about halfway through his sweep when the alarm stopped.

All of a sudden.

Everything went still and silent.

And then the alarm was sounded anew. Yet not the same.

It was less urgent than before. Longer stretches of time passed between one beep and the next.

"What happened?"

...

The water surrounded him whole... Never had he been so grateful to find himself in water.

"Thank you."

...

"What happened?" Rabastan repeated, not having left the library, despite knowing he could do little to help pinpoint the newly awakened creature. "Did he or she..." 'die?' was more than implied in that unfinished question.

"No." Lucius breathed a sigh of relief, uncharacteristically running his hand through his hair. "Someone must have gotten to them. They are still not out of the woods, hence the alarm still going, but the immediate danger is gone."

"What does it mean, Lucius?"

"It could be anything," Severus took over instead as he saw his friend's hands start twitching to complete the search. Motioning Lucius to get to it, the Potions Master resumed speaking. "For example, if the danger had been an assailant, the attacker had been taken out, but the creature is still in a dangerous area."

"Norfolk. Suffolk..."

"If the danger had something to do with a need of contact, someone had come for them. Some creatures are social to death. Quite literally, unfortunately enough. However, the alarm still being on would mean that while there is sufficient contact for immediate survival, there is not enough of others to completely stabilise them."

"Cornwall. Devon..."

"If it was a matter of environment, likely an immediate need of fire or water, the alarm change would mean that a temporary solution had been found."

"Damn it!"

The two Death Eaters and their master turned to the Malfoy lord, who furiously waved his wand over a considerably smaller portion of the map compared to what he started out with.

"They have to be in one of the home counties!" he cried out, before cursing again. "But even concentrating all the magic of the Net does not tell me which one! I only got as far as ruling out Essex. Damn it all!"

It was understandable for Lucius to be stressed out, Severus knew. But why was he behaving so strange?

"How hard can it be to find one child? Why are they so heavily warded?"

As the four men gathered around the map something clicked for one Severus Snape.

The so-called home counties, the areas surrounding London.

Someone who was born in the summer, in all likelihood at the end of July, it being the 31st of July after all.

Someone behind wards so strong even majority of the magic of the Net could not get to them, despite being powered by the Dark Lord himself.

London.

The remaining counties.

And in the centre of it...

Surrey.

'Born as the seventh month dies.'

"You have got to be kidding me." the Potions Master muttered to himself as he glared at the map.

"Severus?"

"Out of those thirty-four students, only four live in that area."

Thinking about it later, the Potions Master was surprised that neither of the gathered men thought of who the creature turned out to be.

They all knew of a child whose birthday was right in the middle of the summer, one who all of them knew was born sixteen years ago. But who would have thought...?

"And I think I know exactly who it is."

Knowing full-well that three pairs of eyes were trained on him, Severus Snape did the only possible thing he could...

"I will return shortly."

He apparated.

Here it is, the first part. Thoughts? Constructive criticism welcomed!

Sending a big Thank you! to every single person who decided to give this a try.

See ya ("-.-)/