A/N: Here's the neter! Which also means the four chapters are up on my Patreon for early access as well as the ce to vote on the dire of the story!

  I didn't inally intend for this entire chapter to take p Rita's head, but hopefully people like it lol. Ritual ime.

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  Rita’s breath hitches as Harry pces his hand on her cheek, her pupils diting as she looks into those bright green eyes of his.

  She’s not unaware of how most people see her. Oh sure, she has her readers, else she wouldn’t have a job at the Daily Prophet to begin with, but even among her fanbase, she knew most were in it more for the sdalous nature of the things she wrote, rather than out of any great love or even like for her personally.

  Heh, she certainly wasn’t getting stopped oreets to sign autographs like say, Gilderoy Lockhart before his act or anything like that. But Rita had always been okay with that. She’d like to the sequences of speaking ‘truth to power’ as she liked to put it.

  … But deep down inside, she knew better. She k ate away at her. Not only being unliked, but also being unloved. Deep down, she just wanted a modicum of the human e that others seemed to naturally have with one another. Unfortunately her own ambition had ruihat for her all the way back at the beginning, on her first day at Hogwarts, School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

  Funnily enough, something nobody knew about Rita was that she’d inally wao be in Hufflepuff back then. She’d never had friends before, never gotten to py with children her own age in all her first eleven years of life. A whole Hogwarts House full of friends had appealed to her in a way the other Houses hadn’t, and her younger self had really quite hoped that Hufflepuff would be where she wound up.

  That was, until she’d gotten up oool and had the S Hat dropped upon her head. It had spoken to her then. To this day, Rita didn’t quite know if she ecial or not. Talking about one’s experiences with the S Hat was sidered so much of a taboo that even Rita knew better than to try and interrogate others on theirs.

  Regardless, when it came to her, the S Hat did something she thought was very special indeed… it gave her a choice. It looked into her mind and saw her desire to be in Hufflepuff… and then it offered her an alternative option.

  “Sure you could have all the friends you might desire in Hufflepuff… but you have an ambition to you, my dear. An ambition that could see you much further… in Slytherin.”

  Slytherin. Rita didn’t have a bad opinion of the House or anything like that. She ureblood after all, so it wasn’t like she o worry about prejudice. And… as much as she wanted friends, she WAS ambitious. Her parents had instilled that ihe desire to always be reag for more. It was just the way the world worked in the end. You either gobbled up all you could or were the one who was gobbled up in turn for your pcy.

  Friends… friends were nice, but ambition was forever. And so Rita had listeo the Hat’s advid gone along with his idea. She’d accepted his offer and been sorted into House Slytherin.

  Almost immediately, Rita had discovered the choice to be something poisonous. Slytherin hadn’t seemed that foreboding until she was actually in it only to realize that everything in the House of Snakes ower struggle. At the tender age of eleven, Rita had been old enough to uand that her parents were social climbers who were always grasping for more… but she hadn’t been old enough to realize they were very small fish in a very rge sea, with several yers of far greater influence, wealth, and power above them.

  Entering House Slytherin as a lowly first year, and possibly the lowest oem pole even among her own year, had taught Rita that valuable lesson very, very quickly. Desperate to be needed, desperate to be useful even if she wasn’t liked, loved, or appreciated, Rita had turo the ohing she was good at… snooping.

  It didn’t help her inal goal of getting friends, of course. Not o. She couldn’t have it both ways, Rita had eventually e to realize. She couldn’t have her ambitions AND friends. So she’d dropped the tter in exge for the former, and she’d bee something of a spy for the older years in the House.

  Most of the time, she tried to keep her snooping and rumering focused oher Hogwarts Houses. You don’t shit where you eat, and all that. But that was just the public fag side of her ‘business’. There was also the other side, where she’d worked to provide more private, destine information on her own housemates to certain well-paying individuals.

  Over her years at Hogwarts, Rita had learned so many valuable lessons that had served her well all her life. But most importantly of all was the lesson that friendship… friendship was a trap. A great lie. And one she wanted nothing to do with.

  … Or so she had thought. She’d been fine before she found herself trapped in Harry Potter’s web. Truly, she had been. Okay, so maybe she hadn’t beeirely well, but she’d been good enough.

  Unfortunately, ever since she allowed herself to be drawn into Harry’s maations, things had ged. It had started off small, with her being rather surprised that he wasn’t ht bckmailing her with knowledge of her status as an illegal animagus. Rita had always known that being an animagus withistering might eventually e back to bite her in the ass.

  That said, the bes had far outweighed the risks. If everyone knew Rita Skeeter was a Beetle Animagus, they would have known recautions to take to keep her away from their private affairs. The amount of spying she’d mao get dohe sheer volume of secrets and juicy pieces of gossip she’d uncovered over the years… it was worth it. It had to be worth it.

  But Harry didn’t even want to take advantage of his knowledge regarding her animagus form. Instead, he’d offered a retionship of venience, and ohat Rita hadn’t really thought twice about. Sexual favors in exge for exclusive stories from the Boy-Who-Lived himself? An insanely good deal, to say the least. It was a win-win, really!

  … Except, Rita hadn’t realized just how much of a ‘win-win’ it would be until it was far too te. inally, her expectation was that she would be the one doing the pleasuring in exge for information… and of course, the ce to one day maybe use those sexual escapades with Harry for her own game, maybe in a ‘tell-all’ memoir or something.

  Shame? What was that? Could you eat it? Or rather… that’s what Rita WOULD have said. Instead, Harry had wound up doing more of the pleasuring than Rita could have thought. And for the first time, she found herself in a retionship that made her feel good… better than good, it made her feel great in ways Rita’s cold, bck heart hadn’t even knoossible.

  It wasn’t fair. She was like a dog seeing in bd white all her life, only for Harry to e along and i color into the vas of her existence. She’d thought she was happy… until he’d showime and time again what true happiness was.

  And of course, on top of that he’d giveory after story that was… well, delicious didn’t even really cover it. More than that, the stories were… well, they were good. Not just good for sales, but good in a way that actually beed and improved their society in general. Corruption at the Ministry excised. An i Lord of an A and Noble House exoed of the crimes he didn’t it.

  For on her life, Rita’s work was actually doing what she had alrete did and speaking truth to ACTUAL power. For on her life, she was writing articles that actually improved the state of affairs, rather than simply tearing people down.

  And then, st night happened. Of course Rita had goo the Yule Ball, and of course she’d done so in her Beetle Form. That amount of young people in one pce? It was going to be juicy; she just k. And of course, she’d focused on the Champions and their dates.

  To her credit, she hadn’t focused on Harry and his date initially. In defereo their deal, Rita had left them alone and focused instead oher three sets. But mostly on Fleur Decour. The French Witch was just too perfect. Rita hated how beautiful she was and wanted more than anything to have an excuse to tear her to shreds in the Prophet.

  So yes, she’d followed Fleur around. Yes, she’d watched as the part vee sent her date off on a wild goose chase and thehe Great Hall aered the gardens. For a moment, Rita had wondered if Fleur had a secret lover of some sort she nning to rendezvous with in the Hardens. That had been the juiciest idea iransformed witch’s head.

  Instead… it was Harry and Hermiohat Fleur and thereafter Rita stumbled upon. Harry Potter, receiving head from Hermione Granger. Sdalous. Utterly sdalous. And more so when Fleur was drawn into the mix, joining them both. How depraved! Terribly debauched!

  It was hirious, watg the Beauxbatons Champion try to take trol of the enter, knowing what she knew about Harry. It was rather arousing, watg Harry shut Fleur down in turn, and basically walk Grahrough dominating the French Witch right then and there. Amusing was a good word for Hermione Granger’s piddling attempts at taking trol, but in the end it didn’t matter when she had Harry’s bag and Fleur Decour arently desperate for his seed.

  Not that Rita was all that surprised. She knew from personal experiehat there was something special about Harry Potter. Something… undeniable. The more time she spent with him, the more she found herself in bed with him, the more she craved it, just like Fleur had.

  It was the story of the decade even with her ret stories. Even with the sdal involving Fudge and Lord Bck, this was still so much… bigger. And sure, it said something rather deplorable about the Wizarding World that that was true, but Rita didn’t care. Or rather, she shouldn’t have cared.

  It was just like she’d told Harry. She should have had that story written and published by the m, a she hadn’t. Instead, she’d arrahis meeting with Harry out here in the Forbidden Forest, hoping to catch him off-bance, hoping to take him away from Hogwarts, from the pce where he seemed to have so much power.

  Only, her ploy had failed entirely. He’d arrived ahead of schedule, somehoed her under an invisible ford forced her to transform back. His power didn’t e from Hogwarts, and she’d been fooling herself if she ever thought it did. Harry Potter brought his power with him wherever he went.

  Rita isn’t stupid. She uands that there’s a threat to her life here in this moment. If she doesn’t give Harry what he wants, if she doesn’t say what he wants to hear, she might not make it out of these woods alive.

  She wishes she could say that influences her decision. She wishes she could say she intends to py along, to pretend to submit so that she find another opportunity ter on to make her escape and take her revenge.

  … But that isn’t the case. In the end, the truth is far simpler. The truth is… Rita has fallen for Harry Potter. For all his darkness, for all his youth, for all his schemes, he’s the first man in her life… nay, he’s the first person in her life to make her feel this way. To make her feel… pretty muything at all.

  She ’t go back to bd white now that she’s experienced color. She ’t go back to that monoe existenow that she’s had such vibrancy these past months. Letting out a shuddering breath, Rita leans even more into Harry’s palm than she already was, staring into those beautiful emerald eyes of his.

  “P-Promise not to abandon me?”

  Harry smiles at that, his thumb rubbing along her pronounced cheekbone.

  “I promise, Rita. Submit to me and I will bring us so closely together that her of us will be able to abandoher. You will be by my side forever, for the rest of your life.”

  Ominous. Rita isn’t so unobservant that she fails to miss that. Ahere’s a siy in Harry’s voice as well. Despite suinous nguage, he really means every word. If she submits, if she gives herself to him willingly, then she will always have a pce by his side. The her of a year ago would never have cared about something like that, of course. But the her of now?

  Slowly, Rita sinks down to her khere in the middle of the forest. Harry watches her go, his hand remaining on her cheek all the while. Maintaining eye tact with him, the bloch shows her submission in the only way that makes seo her. She pulls open Harry’s robes, unbuttons and unzips his pants, and pulls out his cock.

  Then, she takes it into her mouth. Slowly, tenderly, expressing her adoration aion as much as anything else, Rita begins to felte Harry Potter. Right there in the middle of the Forbidden Forest, she submissively sucks his cock.

  He smiles down at her, his hand on her cheek transitioning to the top of her head. His fingers wind through her hair, scratg against her scalp in a way that nearly causes Rita’s eyes to roll up in her head in pleasure. He doesn’t take trol though, allowio tinue expressing her submission to him through her own as as.

  As Rita bobs up and down Harry’s cock, she knows there’s n baow. And that… that’s okay. Because for the first time in Rita’s life, she feels like maybe, just maybe, she’s found something to fill the gaping, yawning hole in her heart.

  -x-X-x- The Vote: [ ] Stick with Rita's POV - 22%[X] Switch to Harry's POV - 52%[ ] Switch to Bel's POV - 26%

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