Warning(s): Slash, really short chapter.
AN: No update next month. I know, I know, I seemingly can't keep a promise or fixed updates, but the upcoming weeks will be packed with due papers, midterms and whatnots - so I really won't have enough time to write.
Eyes On Me
the ceremony of innocence is drowned
3.
The man standing before him in the misty mirror was unfamiliar.
His eyes cynically stripped him bare and laid down his flaws.
Harry swept his wet hair back and dragged his fingers through the knots – relishing the sensation of cool water dripping down his exposed neck to his sore back – and hazily thought that it's been too long since he had the chance to take an unhurried, thorough shower.
Out of necessity, shortage of time, and lack of resources – for essential activities such as eating and showering were something they could no longer afford to do leisurely - they made do with overusing cleansing charms that chafed skin and reproduced sustenance in excessive means to the point they almost forgot what 'flavor' was. The weak-willed refused to consume the staled food and went to battles starved and malnourished. They never returned.
So it was with a soft groan of bliss that he sank in the tub, and almost considered the thought of staying under until the last breath departed his battered body.
Almost.
He'd cut the piece of bread that arrived with the room service into even smaller bits and dipped them one by one into a small bottle of honey, carefully measured each sip of milk even when he only wanted to fall down on the meager, but flavored, meal like a starved man – which, to be perfectly honest, he is – but held himself back.
Now he stands before the grimy mirror and stares.
His disheveled hair – after a long period of neglect – had grown to fall down in uneven cascades over his taut shoulders and rest below the blades, his face scruffy with weeks' worth of unshaved fuzz, and wounds untended, left to bleed and ooze pus scattered all over his body.
What a pathetic reflection.
He sighed, summoned his wand from the soiled robes and began the tedious task of cleaning up.
The muggles of this time were awfully trusting – despite this being a dingy room in a shady corner, but still – the motel's manager did not ask unnecessary questions when he slid an envelope, encouraging him to remain silent about his alarming appearance, over the sorry excuse of a reception desk.
In his era, muggles learnt the hard way how to deal with the majority of the Wizarding kind - shoot first and ask later.
He tided up the mess after him, vanished the bloodied rags and washed off the crimson trails in the bath, unbolted the window to the air the tiny room, and then hesitantly approached the bed pushed into the corner.
It's been forty-six hours since he last managed to catch three hours of restless sleep.
He shook his head, summoned the potions' carrier and selected a Sleeping Draught, he chugged the content of the vial, barely managed to wave the carrier back before he instantly fell unconscious on the bed.
.
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4.
Icy toes skimmed his bared leg, trailed along his shin until they reached his ankle. His face twitched, before he buried his head in the inflated pillow with a groan.
A soft chuckle tickled his ear, and elongated fingers buried themselves in his nest of a hair, nails pleasantly scratching at his scalp.
"'od off," he grumbled, but did not shake the fingers off.
"That's not a nice thing to say, Potter."
Harry turned his head and glared through the slit of his eyes at the drawl.
Incoming breeze softly parted the snowy curtains, permitting sunlight to creep in the room. Amused greys stared back at him, the hazy scenery behind him forming a halo of light around his hair – akin to a holy idol.
He must have said it out loud, for his eyes thawed in fondness.
"Then you should worship me," the insolent slant of his swollen lips tempted him, and he surged from the covers to gladly comply.
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Harry opened his eyes.
He resolutely refused to acknowledge the stickiness of his face.
After a shuddering breath – he slowly left the cramped bed and stretched, popping his bones with satisfying cracks.
There was a rustle near the door, and he turned to see a newspaper slid from underneath the gap. He summoned it while sitting gingerly on a squeaky chair, what light could penetrate the shabby curtains fell on the cover, allowing him to read with semi-clarity.
Huge Heat Wave Is Approaching, said the headline on a Daily Mail paper. Harry blinked incomprehensibly at it, before absentmindedly skimming through the pages. In the current month of June, Britain and Iceland reached the end of the Cod War, a company called the British Leyland launches its innovative new Rover SD1, whatever what was that. Possibly a new type of vehicle?
A suspected republican bombing kills two Protestant civilians in a pub, the Ulster Volunteer Force kill five civilians in a gun and bomb attack at the Chlorane Bar, North Ireland. Bobby Hackett, jazz cornetist/orchestra leader (Air time '57), dies at 61… and many other noteworthy and insignificant things.
No mentions of inexplicable deaths or sudden disappearances. Either someone was deliberately covering the wide massacres happening due to Voldemort's crusade against the muggles and muggleborns, or the Dark Lord was cautious – which was unlikely – or… it was disguised as something else as to not cause widespread panic for the public.
He went back to trifling through the papers, with more regard to details.
He found them. Occurring mine falls, landslides, vicious viruses, gas explosions, and other seemingly 'natural' causes.
Because everyone accepted natural deaths, unfortunate deaths, but natural nonetheless and thus weren't questioned, nor were they ever doubted.
Someone at the Ministry of Magic was doing their job splendidly.
He threw the paper away in disgust.
"Tempus,"
09:14 AM. Wednesday, June 8, 1976.
Harry sighed and dragged himself up.
Time to visit Diagon Alley.
AN: Quote under title is from Yeats' Second Coming.
See you next year... kidding. Or not.