DISCLAIMER: If you recognize it, then it isn't mine. I just play with the characters. Sadly my bank account does not show any influx from my works.
AUTHOR NOTE: I must have restarted this chapter 5 different times. I kept getting way off from what I wanted. Hopefully you still enjoy this one!
Valkyrie
Chapter 16: it's Magic!
Previously:
"What the hell was that? And where in the hell are we?" She rasped out.
"Hello Nat. Good to see you again. Clint, it appears for once you are the one caught off guard." Hermione chuckled.
"Helen?"
"Actually, it's Hermione. Hermione Granger."
XXXX
Bill and Hermione led Clint and Nat into the cottage where Fleur had tea waiting for them in the living room. Having recovered from the sudden kidnapping, Clint held his cup in his hands trying to figure out where to start.
"Ok so someone better start explaining. Starting with who you all are, what that was, and how do we avoid doing that again?"
Hermione giggled. Bill held out his hand. "Well if you didn't catch it earlier, I'm Bill Weasley. This is my wife Fleur. That is Harry Potter. And well you know Hermione, aka Helen."
Hermione answered the rest. "That was a form of travel we use often, known as a portkey. I am sorry it was a sudden jarring, but it was the best solution we could come up with."
"Where are we?" Nat asked.
"This is my home, Shell Cottage. We are currently on the outskirts of Tinworth, Cornwall, near the coast." Bill said.
"Cornwall, as in England?"
"Yes."
"How did we get all the way here from New York?"
"Magic." Hermione said mischievously.
They were met with silence, eyes darting between them in search of any sign that would show they were joking.
"Magic," the four magical folk clarified.
"Magic?" Clint echoed disbelievingly.
"Yes magic does exist, it's just kept a secret and hidden from the world. We have our own communities, villages, towns and cities. We have our own government, schools, hospitals and banks, modes of transport, medication, laws, sports, music. We have doctors, professional athletes, policemen, lawyers, musicians, teachers, bankers and accountants, shop owners, animal preservationists. We have everything you do only we have magic to aid with our day to day life and we're hidden from you."
Clint was shocked. A whole world hidden. What exactly did that mean? Was it like the Mutant society? He had to know more.
"Magic, like pull a rabbit out of a hat magic or Professor Xavier type magic?"
Hermione and the others shared a confused look.
Harry shrugged. "Well I am not sure who this Professor is, or what his magic is like. But I doubt it is the same as our magic, considering it's against the law to reveal magic to muggles."
"Muggles?"
"A muggle is a human that doesn't possess any magical ability."
"What are you?" He asked with a narrowed gaze.
"I'm a witch, as is Fleur. Bill and Harry are wizards."
"A witch? Like Wicca?" Nat asked.
"No. Wicca is a faith or religion, based on a reverence of nature, the practice of magic, and the worship of a deity. While Fleur and I are witches, Bill and Harry are wizards. We are born with our magic. We use a wand to harness our magic and focus our spells."
Clint watched as Helen pulled a stick from her sleeve and said something he didn't understand. His eyes almost popped out of his head when a blue flame appeared in her outstretched hand.
"This is a bluebell flame. It doesn't burn, but provides heat, and light. It is also waterproof. Go ahead, touch it. It won't hurt you."
Clint reached out and stopped just short of touching the blue flames. He could feel the heat coming from them, but could easily see her hand was not being burned. Steeling himself he stretched his fingertips out. They went into the flames, yet he felt no pain. It was incredible. Nat was next to him touching the flames too.
"I thought witches were supposed to have green skin, a pointy hat, boils and warts and a black cat? Go around turning people into toads and flying on a broom?" Clint questioned.
"No, all of that's a load of stereotypical rubbish. Well, I admit we do fly on brooms, me however, never had the talent for it. I prefer to keep my feet on the ground. We do have pointed hats but we only wear them in school for special occasions. We do also have familiars, usually a cat, owl or toad. I had Crookshanks."
"Others called him the reincarnation of Satan," Harry added with a smirk.
"He wasn't that bad," Hermione cried.
"He attacked anyone that wasn't you, me, Sirius or Remus. And even then, he took a swipe at Remus a few times."
"He was a good judge of character; he brought us Sirius, didn't he?"
Harry's expression softened. "Yes, yes, he did."
"What's a 'Crookshanks' and where is it?" Nat asked.
"He was my cat. He was part kneazle, a magical breed. He died during the war."
"War?" Clint echoed.
Sadness washed over the others in the room, their posture stiffening.
"Yes, a war," Fleur said softly.
"You now know that we are witches and wizards. There was a war, a truly terrible one. There is always good and evil in the world. In the Wizarding World, we have four classifications, or blood statuses. First, we have a Squib, which is a child born to magical parents but the child does not possess magic themselves or has very little magical potential and as such, they tend to live their lives here in the Muggle World, away from magic and amongst the muggles.
Next, we have Muggleborns, which are magical folk that are born to muggles, humans without magic. My biological parents were without magic, I am a Muggleborn. Then we have Half-bloods, which are born to either one muggle and one magical parent, or two magical and none Pureblooded parents, which I'll mention in a moment."
"I'm a Half-blood," Harry told them. "My mother was a muggleborn and my father a pureblood wizard."
"And finally we have Purebloods, which are magical folk that are comprised of solely magical lineage with zero muggle ancestry and the older Pureblood families can trace their magical lines back centuries, some even millennia."
"I am a Pureblood," Bill shrugged.
"Most Purebloods look down on anyone who is not a Pureblood. They think less of us. Some Purebloods even think that muggleborns stole their magic. Hench the appearance of squibs. Obviously that isn't true."
"Wait." Clint said. "Does that mean that Bill's family thinks that way? And I noticed you didn't say what status Fleur was."
"My family are Purebloods yes. But in our world we are called blood traitors because we do not follow all the supremacy beliefs."
"I am what you would call half-human. I am a quarter Veela."
"What's a Veela?" Clint asked curiously.
"Veela are semi-human magical beings. They have the appearance of young, beautiful women usually with white-gold hair and moon-bright skin. They have the ability to hypnotise and mesmerise most men with their seductive dance, who will then try to impress them." Hermione explained.
Clint shifted uncomfortably as he looked away from Fleur. "Don't worry! You have nothing to fear in that regard. I do not use my abilities." Fleur soothed.
"When Veela are angered, they transform into something more like Harpies — a bird like creature. Their faces turn into cruel-beaked bird-like heads while long scaly wings burst from their shoulders, and they can launch balls of fire from their hands. It really is quite scary. Good thing Fleur is on our side, yes?" Hermione joked.
"Now that you know of the different blood groups and the blood supremacy that we face in our world, we shall explain the war," Bill spoke, nodding to Hermione in encouragement.
"Well, decades ago, a dark wizard known as Lord Voldemort emerged. No one had seen anything like him. Imagine Hitler, but with magic. Voldemort had a hatred for everything, and I mean everything. He craved power and knowing of the beliefs most Purebloods held. He was charismatic and drew them to his side, using their wealth and power for his own personal gain. He started a war in which Muggleborns and Muggles were targeted for torture and murder. He wanted to exterminate us and our filthy blood," she spat. "Purebloods that stood against him and his followers, Death Eaters, were labelled as blood traitors."
"That's me, I'm a blood traitor," Bill joked proudly as he raised his hand high, sending her a wink. Her mouth twitched into a smile and she sniggered at him.
"Well, they were targeted, too, and unless He believed they could be persuaded to join his side, they were killed. Don't get me wrong; the majority of his followers joined his cause willingly but we know some were forced through the Imperius Curse or blackmail."
"What's the imperius do?" Clint asked.
"There's many forms and branches of magic in existence, but the majority of them fall into three categories. Light Magic which is good, Grey Magic which is the middle ground, maybe a little dodgy and then Dark Magic, which is known for its horrendous and life taking curses. There is a fourth category, the Unforgivable Curses. There are three of them and the use of any one of them is an automatic prison sentence in Azkaban, and it's certainly a place everyone wishes to avoid."
Harry continued, "Azkaban sits on a rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. It is guarded by dark creatures known as dementors and they feed on every bit of happiness in a person, sucking it out of their bodies, causing them to relive their crimes. They hear and see every person they have ever wronged or harmed, every minute of every day." Hermione's hand had moved to grip Harrys' tightly.
"If a sentence of the dementor's kiss is given, you will be but a shell of a human being, you can't eat, speak, sleep, or function really. They suck out the soul and feast on it, stealing a person's very life force."
"The three Unforgivables are the Imperius Curse which is basically, mind control. It allows the caster to get inside the victim's mind and control every action or word and the victim is powerless. Death Eaters are known for using it on families that stand against them. Many Death Eaters claimed they had been imperiused after the first Wizarding War." Bill explained.
"The second is the Cruciatus Curse," Hermione said quietly, flashbacks of Malfoy Manor haunting her mind. "It's the Torture Curse. To cast it you have to wish for the most unimaginable pain to be projected on the victim, you have to hate them so much that you want them to suffer. If you suffer under it long enough, you'll be begging for death just so the pain stops." Fleur and Harry both reached for her hands. "It feels as though white-hot knives are carving into you, as though your blood is being boiled and every bone in your body is being shattered into a million pieces, like you're choking, suffocating on your own blood."
"You speak as though you have experience with it," Nat said quietly.
"I do; several experiences," she whispered.
"The final Unforgivable Curse is the Killing Curse," Harry finished. "As you can imagine, it is instant death if you are hit with it. The majority of magical spells can be blocked or deflected, but these three can't be. If one is heading in your direction, you either get out of the way and quickly or you're struck, your life is over no matter the curse."
"We've gone way off topic," Hermione said.
"Voldemort gathered followers and he used them to do his dirty work. These followers, called Death Eaters, had no problems using the Unforgivables on anyone. Voldemort even used it on his own followers and still the dunderheads worshipped him. Over the years his forces doubled and he became bolder in his movements." Bill said.
"My parents had just graduated Hogwarts. Albus Dumbledore, the Headmaster of Hogwarts, created a secret organisation, named the Order of the Phoenix. The Order was dedicated to defeating Voldemort and protecting the innocents." Harry explained.
"In our world, the Wizarding World, there are ways to predict the future. Centaurs use Astronomy- yes centaurs are real," Hermione said, noticing their shocked expressions. "We have Seers and we take Divination classes for it at school."
"Which she hated," Harry snarked..
"Trelawney was not a Seer! She was a fraud! Please, predicting your constant death, and that Neville's gran was ill. Honestly, what a load of absolute rubbish..."
Bill cleared his throat, stopping Hermione's words.
"Sorry," she muttered, cheeks flushing.
"Anyway, a prophecy was made which stated a child that was born as the seventh month dies would be the end of Voldemort. Of course, him being the nutter he was, when he discovered this, he targeted all families with a child that was born towards the end of July. James Potter married a Muggleborn witch, Lily Evans, and they had a little boy, Harry." Hermione smiled affectionately at her brother. "Voldemort narrowed it down to the Potters and our friend Neville's parents, the Longbottoms."
"Alice and Frank Longbottom were good people, two of the best Aurors of the time," Bill injected.
"Aurors?"Clint asked confused.
"Magical policemen," he explained and they nodded in understanding. "Their son, Neville was born the day before Harry. Death Eaters broke into their house and tortured them with the Cruciatus. They survived, but barely. They were tortured to the point of insanity. They've been in St. Mungo's psychiatric ward ever since."
"St. Mungos?" Nat asked quietly.
"Magical hospital," he muttered.
"Neville was raised by his Grandmother," Hermione picked up, a fond tone to her voice. "The Potters had been placed in a safe house a year prior,shortly after Harry was born. We have a form of magic that can hide a property so that it exists only to those that are told the address by the Secret Keeper. Only those who know the secret can see the property or enter and exit. The Secret Keeper is the only one who can tell the address to another. Even if you know it yourself, you won't be able to tell anyone. We call it the Fidelius Charm."
"There were only five people that knew of the address for the safe house. James and Lily, Sirius, Dumbledore and Peter Pettigrew, he was the fourth member of my father's group," Harry said.
"On October 31st 1989, the Secret Keeper betrayed the Potters. Voldemort showed up, killing my father, James, who was unarmed. My mother Lily was in my nursery and she sacrificed herself for me. Refusing to step aside and throwing herself in front of the Killing Curse. Voldemort turned his wand on me to do the same, but something went wrong. The Killing Curse backfired and struck Voldemort, and a one-year-old baby, saved the wizarding world," Harry explained, letting out a ragged breath.
XXXX
Nat's head was reeling. A whole world, completely hidden from view. A war S.H.I.E.L.D knew nothing about. It baffled her how they were able to keep everything hidden. And now, because of a mother's love, a child had saved them. She felt for Harry. How his young life had been turned upside down in the blink of an eye. She stole a glance at Harry.
"Sirius, Harry's Godfather was arrested for not only killing Pettigrew, who was their Secret Keeper, but also for killing James and Lily and twelve innocent muggles. He didn't do it. He was set up. The Aurors believed that Sirius was the Secret Keeper, and he had betrayed the Potters." Hermione said.
"Everyone knew how close my Father and Sirius were. They considered each other brothers. Pettigrew, was the least likely to be chosen. He wasn't the obvious choice for Secret Keeper. It was Sirius who suggested the switch. But no one knew Pettigrew was really a Death Eater on disguise. He had been a spy in the Order's ranks and no one knew," Bill said.
"Sirius was sent to Azkaban, where he stayed for twelve years, they didn't even give him a trial." Hermione said with tears in her eyes.
"After Voldemort was defeated Harry had no other relatives. Sirius was his Godfather but in prison and the remaining friend, Remus, wasn't allowed custody because he was a werewolf. There's a lot of prejudice in our world regarding werewolves, it's honestly ridiculous. Not only do they have to register themselves with the government, nobody will hire them, so they don't have jobs. Do you know they're not even allowed to enter hospitals, or receive medical treatment unless they can find someone to do it privately?" Hermione said angrily. "They're treated just as bad as Muggleborns, worse even."
"Back to the point, Petite Colombe," Fleur said gently, stopping her angry tirade.
"Sorry," she sighed.
Bill smiled affectionately at her before continuing, "For eleven years the wizarding world was safe again. Harry was taken into the Muggle World to be raised by his Aunt and Uncle."
"Who were horrid human beings!" Hermione exclaimed angrily. "Not only did they emotionally abuse him for years, and make hin work like a house elf, they also made him sleep in a cupboard under the stairs until he was eleven," she said angrily.
Harry laid a hand on her shoulder, and the two shared a look, a whole silent conversation passing between them. That these two cared for each other was obvious. Nat knew from casual observance that most would think they were intimate. But Nat could analyze people and situations better than most. There was emotional intimacy in the way they were. But Nat could tell it wasn't one of physical intimacy. It was like the relationship she had with Clint. One of deep understanding, emotional connections. It spoke of how much they had been through. Hermione took several calming breaths.
"Neither myself or Harry were aware that magic existed. All Purebloods live in the Wizarding World. The majority of Half-bloods do as well. But Muggleborns tend to live in the Wizarding World once they learn of it and have graduated from Hogwarts. Since both our guardians were muggles, we didn't know about it until a letter showed up along with a Professor." Hermione chuckled fondly, "My parents nearly fainted when Professor McGonagall turned the teapot into a rabbit."
"And because my Aunt and Uncle kept it from me, I didn't find out until then. Of course, they knew about it, with my mother, Lily, being Aunt Petunia's sister. We met on the train to Hogwarts, along with Ronald Weasley." Both Harry and Hermione looked a bit disgusted..
"There are books on the Wizarding World about Harry, 'The-Boy-Who-Lived", that's what they call him. Hermione rolled her eyes. "The Killing Curse can't be stopped and yet Harry survived due to his Mother's sacrifice. Ronald and I didn't get along at first, until I was attacked by a mountain troll, that is."
"Mountain troll?"
"Yes, Clint, a mountain troll, they're real. Disgusting, and smelly too," she grimaced. "This one was thirteen-feet tall, had ugly green skin, was obese, smelled horrific and carried a club half my size. Anyways, long story short, I was cornered in the girl's bathroom and injured and they came to my rescue. From that moment on we were referred to as 'The Golden Trio' and have been since."
Harry smiled fondly. "We were inseparable then, you'd hardly see one of us without the other."
"We somehow discovered there was a magical stone hidden in the castle, for protection. This stone was known as the Philosopher's Stone and it held the power of immortality, you know, without the whole drinking blood thing," she added, the others chuckled.
"Unicorns are real. And you can drink their blood?" Nat looked faint.
"The blood of a unicorn can bring the drinker back even from the brink of death. But it also curses the drinker to live a half life. It is a crime against nature to slay something so pure." Fleur said.
"We had a rather terrifying experience in the Forbidden Forest where we discovered that Voldemort wasn't dead, just defeated and he was trying to return to full power. We knew he had help, and we were certain that it was Professor Severus Snape. He was a former Death Eater, who turned spy for the Order during the First War." Harry explained.
"That implies there was another," Nat mused.
"There was," Harry sighed. "We got into a lot of trouble that year. Smuggling baby dragons to Romania, sneaking around the castle, someone jinxing my broom and trying to kill me."
Hermione giggled as their eyes widened in shock. "It wasn't until almost exam time that we faced a near-death experience." She smirked as she added, "Trust me, there's been plenty over the years."
"We found out that Voldemort was going to steal the stone and we tried to warn a Professor, but it didn't go to plan. The details are a little hazy but after a series of deadly trials; including a three-headed dog bigger than a school bus, magical lethal plants, a barbaric life-sized game of wizard's chess and a deadly potions riddle. I'm not certain on what happened next, I escorted an unconscious Ron to the hospital wing and Harry was never clear about the details but I know that he was victorious and he fought off Voldemort."
"And it wasn't Professor Snape, it was Professor Quirrell who was sharing his body with Voldemort, that was after the stone. It's confusing, I know, but the stone was destroyed for good." Harry said.
"You know this might be easier if we showed them." Hermione suggested.
"Pensieve?"
"Pensieve."
Clint look amused for a moment before asking, "What's a pensieve?"
"It's a way to store and view our memories. It might make things easier to understand if you can see them." Bill explained.
"Seeing is believing," Nat said.
"Exactly," Harry agreed.
He blushed when Nat focused on him. Luckily he didn't hold her undivided attention for long.
Fleur hurried from the room. When she returned she sat a large bowl, filled with some type of liquid on the table. She looked expectantly between Hermione and Harry. The two exchanged glances before they put their wands to their head and began pulling what appeared to be wispy silver strings that they placed in the bowl.
"Let me check and make sure they are all sorted," Hermione said.
And with that she stuck her head into the bowl, pushing her face completely in the liquid. Nat and Clint looked at each other. When she didn't quickly pop her head out, they began to panic.
"Um shouldn't she be popping back now?" Clint asked nervously.
"Nah. She's fine," said Harry.
Another thirty seconds passed and Clint was sure she was going to drown. Were her friends just going to let it happen? Nat twitched beside him. They looked at each other before they both jumped, grabbed Hermione by the shoulders and pulled her out of the liquid.
Hermione sputtered in confusion. "What did you do that for?"
Nat and Clint started yelling at the same time.
"You were under way to long…"
"They were just letting it happen….."
"No drowning on my watch…"
"Not happening!"
They were interrupted by laughter.
"It isn't funny! She could have drown! What kind of friends are you?"
Hermione threw herself at them and hugged the life out of them.
"It's ok. It isn't what you think. I was in no danger. I promise. But it is nice to know you care about me that much."
Nat blinked. Then blinked again.
"Well that was awkward," Clint said.
