Hi there!
So, here's the next chapter. I hope you like it. Let me know what you thought with a review; I read and appreciate them all greatly.
Special thanks to Raph and Darkened Void for their help in Beta-reading. Voidy is writing a great Flowerpot fic of his own, which I urge you all to check out.
Anyway, here it is!
Arielle flew to her shoulder the moment Fleur came upon her kitchen, the sight of Bill Weasley that greeted her the sole cause.
The day was young, and with the briefest of thoughts, Fleur came to know that nothing was untoward with the protective enchantments upon the cottage, yet Bill stood there all the same.
"You're early," Fleur said, with a glance to her own attire. The night's sleep after her meeting with Ora was not a peaceful one. They very rarely were after meeting with one of the fair folk, even with a day's separation. Childhood stories of the fae whisking people away still rattled inside of her mind in the night, her body jittery and fitful like a spring that'd been held down too tightly for too long. Her hand passed over Arielle's wings, which soothed her slightly.
"Better early than late," Bill replied. He lifted his head to stare quizzically at the ceiling. "There are worse places to work, I suppose."
Fleur pointed her wand to the kettle absently, the water instructed to boil. "How did you get in?" she asked.
Bill smiled, taking a seat and placing the leather jacket he wore on its back. He brought his legs up so that they could rest upon the chair beside him. "Your wards are set so that only you may pass through unchecked," he said. "I simply made them think I was you."
Fleur was silent then for a time, long enough for the kettle to boil, and for the coffee to be stirred and summoned toward them.
To mimic another perfectly to the eyes of magic, as Bill had no doubt done, was a feat of greatest admiration. To take note of the shape of their magic, and Fleur's own especially given her heritage, and mirror it so wonderfully that even the truest readings of the world could not differentiate one from another was skill beyond skill.
That was the sort of feat that earned a wizard a senior position in the bank of Goblins, for that deftness was quite nearly unnatural. One that made Bill Weasley more valuable than half of the gold in most of their vaults.
The fact that he had done so rather than simply knock on her door was profoundly irritating.
"There is something odd in the air of this place," Bill said, his voice seeming to age in his throat. He sounded like the master he was, rather than the child he played at being. He sat up properly, too, his legs beneath him. "A softer kind of magic than one I often see."
"A fairer kind," Fleur said. At once, her hands began to grow restless. They drummed upon the table and she brought them to her lips absentmindedly. She was forced, too, to resist the urge to bite her fingernails. "I met one of them last night. Ora, their name was."
Bill shook his head, his eyes still surveying the ceiling in recollection. "It is not that," he said. "Their magic is all wishes and manipulation. It is just, but it is not kind." He looked to Fleur. "How are you?"
"I am drawing close to knowing where I need to go," she said. "It's the forest on the hill. That is becoming clearer the day. The locals talk of it like it's no-man's-land. It is thick enough to cover all creatures that might hide there, and deep enough for the fae to make their homes."
And, after a very early morning's walk along its perimeter, her analytical magic had failed her. That did not happen by accident. Clearly, whatever lied within that forest had no desire to be found, be that by her or anyone.
"I wouldn't rush to blame the faeries quite yet," Bill said.
"You think that is not their creation?"
Bill hummed thoughtfully. "I know that the magic here is not one of spells and wands, and I know it does not feel like the Fae's work. I know nothing more than that," he said. "This place feels like northmost Greenland, where the folk magicks are the only magic taught."
"I have not been there," Fleur said.
"It was an annoying job to work," Bill said, sipping from his coffee, though finding it much too hot, the tip of his tongue pained afterwards. "I could never take any signatures, no matter how broad or narrow my search was. At first I thought it was because we were near the North Pole, but I came to realise that it was the magic itself." Bill sighed. "It was like trying to eat soup with a fork."
"So how did Gringotts find about It in the first place?" Fleur asked. Arielle began to play with her hair, and so she summoned water and birdseeds for her friend to eat.
Bill frowned. "I don't know," he admitted. "From what I can gather, their magic is one not born of intent, but of energy. Their instruments read the energy in the earth, and mine it and find gold. They read the energy in the air and find the nests of dragons to take. That is all they need."
Fleur realised at once her error, of course. Her intent.
In her searches, even brief though they were, she had aimed her magic upon searching for artefacts and energies that were invasive and obtrusive, foul-formed and ill-wanted. After all, that was the sort of thing she had most expected to find in Hartoft; that was what, in her work, she most often found.
"Are there spells for finding revealing the magic that you found in Greenland?"
"None that I know," Bill said. "Perhaps if you spent half a lifetime in the libraries of Hogwarts or Alexandria, you might find something that might approach halfway useful, but I do not know them now." Bill gave her a serious look, his blue eyes foreboding. "You haven't the time, either."
"If the fae know of what lies here, then I definitely don't."
"It is not only them," Bill told her. He gripped the edge of her dining room table. "The Ministry has taken notice."
That was to be expected, Fleur knew. She had been using magic in a muggle area. Even though, according to Gringotts' information, the residence had been registered to the relevant parties in power, eventually the oddity of a non-native witch living in the middle of nowhere in their country would rouse some suspicion.
"It's more than that, though," Bill said. "I think they know there's something here."
Fleur nodded. Likely, an auror would be on her doorstep by the evening.
"I'll call for you soon, if things go wrong," Fleur said. She flashed him a brief smile. "Perhaps you might be my boyfriend once more."
Bill shook his head, shaking away the levity she might well have hoped to bring to their conversation. "Make sure they don't learn of anything," he said. "Gringotts would not abide that."
Fleur frowned. She thought to summon her cigarettes, though realised quickly that she'd forgotten to apparate to the nearest proper town to buy more. "Gringotts ought to have placed more people on this assignment then, if their desires are so particular that they must take precedent."
"You know that the bank can't," Bill said, sharply. "This job isn't like that. You know that."
"I do?" She asked. "That is odd, that you know me better than I know myself." Her jaw shifted beneath her skin, the muscles tightening. "They can do whatever they want. It's just more convenient for them not to."
"No, they can't," Bill asserted. He took a breath and finished the then-properly cooled coffee in one drink. "You're the only one that can do this job. Not me, not anyone else."
"if I am such a valuable commodity, they should learn not to order me here and there," Fleur said. She sighed. "The artefact, whatever it may be, will be found. That is all that will matter in the end."
Bill sighed. He pulled his hair from its ponytail, relieving the pull upon his scalp, and ran a hand through his hair. "You're really not making my life easy here."
"The main goal of my job isn't making your life easy," Fleur told him. Upon the table, Arielle had finished with her breakfast and returned to Fleur's shoulder. "Your acceptance of your job doesn't make my life easy, either."
Bill stood, sweeping his jacket into his arms with a single motion. "I apologise for not living every moment of my life catering to your every whim."
Fleur leaned back in her chair, her arms folding across her sternum. "Apology accepted."
He rolled his eyes, taking a step toward the door.
"Do we have to leave each other on poor terms every time we talk these days?"
Fleur's gaze lifted to look him in the eyes. "Do you have to continue being a prick?" she asked.
"Seems that way," he said, with a brief shake of his head.
A knock came from her front door. Both of their eyes snapped in its direction. Before either could speak, a second knock came, and Fleur opened the door without another word, Arielle disappearing to her nesting room as she did.
Harry appeared on the other side, a pint of milk in hand, a frown upon his face.
"Here," he said, leaning down to the ground and placing the bottle upon her doorstep. He turned to leave at first, though his attention was called back as, behind Fleur, Bill appeared. "I didn't know you had company."
Fleur cast a brief glance behind her. "He's my chauffeur," she said quickly, though she did not know why.
"Bill," introduced Bill, leaning around Fleur to offer a hand to shake. There was a moment, then, when he took in Harry as he stood. His strange contrasts. His jolting eyes and broad form, rough hands and careful motion. "Nice to meet you."
Harry took the hand. "Harry," he said, his eyes fixated upon Bill's attire, leather jacket and all. The cover was flimsy, though Fleur doubted that Harry had the worldliness to make a true assessment. "Where's your car, then?"
"Oh, I broke down," Bill said, his gaze similarly quizzical as he took in Harry. "The Princess wanted to drive to see Whitby today, but it's not to be."
"'The Princess' is the only reason you have a job," Fleur said, watching Harry grin as he viewed their bickering. She gave him a hard look. "Don't you have sheep to butcher or something?"
Before Harry could voice a response, Bill cut in. "Don't be so hasty, Fleur," he said, in a tone that brought her to meet his eyes. He mouthed 'trust me' to her, his face obscured to Harry as he did. "I've not had the pleasure of meeting your new neighbours, and if me and my boyfriend are going move up here for you, I'd like to meet some of the folk I'll likely end up transporting."
"I can't imagine we run in the same social circles," Fleur said. Harry hummed in agreement.
Bill waved them away. "Rubbish," he said. He called Harry on. "Come on in, we've just put the kettle on."
Harry shifted backwards slightly. "I wouldn't want to intrude," he said. He took off his flat cap for a moment, exposing the wild black hair beneath, and running a hand through it.
"We've already invited you, so you're not intruding," Bill said. He began to walk away from the door, his action in turn pulling Fleur with him, and Harry followed along too. "And I'm sure you've not got much on; it's Saturday."
Fleur and Bill returned to the very places they'd sat before, though now joined by Harry. He wore a guarded expression, though his eyes flicked around the house whenever he came to think that they took no notice of him. To his eyes, there was nothing to see, as there truly wasn't anything to see. The only thing of note was Arielle and her wand, both of which were tucked away safely.
Yet, his eyes still watched all the same, as though the air held secrets that only he could see. And, more often than not, his eyes tended to drift to meet Fleur's, their looks ones that spoke of mutual discomfort.
"So, what is it that you do, Harry?" Bill asked. He braced his elbows upon the table, leaning forward and peering at Harry. Gone was the master curse breaker, then was the child.
Harry took off his glasses so that he could pinch the bridge of his nose. "Cattle farming," he said. "It's all anyone does around here."
"A fulfilling job, is it?" The kettle pinged out in acknowledgement of its boiling, and so Bill stood, walking to make their tea. "Seems to do wonders for your health, anyway."
The last of Bill's words were accompanied with a swift glance at Harry's arms. Though he tried hiding it, Harry shifted in his seat, uncomfortable at the attention.
"Family business," Harry mumbled, his jaw firmly set.
Bill's head disappeared for a moment, ducking down to retrieve tea bags and sugar. "I suppose it's fun enough. Fresh air, fresh food," he said, before popping up once more. "Is that all you've wanted to do, then?" He dropped three tea bags in three mugs. "Think you'll farm for the rest of your life?"
Harry's eyebrows raised on his forehead. "Haven't given it much thought."
"So, you've not thought about leaving?" Bill asked. "Isn't that all anyone does in places like this?"
Harry looked at Fleur. "Is this your doing?" he asked, in a hushed voice. One pitched in hope, and only hope, that Bill might not hear it. "Did you just invite me in here to take the piss?"
"He's this annoying all on his own," Fleur whispered back. "And no-one is forcing you to be here."
Harry sat back in his chair, his expression thoughtful. Likely pondering why he was there, Fleur realised. "I like it here," he called out quickly. "Besides, my parents need all the help they can get."
"So, when you go to a big city like London," Bill proposed. as he returned, placing their three mugs on the table. He had remembered to give Fleur coffee, thankfully. "You never find yourself hoping you'd one day live there?"
"Can't say I've been too often," Harry said. "Seems like it's loud and full of twats, though."
Fleur breathed out a laugh before she could stop herself.
"I come from a place like this," Bill said. "Ottery St Catchpole, down in Devon. I spent the entire there wanting to leave, and I'll be honest, even on shit days, I've never once thought of moving back."
Harry's eyebrows came together studiously. "What happened to your accent?"
"Private school," Bill explained, "then moving to London."
"How'd you end up being a chauffeur after going to private school?"
Bill looked to Fleur with an amused smile. "Never said it was a good private school," he told Harry. Just as he had before, he took a sip of his drink and burned the tip of his tongue. "So, Harry, what do you for fun?"
"Not much fun 'round here," Harry said, smiling entirely to himself. "It's grim up north."
Bill laughed. Fleur stared at the pair of them, confused.
"We make our own mischief," Harry then said. "Tipping cows and playing football. That sort of thing."
To her side, Bill looked poised to ask another million questions, balanced upon the knife-edge of tact and inquisition. Tact, it seemed, somehow won out, though Harry drew breath to continue.
"Mostly," Harry then said, "on the days I've off, I go around the popular parts of the moors." He gave a bashful half-smile. "I do a bit of volunteering around the trials and the campsites and stuff, picking up all the shit that people leave."
"And that's how you spend your days off?" Bill asked, incredulous.
Harry shrugged. "I like the peace."
"Do you not have friends to get plastered with?" Bill questioned.
Harry shook his head. "I like the peace," he repeated, before pulling back his sleeve to glance at his watch. "I need to be getting off. Still work to be done, even on weekends." He slapped his knees as if to clear the air for his announcement, before he looked to Fleur. "I'll be around tomorrow, same time."
Fleur nodded, and Harry showed himself out. A long silence dragged, until the latch of the door clicked into place.
"There's something strange about him," Bill said, the moment the door shut. "I don't quite know what it is, but there's something." He stood and began to walk the floor. "He's not affected by the allure, is he?"
Fleur shook her head. "Not at all."
"How weird," Bill commented. "He seems so mundane, and yet…not."
"He fits in with the rest of the village, then," Fleur said, "and he's hardly relevant, considering everything at stake if I am slow in discovering the artefact."
"Yet," Bill began. "Yet, he knows this village better than you could ever hope to. He knows what is normal here well enough that the moment something changes, he sees it." He gave Fleur a significant look. "It's why he came back here, even after you've no doubt been an arsehole to him. To make sure your difference is not one that might cause harm."
"He was an asshole," Fleur muttered, folding her arms across herself. "Called me a child for smoking."
"It's not the word I would use," Bill replied. "But if his greatest crime is wanting you to take better care of yourself, then he's hardly an arsehole."
"I'm sure he could have thought of less condescending ways to voice his worry."
"And you could think of less self-destructive ways to relax," Bill replied, with a sigh. "That die is cast. All I'm trying to say is that if magic doesn't provide all of the answers, and the forest holds nothing except its own trees, then he might well provide something that could prove greatly valuable."
"So, what are you suggesting?" Fleur asked. "I go to him, tail between my legs and make friends, in the hope that he might suddenly unearth the Holy Grail in the middle of his haybales?"
"There are worse ideas," Bill commented. "He could be your local guide like we had in Egypt."
"They are magical."
"This one might be too," Bill said, with a laugh. "But there is definitely more to him than meets the eye and I think, in my oh so wise opinion, that you would be better served having him by your side than across the field." Bill folded his arms. "I trust you're able to ensure that he does not see something that might bring your work into jeopardy, too."
Try though she might to ignore it, the riddle of Harry would continue to nag at her in quiet moments. And, her curiosity was a force rarely sated with anything other than the fullest of truths.
Their mugs were empty, and Harry was not the only one with work to be done.
Armed with the knowledge of her own magic's likely shortcomings, the lack of appreciable results from further readings in the village was no surprise. Neither the roads nor the village held any of a wizard's magic, no matter how much she might've wished it to.
Yet, in the moments that Fleur decided simply to go for a walk along the roads in the brightening mornings, with her wand firmly tucked in her pocket, she soon sensed a sensation entirely different. She did not know if it was simply her mind allowing Bill's words to grow true by suggestion, but the air did seem altogether altered.
The air of a magical place, be that Beauxbatons or the halls of her own childhood home, was palpable, as alive as the trees that rooted themselves in the earth or the birds that soared through the sky. When there, thoughts seemed to come more freely. Creativity formed more naturally.
The very air that you breathed willed you to be better, to succeed and to grow greater than you were the day before. Once there, a riddle that one was saddled with for months would be solved overnight. Once there, a grand struggle became little more than the tiniest nuisance.
Hartoft's air, of course, was not that. But there was an aura to it, at first easily confused with a countryside's peace, though upon Fleur's own review it became clear to be more than that. Mr and Mrs Stockton, two of the truly old members of the village, did not walk with creaking joints and crooked spines, their strides as easy as they would've been in their youth. Even as, throughout the country of England, Foot-and-Mouth disease ran rampant in its livestock, there was not a single case in any of the village's sprawling farms.
Though there was certainly struggle to be seen and found and undertaken here, there did not seem to be so much that it overwhelmed those that did. The skies still held clouds in these days of dwindling winter, but they parted as often as lingered.
Yet, such a feeling held one exact end. The forest of Hartoft.
One gentle walk upon its perimeter had shown that the forest's edges offered nothing except cold and darkness. Even in midday or mid-afternoon, no light shone through the bare branches, no birds sang overhead. The changing days did not change its sight one bit, the trees endless immortal, and unchanging.
After meeting with Ora, Fleur did not dare walk in there until she knew exactly of the Fae's involvement in such a place. If it were to be a gate into their world of tricks and misdirection, she would need to know, as to go into such a place unaware was suicide.
Part of growing up, Fleur came to realise, was tearing the myths of magic from the truth of it. A child sees a Veela and reckons them an angel, yet an adult sees a person, of beauty greater than most and power too dangerous to be wielded freely. A ghost goes from a spirit brought forth to scare to people, to a trapped soul, trapped in its failed destiny for all eternity.
Yet, the Fae in Fleur's eyes and in nearly all others had never had such a moment of discordance between truth and tale. They could be the rightful creators of all the world, of magic and life and all in between, shepherds over all the people of the Earth. They could be tricksters, concerned solely in the games they could make out of mortal lives. Or, they could be the hands of the Gods, pushing people in the directions that the tides of fate demanded.
No one knew. They were seen so infrequently that no one had cause nor capability to know. Yet, one thing was utterly certain.
Do not, ever, be rude to them. They are not a malevolent people, not whatsoever, but do not give them even a fraction of a moment's pause to consider that you had been poor company. The consequences would be beyond a mortal mind's comprehension.
So no, even Fleur did not walk blindly into the darkest edges of that forest, despite how much her professional curiosity might well have wished her to. She studied it, both with her eyes and with her wand, though neither offered anything beyond cold, unending blindness.
Such discomforting thoughts accompanied her on her walk from the forest back to her cottage, broken only by the chatter that the other villagers that passed by offered. They came to have learned her name, likely with nothing better to do, and Fleur surprised herself by finding that she came to know theirs, too. Bothoroyds and Blackwells and Dentons, amongst others.
By the time she arrived home, the sky was held in nightfall and nearly all of the other residents fled into the opposite direction of Fleur, aiming for one pub or another, some even planning to allow for an excess of enjoyment on that day, though that day of the week alone.
The perfect time, Fleur knew, for the auror to show up on her doorstep. And the darkness of the night sky did not exist as her only company for long, as no sooner did Fleur unsettle the loose stones on her pathway did they appear with a gentle crackling of their apparition in Fleur's back garden.
They did not need an introduction, either.
"Auror Tonks," Fleur welcomed, as the auror's face appeared from behind the wisteria-covered gate that led into the side of the cottage. Even in the winter, the flowers still managed to bloom, their violet colouring holding the same hue as Auror Tonks' hair. "What a pleasant surprise."
"Wotcher," Tonks said. Fleur's arm swept open and Tonks rushed to follow the path which it tracked, through Fleur's front door and into her house. Fleur's warding enchantments brushed against Tonks, her magic and her form, though they found nothing to grasp.
Before Fleur had the time to direct her to the kitchen, Tonks walked into living room and sat upon the sofa there; a seat Fleur herself had not yet taken.
Fleur took her in, her eyes unfailingly alive in intrigue at her newest guest. Her pale skin reddened by the cold air outside. The softest edges of her face, one most comfortable in grins and smiles. Her eyes, wide and searching, that seemed unable to decide whether to be green or blue, and so choose both and neither.
Yet, as Fleur looked at her, the most pertinent thought was why she chose to look this way. She was a metamorphmagus, after all. Her appearance was entirely her will, so why did she choose a vision as warm as the one she did?
"Might I ask why you're here?" Fleur questioned. She did not take a seat, but rather rested against the side of one of the loveseats that otherwise filled the room.
"There's been reports of magical use within muggle areas," Auror Tonks described. "Given that you decided to move miles away from your place of work for no clear reason, I think that's cause for a further check."
"I haven't moved here," Fleur said. "It's more of a holiday."
Tonks smiled. "That's reassuring," she said, reaching into her pocket to pull out a notepad. She began to write at once. She pushed away the short hair that fell over her ears to retrieve the pencil that she'd placed there, revealing the bar of a piercing that went from side of the shell of her ear to the other. "So, how long do you intend to stay here?" Tonks pushed away further hair that fell over her eyes. "Just so that I can know what to expect."
"No more than two months," Fleur said.
Tonks leaned on the edges of the sofa, her teeth biting around the end of her pencil. "And, if you don't mind me asking, why did you choose to take a break from your job in the middle of winter, into the middle of nowhere?"
Fleur's eyes met Tonks, finding clarity and sharpness at total contrast with the gentle sight that was her every other feature. "I don't see how that is relevant."
Tonks grinned brightly, two dimples upon her red cheeks. "Just trying to make sense of it all."
"There is nothing to make sense of," Fleur said. She stopped leaning against the chair, preferring to stand straight. "I wished for a holiday for the same reason as everyone else."
"Well," Tonks said, "when I first promoted to Senior Auror, I went for a holiday to Barcelona to celebrate. But when I got there, I happened to find a gang of wizards caught up in the dark artefacts trade, and I couldn't just let them go, could I?" She breathed out a laugh. "So, I disguised myself as one of them and brought them into custody. The next week, I was promoted." Tonks jabbed at her notepad with her pencil. "Is your holiday something like that?"
Fleur shook her head. "Not at all."
Tonks' voice grew softer, almost whispering. "If you're sure," she said. "Though, with the strangeness of you being here, there'll be a few further checks. Just in case."
"And will it be you that does them?" Fleur asked, folding her hands upon her legs.
Tonks stood, drawing herself to her fullest height, though her eyes only came to be in line with Fleur's collarbone. "Definitely."
"Seems slightly unnecessary, non?" Fleur asked. "To have the Head Auror work a case such as this?"
"Call it professional curiosity," Tonks said. She walked out of the living room as quickly as she entered. "Though it is intriguing to know that there is a 'case' to be worked here."
"Désolée," Fleur said. "My English is not great."
"I think it might be too good," Tonks commented, before pulling open the door and letting cold air draught into the cottage. She took out her wand, and whispered a spell and all of a sudden, the cold air was no more, warmth returning to the room. "Can I speak honestly with you?"
Fleur nodded, her eyes growing wider.
"Please be careful," Tonks said. "I don't know you at all. I couldn't say the first thing about your life, or where you're from or what's really going on here. At least not yet. But I know the kind of people that hold power in the Ministry, and I know how they view the goblins that you work for. And, unfortunately, how they view magical beings like you."
"You are in a hurry to distance yourself from the Ministry," Fleur said. "Are you not one that holds power?"
Tonks' hand passed over the lapel of her long red jacket, upon which a silver medallion was pinned. "I hold nothing except this badge," she said. "I've had my position for half a year, and I've spent the entire time wanting to arrest the people above me, not the people that I serve. I know in their eyes, I'm just a scapegoat that they know will fail. They can look at me and say they gave a Half-blood a chance and that I'm proof that we can't be trusted." She sighed. "But I won't give them that chance."
Fleur walked toward Tonks, reaching over her shoulder to push open the door, more so than it already was. "I understand."
Tonks looked, the space between them slight. "Good," she said, her voice a whisper in the air. "I hope we never have to meet again."
"Me too."
"That doesn't mean that I don't hope we meet again, as I'm sure we will," Tonks said. "After you've found whatever it is you're searching for, and I make sure no-one named Nott or Malfoy ever works inside my government ever again."
The journey to Harry's house was short, though it was not easy. Yet, much like all of the most difficult paths, it was one made out of growing necessity.
Though she might've worn a fairer face than most, in the turning days Fleur could feel the growing watch of Auror Tonks upon her. Even in the darkest night, she did not dare draw her wand outside her home. Her intuition offered no clarity, either. She was no closer to sensing whatever it was that called her to Hartoft, no matter how much she tried.
Fleur knocked upon their door twice, on a cool, foggy day. It opened before the third, revealing Catherine.
"Hello love," she said. "Do you want to come in?" She pointed her thumb toward the inside of her house, though Fleur's focus remained solely upon Catherine. "We've just had tea, but I'm sure we can make you something if you're hungry."
Fleur shook her head, a small smile tugging at her lips. "I'm quite alright," she said. "I was hoping to borrow 'Arry for a moment if that's possible."
Catherine smiled broadly. "Do you know, me and Matthew were just saying how nice it'd be for you two to get to know one another," she said, her hands coming to rest upon her waist. "He's yours for as long as you like."
The figure of Catherine departed, to be soon after replaced by the far grander figure of her son dressed, for a moment, in clothes that he might well've worn had his house sat inside a city. Jeans and a pair of trainers, his hair not hidden beneath a flatcap better worn by an older man and instead falling wildly around his face.
The only thing that it seemed was the same was his eyes. Still utterly startling.
Harry followed Fleur out of his house and along the road before he spoke. "What do you want?" he first asked.
"Company," Fleur answered, her gaze looking out into the fog-draped moorland.
"I thought we made it perfectly clear that neither of us wanted that."
"Perhaps we were too quick to judge," Fleur said. She stopped and turned, walking backwards just as Harry had done the first time they'd spoken. "I'm sure, given more time, we might find that we share a few things in common."
"Seems a big difference from how you were all of a day ago," Harry said. He did not look at her, but beyond her to the path that they were aimed toward. His focus tilted left, and so she aimed herself right. "So, what's changed?"
In her attempt to answer, Fleur lost her footing on the unfamiliar pavement, tripping backwards and surely to the floor. Except, no sooner did she begin to fall, than did she stop, stilled by the arms of Harry.
She jumped out of his arms the second she realised that she was in them. "My perspective," she said, as she moved from prostrate to upright without a single glance toward him. She did not attempt to walk as Harry had done any further. "I realise that there's no use in me making enemies here if I am to stay for any length of time. I don't want my presence to cause any damage to the village."
Harry's eyes were wide in disbelief. "I'm sure."
"I mean it," Fleur said, before she sighed.
"Seems you care more about a village you've likely never heard of two weeks ago than you do your own health."
Fleur sighed again. "I am trying to quit, I promise."
"It's what they all say," Harry replied, his voice caustic and sharp. "Never fucking changes anything though, does it?"
"Perhaps you want some actual change then, to convince you?" Fleur asked, before she drew a deep breath. "I promise that for as long as I am here, I will not smoke."
"At all?" Harry clarified.
"Not once," Fleur said calmly. With magic, it would be easy. "If I do, I will leave the whole of the North of England, never to return."
He swayed his head from side to side, weighing the offer for a long moment. "I'll hold you to that," he told her, and there was a change in his voice as he did. If muggles were capable of unbreakable vows, Fleur would've then found herself within one. "And it ought to be a token of you taking care of yourself."
"Then it's that too," Fleur said, with a wave of her hand. "So, are you open to attempting to be more cordial with one another?"
Harry shook his head. "One more thing," he said, raising his index finger into the air. "Why are you here?"
"As I said before," Fleur said quickly, "my employers have an interest in the village."
"But what kind of interest?" he asked, with a sense of irritated exasperation flooding into his words.
Fleur paused for a moment.
"I work for a company that curates historical artefacts," Fleur settled on saying, the truth of her words settling Harry. His brow, that seemed to be in a permanent furrow, smoothed out. "They believe that Hartoft is the site for something of historical relevance, so they have tasked me with trying to pinpoint exactly where it is."
"I see," Harry said, smiling to himself. "So, what you actually want is my help."
"I suppose," Fleur agreed. "Yes, I do."
Harry stood still. "Do you promise that if I help you, and you find whatever it is you're looking for, that there'll be nothing else that comes along with it?" he asked, his gaze searching. "That you'll keep it all quiet, and that when you leave, everyone here goes back to living the life they had before."
Fleur's smile was bright and earnest. "Happily," she said. "Your world will be as small as it always was."
Harry offered his hand. "Deal?"
Fleur took it. His skin was coarse, rough with work and far larger than hers. Her thumb brushed against the back of his knuckles by accident, meeting the thin scars that were etched there. "Deal."
As they shook, something passed through Fleur's skin. The cracklings and jolts of energy, undirected and yet all so aware. It was a sensation that stole her focus, almost entirely.
"You had me worried, you know," Harry said, as they walked along the roads that Fleur had beaten the path of so many times in even her brief time there. Yet, despite that growing familiarity, it was only Harry's voice that returned her to normality.
While they walked, the light of the sun began to burn through some of the fog, returning the sights of nature to the two of them. "Why is that?"
"It's just the last newcomer that came from nowhere like you did. He-" Harry paused, measuring himself. "-he didn't bring anything good is all."
"One of those frackers?"
Harry shook his head. "No, not this one," he said, his vision disappearing into the distance. "He was an older bloke; oldest man I've ever met. He came, asked me what my life was like, and then a week later…Well, something happened." He coughed then to clear his throat, and when he spoke once more, his jade eyes cut through her. "Make sure, whatever you do, you don't bring any harm to Hartoft or the people in it, as if you do, there'll be Hell to pay."
Fleur had seen enough in her life to not worry herself over the empty threats of muggles, even strange ones like Harry. And yet, there was something to him then. That strange oddness that seemed to shroud him suddenly hardened, directed at her and only her, and Fleur was forced to believe absolutely in the wroth that Harry had promised.
In that village, in the changing of the seasons, where Winter and Spring blurred and crossed, Fleur came to know that this domain was Harry's, and Harry's alone. He was its Lord, its shepherd, and its guardian.
"I've got a week off this next week; last one before everything starts getting busy," Harry said. "I'll show you what you're looking for. And you won't need your chauffeur to find it." He outstretched an arm, pointing toward the lingering treetops at the top of the hill. "It's in the forest. I know it is."
Fleur's jaw tightened, her eyes closing for a moment. "Of course," she said, quietly enough that the words did not carry all the way to Harry's ears.
Yet, for no great reason, the prospect of entering into the woods with Harry by her side was one that was infinitely more appealing than going by herself.
There it is!
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