Chapter One:
Old but New
No One's P.O.V
The man stood before the Rock of Three Incarnations stoically, as unmovable as the towering edifice of cold, hard stonework itself. Across its moss-stained face shone the orbiting list of names, etched in fortune and fate and something acutely enchanted.
He had been coming to this place once an immortal year since he had been a boy, eons ago, holding the hand of his father, a rite of passage to the Gods of his clan. Every year was the same. The names came, and the frown burrowed deeper upon his brow with each passing epoch. His father came with him no longer, those days of boyhood were far gone, and now he stood alone, hand empty, fingers grasping onto nothing but air.
The Rock of Three Incarnations itself was a gift from Father Immortal to the Heavenly realms, his own father, creator of existence, and foretold the destined couples between the Gods, those lucky, and in some cases unlucky, enough to be meant for another half. Immortality did not mean a happy ending. In fact, it meant having no ending at all. Perhaps that was why there was a million and one more names for such a bond. Heart's desire, friend, confidante, partner, companion, one's promised, kindred-spirit… The mortals down far below had taken to calling it soulmate.
He quite liked that term.
And yet his frown darkened when his own name flickered across the craggy face of the rock tortuously combined besides another.
陶工铁杉.
Táogōng Tiěshān.
It had always been so, that name besides his own, and when he had been young, so very, very young, and filled, like most youth, with curiosity and vigorous energy, and a burning need to see and do all he could, he had searched for the owner.
The name never changed, as his search was never fruitful.
The name remained, unaltered, almost mockingly. Why mockingly? Because there was no God or Goddess of that name, there never had been and there never would be according to the record of Celestial births kept in the Temple which recorded all those born in the Heavenly realms.
It was a name that should not be.
Táogōng meant pottery or potter, a ceramicist. Tiěshān was the sobriquet of the Iron fir, the Tsuga chinensis tree, commonly known amongst the mortals as Chinese hemlock.
Potter Hemlock.
Hemlock Potter.
No matter which way he placed the two, they somehow came up as the number five and not four. It was an odd combination, this mixture of plant and pottery, and thus far not taken by anyone, nor would it be. Not by the Fox clan. Not by the Phoenix clan. Not by the Celestials or the Ghost tribe.
A name that should not be.
He, like all young boys, grew up, his searches grew, and soon stopped all together.
Perhaps that was his destiny. To be besides nothing but air.
Not long after he stopped visiting the Rock of Three Incarnations all together. The years turned to decades, the decades to centuries, the centuries to eras, wars came, wars went, and he lived on. He never forgot the name but he did come to see that, possibly, a name was going to be the only form of existence it would have, faceless, unbodied, and hauntingly hollow.
He carried that with him the best way he could.
Kindly.
He held it close like a flame in the night, never whispered it to an ear not his own, never divulged it to curiosity of another soul, and he let it be.
Life moved on.
And yet…
And yet here he stood once more, faced with the golden light of a name that should not be, after all this time, drawn there this morning by… By what he could not tell, perhaps nostalgia, perhaps gluttony for punishment, perhaps something currently out of his reach of understanding.
After all this time-
A voice spoke up from his far left, across the hallowed bridge of divine repentance.
"Lord Mo Yuan?"
The man at the Rock of Three Incarnations turned and smiled politely at his nineteenth disciple, who had come with him to the Celestial planes from Kunlun mountain that dawn. The boy bowed back deeply in return.
"Lord Dong Hua Dijun requests your presence at the Celestial hall as soon as you are capable of going."
Mo Yuan nodded briskly. He wasn't often needed at the Celestial Temple. The few times he had been called so unexpectedly was in times of conflict. Conceivably, as the God of War, that was his destiny, and, Mo Yuan thought, wasn't that a sad fate? To be bloodstained and standing alone for eternity, hand barren from holding another.
Sorrowful indeed.
"Then I shall leave immediately."
He gave one last parting glance to the names on the rock. As they had for eons, they circled around the pillar like a comet through the dark night sky, far out of his reach.
Hemlock Potter's P.O.V
Hemlock grumbled deeply as she came floating back into her body on the drift and the kiss of consciousness. There was something cold and hard poking painfully into her ribs, and whatever pillow she had found her head resting upon was digging into her neck horribly, making it bend awkwardly over something thin leaving her head dangling dizzily over the edge, her knees were knocking together, pushed up and over something slim and leanly solid.
Wherever she was it was cramped.
Wherever she was it was warm.
Wherever she was it was bright.
Hemlock rolled over, groaning, mentally jostling to hold onto that sweet slumber that had only scarcely left her tentative grasp.
Five more minutes.
I'm so tired.
Five… Minutes…
"Hermione, will you turn that bloody light off and let me sleep-"
And when she rolled she dropped.
Thankfully, Hemlock didn't fall far, just a small, sharp plunge onto something impossibly harder than the confined space she had been on, but it was enough to startle her awake with a muted umph and a little whine. She roused to blinding light assaulting her eyes, and hissed through her teeth as her hand shot up to shield her drowsy gaze from the light, face down on marble, cheek mushed up against the unforgiving stone, peeking through the loose red tresses of her hair.
Strange, Hemlock supposed. She normally kept her unruly hair up, strapped down in a bun, as much of it that could fit in a bun, the ginger curls often far too much to contend or fight with on a daily basis lest she wanted to get her wand trapped in a snare again or another snitch.
But down her hair was, long and loose and wild, fluttering across the marble-
Floor?
Floor.
Hemlock was on the floor. What was she doing on the floor? Where had she…
Her thoughts felt fuzzy like thistledown, sticky on her fingers like bramble leaves, and Hemlock remembered… Hogwarts? Yes, she had been at Hogwarts with Hermione and Ron, and… The Wards had been up but she remembered flashing lights and…
Her thoughts were hard to hold onto, prickly when gripped too tight, and when the dancing white spots in her vision faded and Hemlock saw the floor from down below pressed against her face, a floor that was marbled white with thick veins of gold, a bright white and a brighter gold…
Huh, was her first lethargic thought. Huh.
Hogwarts was made of granite and limestone and moody grey slate. Not marble, and not white, and not-
Hogwarts!
Hemlock remembered now. She remembered everything. She recalled how she had stood still on the Astronomy tower, watching as the Wards fell. She remembered Voldemort and Death Eaters storming the castle in droves like ticks in the grass leaping for a dog. She remembered Snape dying in her arms, her hand pressing into the torn flesh of his neck, how warm his blood had been on her hands, between her fingers, as she vainly tried to stem the bleeding and-
She remembered dying.
She had died, in a flash of green light, Hemlock had died.
Then why was she lying face down on the floor?
Hermione and Ron. Find Hermione and Ron. Tom's still out and about and-
Hemlock bolted up, curls fluttering about her shoulders and back, arms fighting with the sleekness of marble as her knees slipped once or twice in the layers of her dress-
Dress?!
She glanced down, frowning, bewildered, shakily plucking at the skirts and sleeves of her dress as if she had never seen such a thing before.
Yes, it was real, and it was unquestionably a dress. A bizarre dress, certainly, lush and lively, and perhaps as green as her own eyes, layered in sheaths of cloth impossibly light and soft, gentler than downy feathers or the lapping of a bubbling brook, and tied in intricate seams and sashes with sleeves long enough to reach her ankles, and skirts lengthy enough to hide her bare feet.
Bare… Feet?
Where was her jeans and t-shirt? Where was her tatty tennis shoes? Where was her bun and her Wand and her blood-stained hands and-
"Can you sense if it is him or not?"
Hemlock was panicking. She was Gryffindor enough to admit that. She could feel it in the bottom of her gut like worms wiggling in wet mud rising to meet the rain, and when the eccentric voice came in a inexplicable room, while she was dressed so outlandishly, herself feeling so strangely, weary and weak and fragile as if she were made from spun glass still cooling into her hardened form, Hemlock jumped and jumped hard, gaze flying for the source of the noise.
The voice was new, unusual in the way it flowed, without hiccup and hitch, almost too polished, nearly too perfect, and when it came singing in from her right, Hemlock dodged left on instinct, hip striking whatever she had been sleeping on.
That was when she came face to face with a room full of strangers.
There was too many to count, faces of varying beauty, clad much as Hemlock had found herself dressed in, robed in elegant shawls of cloth that almost glimmered in the blindingly bright room as if some madman had managed to weave starlight into the interlace. Many of them had long hair, dark in varying shades of black, straight and shiny and impossibly graceful as it was oiled back and up in ornate hairstyles pinned with gemstones of Goblin worthy envy.
They really were a beautiful bunch, beautiful and strange.
Just as the room was.
Sprawled wide, the room was surrounded in red, lofty gates, the windows sheened in some sort of transparent… Paper? Cloth? Something that muted the outside light into something softer, kinder, cornered with hanging embroideries of gold, silver and sunlight thread.
Magic.
The whole place reeked of magic. From door to drapery, marble to man, the whole place smacked of magic, and none more so than the person closest to Hemlock, the one practically in her face, the one with the only shock of pale hair, whiter than snow, crowned in purple robes and with a…
Bored, yes, an almost bored face, as pretty as a picture, and as uninterested as a rock on a mountain top was attentive to the forest laid below it.
In which to say not at all.
People.
There were people, and people meant civilisation, and civilisation meant life.
She must have… Survived? That too seemed outlandish, impossible almost. She remembered the green light of the Killing Curse hurling her way and-
Had she dodged?
She must have.
Dead people don't wake up face first on gold speckled marble floors. Then how did she end up here?
Hemlock tried to smile as wide as she could despite her sudden mystifying disorientation.
"Uh, hi. I'm… I… Is this the Chinese Ministry of Magic? Did we win the war? Is Hermione and Ron okay-"
The man with the white hair blinked before pulling back to stand tall once more from his crouch before her, shaking his head, and Hemlock's stomach plummeted.
Had Tom won?
Had it all been for nothing?
Where were the other survivors, then? Someone must have survived the Battle of Hogwarts other than herself. Someone must have brought her here, for whatever reason, perhaps if this truly was the Chinese Ministry of Magic then it being the furthest away from England, and thus furthest away from Tom, allowing them time to regroup and plan and-
"It's him… Of a sort. I can sense his essence. It is strong, nearly overpowering, but this… This is something new and very young. Like a needlepoint made from old thread, the core is the same but the picture is unique."
Or the white-haired man might not have been answering her at all, ignoring her questions entirely. Hemlock shook her own head, still thistledown-dazed, still exhausted, still feeling… Raw, re-spun… Forming.
She felt as if she were forming, hardening, melding into her own shape again as if she had been ground up into fine powder, sprinkled a bit with water, and put in a cast of her own proportions. She felt bitty, and delicate, and not entirely, completely, utterly… Complete.
She wasn't finished yet.
She needed…
Sleep. I need to sleep. I'm so bloody tired.
That was not an entirely pleasant sensation, and for Hemlock, it was not very important at all. What she felt never really was.
Sleep can wait. I need to get back to Hogwarts. I need to find Hermione and Ron. I need to finish this.
"Thanks for… Changing me into something less torn, and I'm guessing healing my wounds, but I must really be off to-"
And she was promptly cut off by another man behind the white-haired fellow, kindlier in his face, quieter too, strange robes a delicate pink.
"How young are we thinking? Sixty thousand? Seventy thousand? Surely not below?"
How very rude.
Hemlock scowled as she hustled to a stand, fighting with the miles of cloth swathed over her.
Plainly these people didn't duel very often if they were swanning around in the entire textile shop.
"Look, I have a lot of shit going on right now, war, prophecy, and saving the world and all that, so if you excuse me-"
No one moved out of the way, no one so much as met her eye, not a glance or peek in her direction, and Hemlock was quickly slipping to the end of her tether as the white-haired man answered the pink robed fellow, and, anew, completely ignored Hemlock.
"Seventeen."
"Listen, I need to get back to Hogwarts, so if you could simply move out the way and let me through then-"
Another man from the crowd, this one adorned in all black, young face handsome under the bright light of the chamber, long sleek hair pushed back from the top and wrapped in a small knot crowned in a black cap with a gold pin to hold it in place, cocked his head at the white-haired man's assertion.
Hemlock's hands fisted at her side.
Calm.
Stay calm.
"Seventeen thousand? It is barely a babe. It should still be cultivating in its mother's womb. Perhaps what happened to me has befallen him too?"
"Are you even listening to me? I know I'm on the short side but this is ridiculous-"
The white-haired man shook his head.
"No. Seventeen."
Whatever nonsense this meant, and it must have meant something to the people in this white-marbled, gold freckled, far too extravagant hall, caused a ripple through the gathered crowd. None more so than in the man on the far right, large, towering, imposing in his extraordinarily white robes, some strange golden crown of gilt wings pinned to the back of his head, long beard and goatee brushing where Hemlock imagined his belly button to be, maybe not the Chinese Ministry of Magic then, guffawed.
"Seventeen? And you are sure you sense the Jade Emperor in its divine light?"
Okay. Alright. Fine.
If this was how it was going to be.
There was no time for babble. No more time for drivel about divine lights and thousands of somethings. Hemlock had tried to be polite.
Clearly it was getting her nowhere fast.
She stormed forward, towards the crowd, preparing to shoulder through if she had to.
"Cheers again for the dress and the wakeup call, but I can see you're all very busy with… Whatever it is you're talking about, so I'll just be off to-"
The white-haired man walked forward too, at the exact same time as Hemlock came down, and she couldn't side-step in time to move out his way, for neither did he try to, and the white-haired man walked right on into her.
Right through her.
Hemlock stumbled back on impulse, felt a rush of… Pressure? Wind? Something that bled through and chilled her from the inside out, or maybe the outside in, and-
And someone had just walked through her, right through, in a room where no one looked at her, where no one answered her questions, where-
Hemlock glanced down to her hands, held them up and out in front, flexing her pale nimble fingers, turning her palms this way and that, watching green sleeves roll down her wrists.
Her hands looked fine. She looked… Better than fine. Her skin was healthy and unstained, no scratches or scraps, or mud and blood beneath a nail, not even an ink stain on her finger, and her hands were bare of marks.
Her scar was missing, the one slashed across her knuckles in chicken scrawl, the one she hated most.
I must not tell lies.
Hemlock's scar was gone.
"Yes. In this I have no doubt, Heavenly Lord. It is him, but… Shifted. The pieces of his spirit reside here, but they have been misplaced together. The same but new. It is the only way I can describe what I can sense of the soul. Old but young. Same but new. Torn yet hole. Contradictions made complete. Perhaps a... Offspring? No, not quite. Something else..."
Hemlock's hands fell down, swinging uselessly at her side, tongue heavy in her suddenly dry throat, gummy and fatty and useless.
Where was her scar? Where were her trainers? Where was…
Hemlock whirled, wide-eyed, terrified.
"Hello? Can any of you hear me? Hello!? Hello?!"
Frantic, Hemlock moved for the closest man, the one in pink, went to stretch and snag and shake some impression out, just something that was familiar, just something that made a lick of sense, to make him look at her, to make him hear her, to feel real and true-
And she watched as those scarless hands slipped through his shoulders and chest like she were trying to catch smoke-
No.
As if she were made of smoke.
Oh.
Oh.
Oh no.
Sluggishly, on autopilot, Hemlock turned to the white-haired man finally, the one who had walked closer to the place she had woken up as she had tried to walk away.
It was not a bed he stood before, but a… Chair? Big, grand, it was a carven thing of green rock-
Jade, hewn from jade, the chair itself was, perhaps, the most impressive thing in the room, beautiful in its simplicity, etched with water lilies and rearing stags, and that's when Hemlock saw it.
On the green velvet cushion of the greener chair rested a flower.
A lotus.
A glowing lotus.
Delicate, the flower was made of red light and gleam, and something that sparked like lightning in the air. Like a fish on a hook Hemlock was lured in, stumbling closer, drawn like a moth to a flame. The closer she got the more she could feel it, that flower, wild and untamed and oddly familiar. It bubbled, it simmered, it effervesced, as if the petals and the pollen were made of flickering flames, and yet… And yet there was a warmth to it Hemlock knew.
The warmth she felt in her own chest.
The warmth-
Hemlock came to a staggering stop beside the white-haired man before the jade chair, peering down to the fire-lotus, and her befuddled, drained, war-weary mind in the end, finally, recognized the familiarity staring right back at her.
A man who had never seen a mirror still recognized his reflection after a few minutes.
"Is that me?"
Woo or Boo?
A.N: It's Mo Yuan Monday Y'all! I hope you guys liked this instalment, it was very fun to write. From here on out we're slowly going to be peeling back the layers of this mystery, and discovering who exactly this Jade Emperor is and was, how exactly Hemlock fits in with all this, and, of course, the good, good romance will begin trickling in.
I would just like to say this is a strong AU, as in alternate universe, for both Harry Potter and Ten Miles. If you've noticed anything that has changed from canon, this will be explored/explained throughout the story as we progress. This version of the Jade Emperor is something I've constructed and added from Chinese mythology into these universes, and as in some legends, in this the Jade Emperor was originally mortal. As for how the Celestial throne ended up in the Jade Emperor's hands from the Heavenly Father before Dong Hua got it, this is something that comes along in the plot. All I can really say on the matter is the Jade Emperor in this is a construct of my own making, not taking the place of anyone in canon, is not related in anyway by blood or Clan to any other character, and that his story, Hemlock's story too, will be explained as we go. I hope that cleared up some of the confusion, and I'm sorry for causing it by being obtuse and vague in the beginning, and I do really hope you guys enjoy what I have coming up as quite a lot of research has gone into it lol.
Next update should hopefully come on next Monday, as I'm really trying to keep a good updating schedule with this fic.
A BIG THANK YOU to those who have followed, favourited and reviewed. And, as always, if you have a spare moment, don't forget to drop a few words in that box over there, and I will see you all again next week!