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Fair Warning; Lilies ahead! Almost too many to handle.

oOo

When the Lilies Bloom

Chapter 3: Lily Blossom

oOo

The next thing Harry knew was that he was lying on his back. He could feel warm sunlight on his body, and when he raised his hand to his eyes, he found that his glasses were absent. His eyes shot open and he sat up quickly, trying to look around and shield his eyes from the suddenly abundant sunlight at the same time.

He was on a hillside covered with fresh grass and lots of… well, lilies. The strange thing was, despite his vision seeming better than ever without his glasses, he could see neither the top nor the bottom of the hill, despite the air being deliciously fresh around him with no traces of any fog, mist or smoke. It wasn't even as if the hill rose to an infinite height; he just couldn't make out anything beyond a certain distance.

As he stood up from his prone position, he realised that his glasses weren't the only thing missing. He was standing on an endless hillside covered with lilies, naked as the day he was born. Wishing he had something to wear, he looked around and to his astonishment, found pure white robes lying behind him. He pulled them on gratefully, their texture eerily reminiscent of the Acromantula silk Hermione had wrapped around his finger. Looking at it now, his finger was flawless, no wound present to suggest that he'd used a knife on it. Now that he thought about it, none of his scars seemed to be present, most notably the one on his forehead.

Something strange was going on here, and the only thing he could be certain of was that he was no closer to bringing Lily back.

No sooner had this thought crossed his mind than the sound of a voice quietly humming a tune reached his ears. Harry jumped, turning around to point his wand at the source - wait, when did I get my wand? - before lowering it when he realised what, or rather who, he was looking at.

Not ten steps away sat a young woman with dark red, almost auburn, hair. Her back was turned to him and with her legs pulled to her chest she was wearing the exact same pure white silky robe as him. Unable to move, he watched as she plucked a few half-grown buds from the lilies around her. Still humming a melodic tune, she placed them on the palm of her left hand and, transfixed, Harry watched as the buds began to grow in front of his eyes.

When the lilies bloomed, the young woman laughed happily and tossed them into the air. As they touched the grass, each flower turned into a separate plant, and Harry ran his gaze over the hundreds upon hundreds of lilies blooming on the hillside with a new perspective.

Returning his eyes to the woman, he saw her starting the same process again. Mustering his courage, he took a step closer.

"Mum," he said, his voice sounding hoarse to his own ears. He waited in anticipation, but the woman gave no signs that she'd heard his voice. "Mum," he tried again, with the same results.

Then, watching her once again throw a handful of lilies into the air, Harry whispered, "Lily…"

The young woman suddenly stopped humming, her shoulders tensing as she wrapped her arms around her folded legs. Not sure if that was a good thing or not, Harry took another step forward.

"Lily," he said once more, clearer this time. In response, she buried her face in her knees.

Crossing the remaining distance, he bent down and cautiously touched her shoulder. She was neither warm nor cold to the touch; she was definitely something, but it was a feeling he couldn't begin to comprehend, let alone describe. The only thing he could think of was that she felt like life.

When she didn't show any negative response to his touch, he slowly sat down beside her, hardly daring to breathe.

"Hey," he finally uttered, heart pounding furiously as he looked at her. He couldn't believe she was here. He had no idea where here was, of course, but in that moment, he didn't care.

And then she spoke.

"I thought you were him."

Her voice, if it was possible, was ever more beautiful than he recalled from his recent dreams.

"Who?" Harry asked, confused.

"For a moment, I thought you were him. The dirty snake with red eyes."

"Oh?" Harry knew of only one person with red eyes.

Slowly, she lifted her head a bit, but her long hair was still hiding her face.

"Yes. He used to come every so often to harm them," she gestured at the lilies around them with one hand.

"He didn't hurt you, did he?" Harry asked quietly.

After a moment's pause, she said, "I'm a witch, you know. I'm not that easy."

A smile crept onto Harry's face. "Of course."

Finally, she brought up a hand to swipe her hair away from her face and her emerald eyes met his.

His breath caught.

For years, people had commented on how his eyes were exactly the same as Lily's, but he had never appreciated it enough until this very moment. Looking into her eyes, he found that they were so similar and yet so impossibly different from his. It was as if he was looking into a mirror, and yet it was also as if he was staring at thousands of stars lighting up the night sky, the heavenly depth of their beauty delightfully expressive and inexplicably mysterious all at once.

After staring into each other's eyes for an indiscernible period of time which might have been anything from a fraction of a second to an eternity, Lily spoke again.

"You're you," she said simply.

"I am," Harry agreed.

"I've been taking care of your lilies." She plucked one of the nearby flowers and handed it to him. Harry took it, and immediately felt a sense of elation, much like the effects of the Patronus Charm.

"My lilies?" Harry inquired, though even as he said it, realisation dawned on him.

"Oh, yes. It's been much easier since he went away," she told him, picking at a lock of red hair.

"How big is this place anyway?" he asked, gazing around the hillside once more.

"How would I know that? It's your magical core, isn't it?" Lily shrugged nonchalantly. "I guess it's as big as you can make it."

"I suppose so," Harry agreed. Holding up the lily she had handed him, he asked, "And the lilies are my magic? That the dirty snake with red eyes had been suppressing before he went away? You've been taking care of it?"

"Mmhm," she hummed easily. "So, what brings you here?"

"You, actually. I've come to get you."

Lily froze. "I don't know if I could…"

"Why not?" Harry asked gently.

"I'm… afraid. I'm not sure I'm brave enough to go back. I'm scared it'll all go wrong again," she spoke in a quiet, subdued tone.

Deciding to take a chance, Harry reached for her hand and squeezed it gently. She didn't immediately pull away and, after a moment of hesitation, she squeezed back.

"I'll be there," Harry whispered. "I'll make sure nothing bad happens."

Emerald eyes flicked up to meet emerald eyes and Lily whispered, "Promise?"

"Promise," Harry replied. Then he flashed her a brilliant grin. "After all, you've been taking care of all my lilies for all this time, it's time I took care of one, too."

She gave a blinding smile in return and Harry felt a joy unlike any he'd ever felt before. He gripped her hand tighter and pulled her off the ground with him, making her giggle at his enthusiasm. It was a beautiful sound, just like everything else about her.

"So," Harry asked, looking around. "How do we get out?"

Shaking her head with a smile, she said, "It's your magical core, get us out."

"Oh, alright." He was still unsure about what to do, so decided to try the first thing that came to mind.

Taking Lily's left hand into his, he guided them down till they were both kneeling with their right knee on the ground, facing each other, left hands clasped tightly.

"Wait," Harry said suddenly. "Will you remember any of this?"

Lily shrugged. "I guess you'll have to remind me."

Squeezing her hand one last time, Harry took a deep breath and placed the tip of his wand on the ground between them.

Suddenly, the world shifted around them, and lilies went flying in all directions till all he could see were the flowers whirling around them. And then, just as abruptly, the lilies stopped and fell down all at once like a curtain to reveal not the sunny and grassy hillside, but the moonlit Room of Requirement.

Before Harry could register much else, however, Lily toppled forward and slumped against him with him barely catching her in time.

"Harry!" Hermione and Ron quickly made their way over as he gently laid down Lily on the bed of flowers that was now covering up the entire Runic circle. Doing that, he noted that Lily was still clad in the same pure while Acromantula silk robes from the hillside while he was barefoot and topless as he had originally been.

"Merlin's arse…" Ron breathed out as he and Hermione kneeled down beside Harry to stare at Lily in awe. "This is insane. We raised a woman from the dead. I know that's what we'd planned but… merlin's arse."

Hermione, recovering first, cast a quick inspection charm over Lily's form - who was, thankfully, breathing normally.

"She just seems to be exhausted," Hermione reported faintly. "Better let her sleep it off rather than try to revive her just yet."

"Right," Harry said, finally looking away from Lily and up at his friends. He frowned as he heard them gasp. "Wait, what the-" He reached up to remove his glasses and his visibility improved at once. "Oh," he said simply.

"Oh?" Ron exclaimed. "Mate, your eyes!"

"Yeah, I can see without glasses, I noticed," Harry asked in confusion as they continued to stare.

"You can see without- no, no, that's not what-" Hermione cut herself off before pulling a hand mirror out of her robes. "Look!'

Taking the hand mirror from Hermione, he peered at his eyes, which immediately widened. His eyes were still their usual emerald colour, but they were now brighter, much brighter. In fact, they were glowing with a light of their own. It reminded him momentarily of Voldemort's own glowing red eyes, except that instead of the pure, unadulterated malevolence that shone in the Dark Lord's eyes, his now glowing orbs seemed to exude a sense of warmth.

After a few seconds of shocked silence, he chuckled. "I guess they're right when they say you can see people's souls in their eyes."

"Has anything else changed?" Hermione asked quickly. "Any other noticeable side-effects yet?"

Running a hand through his soft hair, he said, "I can't thi-" Wait, soft hair? "My hair's changed!" he informed, running his head all over his scalp to find that his hair, though still having a messy quality to it, was now much smoother and no longer untameable.

"And, apparently, this," Hermione grabbed his left arm and turned it around to find a small but intricate white symbol etched onto his wrist. A thin line made of tiny runes ran up the inside of his palm, connecting the curve symbol to the tip of his ring finger

"The Yang," she whispered. Dropping his hand, she peered around to where Lily's left arm lay limp beside her head. Sure enough, an identical symbol and line of runes were etched on the skin of her left hand, but in black. "The Yin."

"What does that mean, again?" Ron asked, looking at Harry.

"It means, Ron," Hermione said. "That Harry was right. They've been handfasted. Their life and magic are bound together never to be separated again."

"So, basically, it's like Harry said? One is killed, both are dead?"

"In simple terms, yes, Ronald," Hermione rolled her eyes. "But it's much more than that. Handfasting is typically seen in-"

"We can discuss all that later, Hermione, but right now-" Ron turned to Harry. "What the hell happened there, mate? One moment you were shouting the incantation and the next, the potion started getting all thick and hot. It melted the cauldron! And then that slik strip coiled around the mess of potion like a cocoon before flowers began popping out of the Runic circle like mad and when they fell down you were somehow holding her, alive and breathing! All in less than thirty bloody seconds!"

"Oh. Well, it felt a lot different from my perspective." Harry then proceeded to tell them about the hillside landscape of his magical core and the blooming lilies as the units of his magical power.

"Well, that makes sense," Hermione nodded. "We already knew that the Horcrux inside you had been suppressing your magical power, I guess now we know what it looked like on the inside."

"So you're saying that if his mum hadn't been, what, 'taking care of the lilies', then there's a chance that Harry might have all but turned into a squib?" Ron asked incredulously. "Bloody hell!"

"She didn't seem to have her memories back there," Harry thought out loud. "She only recognised me as the one whose magical core she'd been protecting. Apparently, she understood everything in a vague, broad sense, but wasn't focusing on the finer details."

"Do you think she will remember everything when she wakes up? The finer details?" Hermione inquired as the three of them turned to look at the peacefully sleeping Lily.

"I think so," Harry nodded. "She did mention before we left that she probably won't recall much about the time in my magical core."

"Harry," Hermione abruptly said. "Don't you think she looks younger than she should? I mean, I know she was young when she, you know, 'died', but now she hardly looks to be nineteen!"

"Now that you mention it…" Harry muttered. "I'm sure she looked just a bit older in some of the pictures I've got."

"Maybe it's because we used your blood in the ritual," Ron shrugged. "Or the ritual changed a few things about her, just like your eyesight and hair, I don't know."

Hermione blinked. "I do think you're onto something," she admitted. "There's not much more we can do until she wakes up," she added.

"So," Ron spoke up after a moment of contemplative silence. "Can we get some sleep now?"

oOo

As the sound of students talking echoed around the Great Hall, Harry placed his head on the table in front of him and closed his eyes. The ritual had taken more out of their system than any of them had realised, and even after spending the remainder of the night sprawled on couches in the Room of Requirement, they were all still worn out.

It was a Sunday, and Ron had insisted they make their way down to breakfast as soon as possible. For once Harry and Hermione had agreed. Lily hadn't woken up yet, and though he had wanted to stay with her, Hermione had all but ordered him to get fed first while she stayed behind to watch over Lily. Reluctantly, Harry had agreed. They had initially been worried about Harry's glowing eyes freaking out half the school, but as it turned out, the further he went from Lily, the less his eyes glowed. By the time he had crossed the corridor, the glow was nonexistent.

Which brought up his latest worries. They had been so focused on bringing Lily back that they hadn't paused to think what they would do after that. After all, they couldn't very well hide her forever. The most obvious choice was, of course, to finally tell Dumbledore. Now that the ritual itself had been completed, there wasn't much that the Headmaster could do about it. Especially seeing that he, Harry, was the one prophecised to kill Voldemort, and his life and magic were now tied to Lily's. And damn if Dumbledore was going to give up the only chance of getting rid of Riddle.

As he waited for Ron to finish shoveling food his mouth so that they could head back to the Room of Requirement, a sudden chill ran down his spine and he raised his head from the table. The noise around him had suddenly become muffled as if he was underwater, and fear and uncertainty that were not his own settled in his gut.

"Harry!" Ron hissed urgently from beside him. "Your eyes are beginning to glow, mate!"

Standing up abruptly, he ducked his head and began walking as fast as he could without running, Ron following behind. As they exited the Great Hall, Harry broke into a sprint up the staircase, only to run into a frantic Hermione before they could even reach the first floor.

"Harry-" Hermione gasped, very out of breath from apparently having run all the way from the seventh floor herself.

"What happened, Hermione?"

"She woke up when I was turned the other way, and she was out the door before I could say anything. She was running downstairs, but I don't know where she went," she panted, clutching at a stitch in her side.

Nodding, Harry patted her shoulder briefly before sprinting away once more. He ran down the Grand Staircase and out the Entrance Hall without pause, entering the castle grounds. He didn't know how he knew, but he knew he would find her.

He slowed down as he reached the spot where the edge of the Forbidden Forest met the Lake, and walked along the tree line until the large boulders came into view.

Squeezing himself in between two of the large rocks, he emerged into a small clearing facing the Lake and surrounded by boulders, so that it was shielded from outside view. The clearing itself was covered in grass, and lilies were in full bloom all around with the arrival of spring.

And sure enough, on the grass and surrounded by lilies, just like on the sunny hillside, with her arms wrapped around her legs and head buried in her knees, sat the red headed figure of Lily Potter.

oOo

So many lilies! Do tell me how you liked it.

-DragonsAndBroomsticks