Just wanted to point out, I don't own the characters of this story. There may be one or two OCs, but that's about it. If you see anything in this that you think is from another fanfic, then it's by complete accident. Everything else belongs to J.K. Rowling (sadly). Also wanted to say that all reviews are welcome, but if you have a problem with something in the story try to keep it to something constructive so that maybe I can change/fix it. Thanks, and I hope you enjoy the fanfic. Rating is just in case.

'Parseltongue'

[Thoughts]

Stars of Avalon

Where there is darkness, there must also be light. Where there is light, there must also be darkness. But where there is so much darkness that light is swallowed…that is where a star is born.

Chapter 4 - Growing Elements

Duck, dodge, dive. Spells were flying left, right, center. Three on one doesn't sound very fair from an observant point of view, but if you knew what you were looking at, it was more unfair than it truly looked. The fight was completely in favour of the solo opponent. While the three were covered with many small to large wounds, the solo fighter didn't have a single mark on them. Dodging or blocking every spell thrown their way. They were definitely drenched from the duel though. So, they decided to end it. With four quick spells the three opponents' bodies hit the floor with holes where their chests should be. With a flick of his hand the wood came back together as if never damaged in the first place. It's been two whole years since he slowed time and he was ecstatic at his progress. Harry had just duelled three level three training dummies to what seemed like perfection to most. To Harry, he saw a spell he could have done faster, a dodge he could have used to a better extent, or a block he could have dodged so as to not waste so much energy. As many say, you are your own worst critic, but at least what he believes to be mistakes were easily fixable with practice.

Harry grabbed the towel that was left for him by Tizzy and went to get dinner. It had been the same for the last year and a half. In the morning, before breakfast, he would go to the library and read, looking for new spells or ideas to implement. After breakfast, he would go to the duelling room and try out any new spell he found or a new idea that he thought of and wanted to try. Once lunch was over with, he would go back to the duelling room and use all the knowledge he had gained so far to fight all-out duels with the training dummies of his choosing. The dummies were set to have random fighting styles every time they were activated, so Harry never had to worry about getting too used to one single style. In the year and a half that he had been duelling, not only had his body gotten massively stronger compared to what it was, but his wandless abilities have grown in leaps and bounds. He could now use any spell he wished after only one or two tries. It was quite helpful that he could actually feel his magic so that he knew exactly how a spell felt after minimal practice.

Recently Harry had even been working on thought magic, the theory that all one had to do was think about the desired effect and will their magic to accomplish it, and what was wanted to happen, would happen." Not that he was having an easy time learning it. By now, he had already ingrained in his head for at least some sort of movement, be it hand, or any other body part to be used when casting wandlessly. Apparently, that was not the way to go, because after duelling for quite some time, he understood that having to move in general was what sometimes gave duellers away in a fight. He had actually lost plenty of practice duels for this exact reason. So, he decided to see if an idea he had was possible. That idea was thought magic, but sadly it would seem that even if someone had an idea, it didn't mean that putting that idea to practice would be easy. Yes, thought magic was possible, but it required a mental finesse that he couldn't hold for more than a second or two. Thus, he would have to up his mind magics practice, which would be difficult because, as far as he knew, he would need a practice partner to get any better. So that would have to be an idea for later, not that he wouldn't stop trying. He would still practice every so often, but it would not be an object of obsession for learning. His time for singling out duelling would also be over. He wanted to practice much more magic than just magic for battle. While he had already gone through and learned all he could about ancient runes, he still needed to look at arithmancy since both were needed to a degree for warding. Warding was the one thing he wished to be an expert in, Tizzy's words when talking about wards still in his head. The ability to put wards up in seconds was a very useful thing to have along with being incredibly powerful. Imagine you're in the middle of a fight and the person you're fighting just throws up a darker intruder ward. You would at best be immediately knocked out. That would be a powerful thing indeed. Like thought magic, he would still practice, so on that line of thought, Harry decided to make a weekly schedule.

Sunday - Duelling

Monday - Warding, Arithmancy

Tuesday - Arithmancy, Duelling

Wednesday - Look through library for fun subjects

Thursday - Mind Magics

Friday - Warding, Arithmancy

Saturday - Arithmancy, Mind Magics

[I hope I can find something that will help strengthen my mind] Harry thought sullenly, while writing his schedule. Just because he wasn't going to solely study thought magic doesn't mean he was just going to give up. He just had to see it through to the end, or until he could practice with another person.

With his schedule made he got to work, doing the best he could every possible second. Month after month went by with this schedule. Harry was getting quite good at most of the things he wished to study and because of this was beginning to get a slightly swollen head. On a Monday, many months after starting the schedule, he just finished a successful arithmancy lesson so he wanted to see just how high a level he could go on the training dummies. So while normally he would have never even acknowledged the idea, he put a single training dummy to level nine. Here is where Harry went wrong. While a level seven would have easily been possible since he is quite capable at defeating a level six, level nine is where things are different. Level nine is the level that introduces the Unforgivable Curses and many of the darker curses such as the heart stopper and the entrails expelling curse. While Harry has come across these while reading he has never fought them. So, when the duel started, at a blinding speed that Harry had trouble keeping up with, the dummy fired off a mix of the Unforgivables, darker curses, and many debilitating hexes. Harry had almost no time to prepare for the onslaught. Thinking back Harry could immediately see how stupid he had been. Luckily for Harry, a strange feeling overtook him. While he was in the process of trying to dodge all the spells, he fell through the floor. Or so it seemed, because when he gathered himself and looked at his surroundings, it was as if he didn't even open his eyes, the area was void of any light at all. He tried listening for the duelling room, knowing that the training dummy would still be looking for him. What he didn't expect to happen was for him to appear right under soft footsteps that sounded like they were slowly lowering to meet him. As the footsteps got closer, light started to melt into his view. At the same time, the darkness started to bleed off of his body into the ground. When he once again gained his bearings, he looked around and was able to see again, but what he didn't expect was to be right behind the training dummy. What was curious though, was that the dummy didn't seem to have even heard him as it was still looking for him. [I mean, what did I expect? They are called training dummies] was Harry's thought as he tried not to laugh at his own joke, didn't want to go and give himself away just yet. With his little joke over with, he blinked, sending forth a spell that would hopefully end his duel with that monstrosity of a training partner. Good thing he didn't try to go any higher with the training level because the training dummy turned around at the last second and still almost managed to dodge the spell. Sadly, for the dummy, the spell was an extremely strong lightning curse, so the moment the spell landed, it was fried from head to toe. [Not a very nice way to go. Good thing the dummy can't feel, at least now it can't.] If Harry didn't have the problem of finding out what just happened, then he would probably be giggling to himself, but as that was not the case, he got to thinking. What could have possibly been the reason for his little experience into the abyss, as he had decided to call it.

As one with questions would do, he decided to try looking it up. After looking for what felt like days he decided to call it quits for now. With that decision made, he was back to square one. He wanted to see if he could recreate what he had done before, but didn't know if he could. He had plenty of time to think of ideas for what it was, but until he saw it again he wouldn't have a name for it. So he decided to just get on with it. He went back to the duelling room and tried thinking about everything that happened in that moment, how he felt, what spells were being shot, his own movements to get away and that's when it clicked. He wanted to get away from the spells, he wanted to with the very soul of his being. Now that he had a starting point he looked to see where he disappeared to. To his absolute shock, it looked like he was melting into the shadows, his own shadow to be specific. He was amazed, absolutely stunned. He had no idea what this was, but it was just fantastic! [Now I have to do this again! What a wonderful power!]

With that in mind, he willed as much as he could to disappear, to be away, to be gone. To his glee, he started slowly falling into his shadow. It was much slower than when he first did it, but he put that down to adrenaline and a stronger will since, in that scenario, he was about to die. It was slow going but sink he did. Once he was fully in his shadow, he tried to think of what he did, and realized it was simple. He had read the theory behind apparition and it was almost exactly like that. All he had to do was want to go somewhere and there he would go. So he thought of Tizzy and wanting to go to the excitable house elf. Now that he understood how it worked he could easily feel the slight tug pulling him towards his wanted location and soon he was hearing footsteps above him, slowly getting closer and closer to his head. It was truly comforting, being in the darkness that he now knew was shadow matter, but as all good things must come to an end, he slowly started forming out of Tizzy's shadow. Tizzy was facing the opposite direction just like the training dummy, so Harry figured that he always formed behind whoever he wanted to go to or he was just lucky and the shadows had been behind each time. Either way, he would find out, but first, saying hi. What he didn't think about was that he silently appeared out of seemingly nothing. So when he said hi, what he got was an extremely scared house elf with a trigger finger. Tizzy jumped about a foot in the air, or at least seemed to due to his size, then threw whatever was in their hand straight at Harry's face. What Tizzy was holding ended up being a bucket, so Harry got a face full of bucket.

"Tizzy is being sorry Young Master! I's not knowing you's being there! Gave me a large fright!" Tizzy was hysterical. Between getting scared and throwing a bucket at his master and family, he was on the fritz and about to burst.

"No worries, Tizzy. It was my fault, I shouldn't have scared you like that. I truly didn't even think about it, but now that I have, I probably should have seen that coming" At this point Harry was Laughing so hard that his eyes were watering. What didn't help was that he still had the bucket on his head, so it was echoing slightly.

"Where's did you come from's Young Master?" Tizzy seemed to be calming down, so after taking the bucket, Harry explained what happened. When he was finished Tizzy seemed about to lose it again.

Tizzy squeaked out a "Young Master is an elementalist?!" and then promptly passed out. Harry was intrigued to know that what he was had a name and promised himself to look for it in the library. First, he had to see to it that Tizzy got to his bed, seeing as he probably wouldn't wake up any time soon after so many shocks. After such an exciting day, Harry agreed with his only family and went to sleep, dreaming of shadows dancing on walls and flashing lights.