STANDARD DISCLAIMERS APPLIED: All the characters mentioned in this fic either come from J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series or from Shin Kidousenki Gundam Wing (Sunrise, Bandai, Sotsu Agency etc.). I do not own any of them.
Eric2: Thanks a lot for your encouraging review. Eeeps! I've totally forgotten that there is dual-meaning for the word 'cum' (laugh). I should have used some other word, ne? Well, the 'cum' in the last chapter was meant to mean a thing with dual natures / purposes (ie Heero and Duo is both Harry's god-brothers as well as his best-friend) and not the more pornographic type meaning (blushes). I'm really sorry for the confusion caused.
Yana5: Once again, thank you very much for reviewing. Yup, you're most definitely correct, only Harry is a prince, all his other kiddies friends (including his god-siblings) aren't.
Harry Potter and the Legend of the Elves
Date written: 29/11/2004 (Yes, I did actually start on this chapter one day before I wrote the previous chapter), 1/12/2004 and 2/12/2004; Language: British English.
Pairings mentioned in this chapter: This is a nice and clean kiddies' chapter, so nothing much here on the romance side.
Chapter Four: The Strangers Who Lived Among the Trees
Harry, Heero, Duo and Draco were all still feeling greatly exhausted from their prior battle, and had all chosen to remain seated at the very spot of the great forest that they had somehow apparated to. They were currently wearily eyeing one another, as every single one of them were at a lost of what they should do next, and all of them were hoping that somehow one of the other boys would miraculously come up with a brilliant plan that could redeem their pathetically bleak situation.
Suddenly, a loud roar broke the silence of the dark and lush forest. And straight following that, a large black hawk could be seen soaring overhead, circling them from above…
And at this strange sight, the four tired and wounded boys stood up shakily on their feet and readied themselves in pre-battle stances by arranging themselves back-to-back in a square-shaped formation, so that all the boys were facing and scanning a different direction.
"Heero, is it possible for you to read the hawk's mind?" asked a curious Duo.
"No, idiot. I like you is a half-Moon Elf, and not a Wood Elf, so since you can't communicate with animals, why should you expect it to be any different for me," replied Heero gruffly.
"Wait, did you say that you are elves?" interrupted a startled Draco. Nevertheless, his question was ignored, as the two brothers continued on with their argument, with Harry laughing away at this awfully familiar sight.
"But you're a Star Psyche! So, why can't you just enter its mind and find out what its thinking?" questioned Duo insistently.
An impatient Heero rolled his eyes before saying, "Duo, can you just shut up and stop asking stupid questions. To read someone's mind, I need to be able to decode the person's thoughts, and since I can't understand the profound languages of animals, it is of no use for me to enter their minds."
Duo gave a pout and then protested, "But still…"
However, unfortunately for him, his words were cut off right at the start, by an interrupting Heero, "Quiet! I'm sensing something… there is someone nearing…"
Soon after Heero had given the warning, the four boys could hear the increasingly loudening sounds of approaching footsteps treading upon cracking dry leaves and brittle twigs that were scattered across the forest floor. And out from the rustling undergrowth of the forest, a beautiful young boy around their ages appeared. He was ridding upon the back of a majestic-looking golden-coloured lion and curled up within the comfort of his lap was a tiny and adorable silver fox.
The mysterious brown-haired boy had long bangs that flowed across half of his face and blocking out one of his forest-green eyes from view. In a highly collected and expressionless manner, the boy had dug out a miniature silver flute from within the folds of his navy blue turtleneck and without saying a single word to the other boys presented he had started playing a soothing tune on his flute.
When the enchanting sound had finally eased away, the four boys were greatly surprised to discover that all their wounds had amazingly disappeared and furthermore, even more remarkably was the fact that they were feeling a renewed sense of refreshing calmness and mental rejuvenation.
"Well, err… thanks for your help. But, who are you?" asked Harry, the unofficial leader of the new Marauders.
Instead of giving a response, the mysterious young stranger just stared blankly back at Harry.
Hence, Heero (the walking encyclopaedia among the group) stated, "He a Wood Elf."
"A Wood Elf?" queried a greatly bewildered Draco, "You mean that elves really do exist?"
However, his questioned was once again being ignored, for the mysterious Wood Elven boy had by then, noiselessly walked up to the group of boys and was busily poking away at their bodies, examining them for any signs of residual injuries.
"Hey, that hurts! I know I'm drop-dead gorgeous, but what's with all this touching?" questioned the young Duo (in the manner that he had blindly copied from his Daddy Padfoot), "And by the way, are you a mute?"
As a reply, the stranger just arched his single-visible eyebrow slightly.
"Are you brainless or what? He is clearly just checking for wounds," retorted the marginally irritated Heero, as he reached forward and tapped his fist at the side of his brother's head to emphasize his point.
Harry who as usual was once again forced to take up the position of peacekeeper between the two brothers, decided to turn the heated conversation away towards introductions, and thus he stretched out a hand in offer to shake hand with the Wood Elf.
However, instead of returning the greeting, the mysterious boy had just stared back at Harry's outstretched hand expressionlessly and had asked in a blank monotonous voice, "You want to shake hands?"
"What kind of a question is that?" interjected a somewhat shocked Duo, "Aren't that like so totally obvious? And according to Mr Heero here, it is I that is supposed to be the stupid one."
Once again, the boy just raised a single eyebrow as response.
Harry attempted to diffuse the tense moment by saying, "No, no, it's alright. Let's just forget about the handshake. I'm Harry Potter, and these are my god-brothers, Heero and Duo Black-Lupin, and err… Draco, is that right?"
Draco nodded and acknowledged his name with a disgusted grimace, "Yes, Draco Malfoy."
And to the introduction, the ever-talkative Duo added, "I and Heero have a sister too. We're triplets. But, as she is a girl, so she is infected by yucky girl-germs, thus we are forced to leave her at home."
The mildly amused Wood Elf turned to Heero and commented with a slight twitch of his mouth, "Your brother, really? You two sure are vastly different."
To that, Heero answered with a smirk, "Yes, I'm most unfortunate…"
"Hey! I'm not that bad. It is you who is the mean and boring one!" declared Duo loudly.
"Well, I may have a bad attitude, but fortunately for me, at least I'm not born as the childish and idiotic one, unlike some poor soul here. Come on, girl-germs? For god's sake, we're no longer three years old or something, why don't you just grow up," rebuked Heero.
And at that, the two older children, Harry and Draco busted out in laughter.
After his laughter had finally subsided, Harry faced the Wood Elven stranger and asked, "We're lost. Do you know where we are and how can we get out of this forest?"
The Wood Elf stared at Harry for a moment, before replying in his usual monotone, "You can come with me. I'll bring you to my home."
After a short track through the undergrowth, they had come to an abrupt stop right in front of a large tree. "We need to climb up," informed the Wood Elf in a quiet voice that was entirely free from intonations, as he pointed up to a tree house that was rested upon its solid branches.
On reaching, the small wooden platform outside his tiny home, the Wood Elf knocked on the wooden door. On the fifth knock, the door creaked open. It was a pretty young female Wood Elf with lovely blue eyes who was the one that had opened the door of the little wooden tree-top house. She was dressed in a pink and maroon kneel-length dress with long sleeves and had a single white feather stuck in her curly shoulder-length reddish brown hair. A large golden star-shaped earring that was dangling from her left ear was glimmering in the soft glow of the sunlight that was filtered through the lush canopy of the forest.
The red-headed young lady eyed the boys in front of her and said with a pleasant-sounding chime-like laugh, "It's really amazing that we've visitors. It's been so long since I last saw anyone else besides Trowa, his beloved animals and various wild beasts. And oh yes, I'll take it that Trowa here hasn't introduced himself, am I right?"
All four boys (excluding the newly labelled mysterious stranger) nodded in reply.
"Well, I better amend this quickly then," quipped the lady, "I'm Catherine Bloom Barton, and this most silent one here is my darling little brother, Trowa Triton Barton. Please do come in to our puny tree-top cabin of a house, and make yourself at home."
Harry reached forth and took up the elven lady's hand in his smaller one and gently placed a peck on the back of her glove-covered hand in the gallant manner that he had witnessed and modelled from his Godfather Padfoot's occasional playful greetings with Grandma Jena, before announcing politely, "Hi, it is nice to meet you. I'm Harry Potter, and these two are my God-brothers who also happened to be my best-friends. They're Heero and Duo Black-Lupin. And the one with the blonde hair is Draco Malfoy whom we had just met earlier on."
"Hello!" chorused Duo in his cheerfully bubbly manner, with a friendly wave, whereas Draco chose to repeat the same charming hand-kissing gesture of Harry for his own greeting. As for Heero, he just gave a single nod to show acknowledgement of her presence.
Following that, the boys neatly filed in, one by one into the tiny and sparsely-furnished but well-cleaned dual-roomed cabin situated on the thick branches of the steady old three, and sat on its hard wooden floor in front of an old heating stove. The large golden lion and the small silver fox had remained protectively by Trowa's sides, whereas the great black hawk had flown to its solid wooden perch in the far corner of the room.
"You are all such lucky boys. I have just finished cooking a large pot of awesomely delicious tomato soup. It's ranked as one of my best, along sides with my famous celery soup, cabbage soup and carrot soup. They are all…" said Catherine with a warm smile.
"All soups? You sure seem to be weirdly obsessed with soups," interrupted Draco with a smirk.
"What's wrong with soup? They taste good and are beneficial for your health, you should learn to enjoy them more," admonished Catherine as she waved a pointed finger in the air.
"But they are all yucky vegetable soup," protested Duo, "Don't you made chicken soup? Granny Jena always made the best chicken soup."
"Chicken? As food? That's awful! Those poor chicken," mumbled Catherine to herself, before adding out loud, "You mean that although three-quarter of you lots here are half-elves, none of you know this most basic fact that all Wood Elves are vegetarians?"
In reply, all she got were two concurrent shake of heads from the surprised Harry and Draco, a cheerful and boisterous "No" from Duo, who at that very moment was bouncing on his toes and a blank look with the barest tilt of his head from a marginally curious Heero.
"Anyway, no more insulting of my fabulously good soups," interjected Catherine with her hands resting on her hip.
"But they are yucky!" retorted an unrepentant Duo, "Tomato soup is mushy and looks gross. Daddy Padfoot always said that tomato soup is just like the blood that disgusting old Snivellus likes to drink."
"And besides, we're kids, and it is almost an unspoken rule for kids to hate their veggies," added Harry with a shrug, "After all, it is the job of children to irritate the adults. For if we don't do it than who will?"
"Now, now, child, you can't go about aggravating us poor adults," chided Catherine amiably as she reached forth and playfully ruffled Harry's already and constantly messy hair.
On hearing her words, Harry chortled and then he rolled his eyes and remarked in mirth, "You should tell that to Padfoot. He keeps insisting that we're not carrying out our marauding duties well enough and we're really pathetic pranksters. He keeps stressing that we're way too angelic and are putting their infamous names of the Marauders to shame."
"Marauders? What do you mean?" questioned a somewhat confused Catherine.
"They're the number one pranksters in the whole of Hogwarts' history," proclaimed Duo proudly, "And they consisted of Papa Moony, Daddy Padfoot, Godpa Prongs, who is Harry's father, and some evil rat that we have never met yet."
"You never had the chance to meet my Dad too," said Harry with a tinge of sadness in his voice.
"I'm really sorry," muttered a truly apologetic Duo, as he moved closer to Harry and gave him a tight comforting hug, "Me and my stupid big-mouth."
The solemn-looking Heero too moved towards Harry and awkwardly patted him on his back, while the others looked on in bewilderment.
"What is the matter?" asked Catherine gently in her honey-sweet voice.
"Godpa Prongs and Godma Lily were killed by a very evil wizard called Voldemort when Harry was one-year old," explained Duo in a mournful tone of voice that was so unlike his usual cheerful and sunny personality.
With his words, a gloomy silence settled on the room…
In the midst of the silence, Trowa and Catherine exchanged a quick look. Following that Trowa closed his eyes and deeply concentrated so as to gather the energy of nature and once again call forth his power as a Wood Elven healer, and soon after that, a ball of greenish swirling energy could be seen floating in each of his palms for a brief moment, before they dispersed and showered the room in glistering droplets of green. And with that, all the occupants within the room felt a sudden burst of peace flowing out from the deepest core of their souls, washing through them and alleviating them off their grieves.
"Wow! That is awesome!" exclaimed Duo zealously.
"How did you do that?" wondered a puzzled-looking Draco aloud. And at his words, Harry, Heero and Duo all turned to look at Trowa inquisitively, waiting in anticipation for his answer.
However, all Trowa gave as a response was a slight shrug of his shoulder, before he turned away and returned to his activity of combing his hand tenderly through the thick and soft mare of his beloved pet lion.
At this sight, Duo started chuckling loudly in glee, before he teased, "Tro, do you know that you're even quieter than the mutes? At least they do communicate with sign-languages, but you…" And abruptly his words were cut off in mid-way by a new blow of laughter.
Trowa mutely stared at Duo blank-facedly for a short moment, before he once again arched the single-visible eyebrow of his as reply.
An amused Catherine responded, "Trowa is one of the extremely rare Pure Ones, the mighty and highly respected Full Healers, and a very powerful one at that." She paused for a moment and then added in a sober tone with a daze look in her eyes, "Like our late mother… She too was a Pure One… On the very day of my fourteenth birthday, there was a ferocious forest fire that wiped across the lovely forest that we were born in. The fire was one that was purposely started by some humans who were clearing the land. The fire had burnt its way through our forest home and our mom had refused to leave the burning forest… She was suffering with its pain… and in her grief, she had chosen to perish with the destroyed nature that was surrounding her. For the more powerful a Wood Elven healer is, the more connected he or she tends to be to nature, and in general, among healers, the Full Healers tended to be the ones that are the most powerful and versatile in their healing skills. As for dad… he had loved her very much and hence he too had chosen to stay behind and be by her side till the very end… I had managed to escape with Trowa. Although, he was barely a few months old, he too was feeling the pain strongly… Trowa was normally a very calm, quiet and sweet-natured Wood Elfing, but that day… he was crying… weeping none stop… he too was gravely tormented by the pain that the forest was feeling…"
Trowa reached out and gently touched her on her forearm with his glowing fingers that were charged with his power, and so waking her up from the depth of her memories of a time that had long passed…
To shift the topic away from this depressing one, Harry asked, "Do you've special powers too?"
Catherine sweetly smile, before replying with a grin, "Well, I'm a Common Healer, so if you've a fall, and scrape your kneels or twist your ankles, do feel free to come and seek my help. But, there is nothing I can do about emotional upheavals or mental strains. You'll have to seek out my sweet little brother for that, and he can cure you off your scraped kneels and twisted ankles at the same time too."
"Well, I'll keep that in mind," acknowledged Duo with an enthusiastic nod, "So you better promise that you'll help me in future, Cathy."
"I promised," answered a delighted Catherine, "You boys are just so cute. Well, are you all ready to savour my most tasty tomato soup now?"
"Do we've to?" queried a somewhat disgruntled Duo with a most adorable pout.
Likewise, both Harry and Draco had a look of disgust firmly etched on their faces. As for Heero and Trowa, their faces had remained in their usual emotionless blankness.
"Besides, I still do have to keep to my belief that you do have an awfully strange and unnatural passion for soups," added a smug-sounding Draco with a slight snigger.
For an eye-blink of a second, the corners of Trowa's mouth quirked up in a tiny smile of amusement, before his face return to its usual stoic blankness and then in his toneless voice he uttered as his hand soothing stroke through the fur of the small silver fox that was lying in his lap, "The only reason that it's always soup is because she burns everything else that she tries to cook, and I do mean everything else."
"I don't!" exclaimed a slightly affronted Catherine with her hands back on her hip, "I'm sure that my culinary skills are not that bad."
In response, Trowa just gave her a look that even without the use of a single verbal expression, was enough to clearly state to all that were presented the rhetorical question of 'Really?'
With that, the small room was filled up with echoes of boyish laughter of varying extends (due to the differences among the boys' personalities) from their delighted audience that consisted of the four other boys (including the rather gruff and serious Heero).
Catherine affectionately cuffed her much younger brother on the side of his head and then in greatly exaggerated pretence of wounded pride she said with a hint of underlying amusement, "You boys, I won't stand here anymore and take all your groundless abuses. Being such a wonderful person that I'm, even with you all laughing at my expense, I'll still go and bring back some bowls of tasty soup for all of you, poor hungry souls." Following that, she walked off to the other room (which contained a miniature kitchen and a toilet) in fictitious huff.
After Catherine had left the tiny room, Harry turned to Trowa and commented, "Even with her odd fetish for soups, I've to say that I do like your sister. She seems really cool." And Duo too enthusiastically chorused his sentiments by nodding his head vigorously, before adding, "And she's an adult. So unlike Relena, we don't have to worry about getting girl-germs from her."
"You can be such an idiot, Duo. How many times do I've to repeat myself that there is no such thing as girl-germs?" scoffed an amused Heero with a smirk.
And once again, the room broke out in dazzling sounds of sweet laughter.
-- Chapter Four (End) --
Well, I've been wondering whether in the future I should give Catherine a boyfriend. And if so who should it be? I'm kind of running out of eligible bachelors, since I had paired so many of them with each other (laugh). So, please do help me with this one. What do you people think? Should she gets to have a boyfriend in future chapters? And if so who would you recommend? (And yes, as of this chapter Trowa is 7 years old, and as Catherine is 13 years older than him, she is currently 21 years old.)