Disclaimer- I don't own Harry Potter. I do hope one day to be as good as J.K. is at writing, though.
Chapter 4 Constructed Paradise
Harry awoke the next morning, refreshed, and a little queasy when he remembered he just ate a turkey, raw. Still, survival was a rough business.
His muse danced within his mind, making him remember the promise he made. Today, he would use his powers to create true things, to create life.
He would not be alone anymore. He would create life, would create an entire paradise for himself. There would be life on this island, and his life would have purpose.
With that mind set, that purpose, he got up, and began to let his muse and imagination flow, to let them bring forth creatures, images, sights, smells.
To make something truly live, to create an entire ecosystem, Harry would need a lot more concentration than what he used to create the goldfish and turkey.
He would need all his willpower.
True Creation would be more difficult than Harry originally thought.
The first thing Harry decided that his new land should have would be shade. He would make trees, trees that would live and grow and provide fruit and help him sustain his new land, and himself.
But the ground was unsuitable, he realized. Nothing but sand all around. Unless he willed that sand to become fertile soil, to be a life giving ground, to be the building blocks of his new paradise.
Harry's muse danced, and gave him the inspiration. Patient, slow growth, that would be what he would envision within his soil. It would be the most fertile ground in the world.
Focusing, Harry closed his eyes after freezing a mental image of the unchanging, coarse and tanned sand, willing it to become brown, soft soil. Patient growth was his paint, and the canvas was the land, as Harry worked his art.
When he opened his eyes, the ground was brown, as far as the eye could see, until it touched the beach and intermingled with it and made tanned sand and brown dirt into one ground. Harry smiled.
The first brick of his new land had been laid down, the cornerstone. Soon, his new home, his paradise, his sanctuary, would be finished. Now Harry envisioned trees, soaring, giant trees, whip thin ones, short ones, fat ones, ones with large fruit, small fruit, ones that had no fruit but smelled sweet and felt soft, all filling the picture of his mind, and soon to fill the vision of the land.
So shall it be willed, so shall it be done.
"Wicked," Harry managed to pull that world out his darkened mine, and smiled, a feeling of friendship and a flash, too short to tell who it was, but still, a friendly feeling. All around him, there were trees, the trees from his mind. He smiled, and plucked a sienna colored fruit out of a perfectly proportioned tree, a tree that produced fruit at just his height. He bit into the fruit, and the juices exploded into his mouth, filling his senses with a sweet, tangy flavor, earthly and yet unearthly at the same time.
Harry sat down, smiling, enjoying the taste of the fruit he created, a fruit that existed no where else, but was inspired from the blank forms of his memory, inspired by his muse. He bit into the sienna fruit twice more, finishing it off, sighing with satisfaction. The tree rustled in the wind, as if beckoning Harry to taste more of its fruit, but the creator was satisfied for now.
Yet, as his stomach settled and he cast a satisfied eye over his land, from the forest that surrounded him to the oasis turned pond behind him, that shimmered in the forests elusive light, he found that he was uneasy again. This time, he found the forest too quiet, which was of course, understandable. Forests were full of life, which by proxy has sound, and this forest had only the movements of its creator within its depths.
Harry focused again, and began to conjure up the image of a new animal, as his muse danced faster and faster in his mind, casting the image with every twirl and dance and movement the muse made.
It took form within his mind, the creature did. It took a long, graceful neck with a relatively small head and tiny antlers, with a lithe, agile body, and a shimmering earth brown coat. Beside it, another of its kind, this one more bulky and with larger muscles and an apparatus that defined it was male, appeared. Harry opened his eyes, and, just as it had been done before, the two animals appeared, stepping cautiously, eyeing their creator warily, before bounding off into the woods.
Harry smiled, watching them go, before falling back down to the ground to sit. He was tired, as all true creation had to be draining on the soul, the mind, and the body. All things needed to feel at least uncomfortable to create something, if not feel pain. That was how Harry had begun to create, in the agony that happened before he created the oasis, the agony of giving something form, giving it life.
That was how all things came into life, through pain and anguish, how pain and death by proxy turned to true life, and creation.
A few hours later, Harry was once again lying on the ground, exhausted, completely and utterly spent. He had finished his forest.
A meter tall auburn colored squirrel frolicked with another, equally tall squirrel, high above him on the boughs of one tree, one among many Harry had not yet named.
The squirrels were provided from his memories, given to him by his muse. He found them a little too small for his liking, and quickly enlarged them in his mind.
Nearby, a gurgling, giggling river lapped playfully on its banks, flowing steadfastly towards the ocean. It originated from the oasis that Harry first created, and was something he had almost forgotten to add.
A snow-white ferret with crimson eyes darted to and fro on the ground, causing a smile to crack on Harry's face. For some strange reason, he was always greatly amused whenever he saw that ferret, which was why he created it.
The ferret squeaked in fright of some unnamed foe, and ran off quickly. The unnamed foe turned out to be a three meter long snake that slithered on the ground, stalking the ferret amusedly, which was what Harry had asked it to do when it wasn't busy sleeping or eating the giant squirrels. It was forbidden to eat the ferret, simply because it amused Harry so much, and gave him a sort of guilty, vindictive pleasure.
The snake nodded and hissed at him. "Hello massster."
"Hello." Harry greeted back. It had been quite an amusing moment, he supposed, when he learned he could talk to snakes. The snake just greeted him, like it had done now, but Harry hadn't greeted back, but fallen right into the river.
For once, Harry had been glad no one was around to watch him.
He himself had changed along with his surroundings. He now wore a plain black robe that was open at the front, and a much better looking pair of trousers than his previous ones. His skin had begun to tan, and his injuries were nearly faded. He was beginning to grow stronger, just like his powers, and to look much healthier than before, much like the island on which he lay.
Yes, this place was a constructed paradise.
In another part of the world, Severus Snape was in Hell, or at least in the Devil's presence.
The red eyed devil paced slowly in front of the Inner Circle, his midnight black robes swirling and swishing around him, his deathly pale skin contrasted in the dim firelight.
Finally, the Devil known as Lord Voldemort spoke. "We will move against the Ministry and Dumbledore soon. Begin preparations for an attack immediately."
Snape resisted the urge to blink and ask the question his other master had asked of him. Where was the Potter brat?
Luckily, an impetuous Bellatrix Lestrange asked it for him. "Master, where is Potter?"
Lord Voldemort paused in his pacing, as if weighing his next words and schemes, or perhaps weighing how long he would hold Bellatrix under the Cruciatus. Finally, he spoke after seemingly endless minutes. "Potter is... disposed of. Wormtail accidentally allowed the boy to fall in the ocean."
Snape's eyes nearly widened in surprise, but years of discipline had steeled his reflexes. "So, Potter is dead," Snape asked quietly, "Master?"
Lord Voldemort turned towards him, smiling slightly and cruelly. "Indeed, Severus. I am disappointed I could not further Potter's... punishment, but Wormtail graciously agreed to take the cup of my wrath."
Every Inner Circle member winced and shuddered in unison. The Wrath of Lord Voldemort would not have been an easy death.
"I will let the world know soon that Potter is dead, and then we will strike in the chaos that follows."
"When shall we begin master?" Bellatrix whispered eagerly, fingering her wand.
The Dark Lord cast a dark smile on the female Death Eater. "Soon enough Bellatrix."
"Potter's death may make him a martyr, my Lord." Lucius Malfoy cut in slowly, smoothly.
"True enough, Lucius," The Dark Lord said indulgently, "But it will also throw the public into a panic. And a show of force soon after will crush their morale." The Dark Lord paused for a moment, smiling widely to reveal his fangs, his crimson eyes glittering like rubies.
"The death of the Boy-Who-Lived will prove to the world once and for all that no one escapes Lord Voldemort." He smiled wider. "No one."
Severus knew that that smile would haunt his nightmares for years after this meeting, and somehow, felt a small twinge of pity for those who would feel the fury of the Dark Lord.
And, although he bitterly fought against the idea and hated it, something in him lost hope at knowing the Boy-Who-Lived had died. And an even more unacknowledged part of him felt a miniscule shred of comfort that the boy had not suffered for too long.
He also felt an slight revulsion at the fact that he was deathly afraid of what would happen if he said something wrong about how the boy had died to Molly Weasley.
Thanks to Gaps, azntgr01, Alan Quicksilver, ashleighm, moonfyre, PinkyTheSnowman, Lady of Masbolle, FroBoy, danjo210, Cattatra, Wren Truesong, Gohan00, Emma Barrows, dead feather, and Neo Seeker for reviewing!
Q&A
Lady of Masbolle- Probably know resurrected Sirius
danjo210- That doesn't really work here. Heck, I can't see much romance working here for the most part.
Wren Truesong- Harry's version of Heaven is just peaceful. Of course, you, me, and everyone else from here to that tiny planet next to Alpha Centuari knows that Harry's life can never be peaceful.
Neo Seeker- Sorry if you don't like it. Just ignore this one and write Dark Rage. Personally, sometimes I have mixed feelings about it too.
AN: Sorry it's so short, there's just not much to do here. Thanks for reading and please review!