Walking Dead Wizard

Chapter 54

Harry flicked his finger lighting the candle which was placed inside the sink which he used as a little table. He scooted to the side of his bed, so he could lean against the wall, a little befuddled at this new turn of events. Although it could have something to do with the fact he was still half asleep, the candle let a little light glow around the room so he could make Daryl out. He glanced briefly at his watch as he yawned, it was rather late, but he had slept for four hours straight so he wasn't going to complain.

"I heard you talking to the kid," Daryl admitted, remaining standing, but his body radiated a tense energy.

"Alright," Harry said, but there was obviously more to it, Daryl obviously wanted to ask something, but Daryl was by nature quiet and he obviously didn't know how to ask the question so it was probably personal. "Sit down then and ask what you want to ask," it had evidently been playing on his mind for some time. Which didn't surprise him; both Dixons waited until they exploded with curiosity and just had to ask.

"What you said, was it true?" Daryl asked, but he already knew the answer to that, Harry didn't make a habit of lying…in fact he didn't lie full stop.

"Yes," Harry replied immediately, while he got himself comfortable, watching Daryl as closely as he was able considering there wasn't much light in the room. He wasn't surprised when Daryl did eventually sit down, there wasn't much room to manoeuvre around his double bed and the snake tank he kept covered under the sink. So he couldn't pace as he liked to do. Summoning his empty water bottle, he stuck his wand into the opening and refilled it before gulping the entire contents down, then repeated the process but handed over the filled bottle to Daryl.

"Luna said all the stories you've told Sophia are true," Daryl added after taking a long drink himself. Magically created water was better than anything else they could get, whether it was rainwater or filtered water from the river.

"Ah," Harry said finally understanding why Daryl had come. "Luna's right, she's even featured in the one I told Sophia about a while ago."

"You had to kill in self defence when you were eleven?" Daryl asked, his brow furrowed, he couldn't even begin to imagine what that had done to Harry. Seeing his house burn down with his mother in it had affected him, but that was a totally different scenario.

"My defence against the dark arts teacher," Harry informed him, his voice sounding far away as if he had reached through back in time. "I brought it on myself though, I had tried to tell a teacher what was happening, and my Head of House, but she just told me that the stone was safe. The stone was the Philosopher stone, it's the elixir of life, and it can make the drinker immortal and also turned any metal into pure gold."

"In a school?" Daryl was perplexed, why would they keep such a thing in a school.

Harry chuckled darkly, "It was removed from a high secure vault and put into Hogwarts, Dumbledore in all his wisdom decided to test me against my parent's killer. He got what he wanted, Voldemort had attached himself to the back of Quirrell, a willing possession…Quirrell the fucking fool that he is was drawn to Voldemort, swallowed his propaganda, the problem is that Quirrell couldn't touch me while Voldemort was possessing him, my mums protection extended beyond the grave, and made him unable to touch me. It literally burned him when he touched my skin, Voldemort began screaming to Quirrell to kill me, because I had the stone, I was able to get it when they could not. In the end it was kill or be killed, I grabbed a hold of Quirrell's face and held on. Voldemort fled when he realized he couldn't win, ripping himself from Quirrell just as he was reduced to a pile of ash, took a lot out of me, last thing I could remember before wakening up in the hospital wing."

"How'd you manage that?" Daryl asked only slightly amused that an eleven year old found something an adult couldn't.

"The stone was concealed in a mirror, to get it you had to want it but have no desire to use it otherwise it wouldn't appear for you. Despite my hatred for Dumbledore…I do have to admire the spell work that went into hiding it." Harry said wryly, but that wasn't strange, he had some admiration for some of Voldemort's spells and rituals, considering how hard it was to create them, and he knew that now, it made his admiration more profound.

Daryl's fists clenched, the urge to lash out was very strong, but that was him all over. Act first, think never; what kind of dickhead got a kick out of sending a kid to fight a man's battle? This Dumbledore may never have lifted a hand to Harry, at least he assumed so, but he was no better than the miserable dickhead his father had been. He hoped everyone knew what a dirty bastard they'd had being headmaster of school kids.

"The Troll?" Daryl then asked, mentally going through the 'stories' Harry had told Sophia, which go all the way back to the quarry, usually Harry would sit and tell them tales while he whittled figures for the four kids that had been there in the beginning, although it was mostly Sophia and Carl, the other two kids rarely left their parents side.

Harry smirked, "Very true, held me by my leg and swung me around, managed to get onto its back and my wand went up its nostril." he informed him greatly amused. "What fallowed was a friendship with one of the smartest girls I know, Hermione had ended up in bathroom upset for being bullied. I'd never regret it, even if I had ended up injured, without her I wouldn't have been able to do everything I did…" that's led me on this path. While living in an apocalyptic world wasn't anything fancy, he had Luna, Daryl and Merle with him, and he cared very much about them. He cared for the others sure, just not in the same way; he kept his distance because they didn't know one vital thing about him, about his magic. While Mira knew…he hadn't known her as long as the others.

Daryl grunted, there was no denying Harry was surrounded by strong confident women, he had thought that himself after speaking to Hermione through the mirror, or rather when she spoke to him.

"I didn't think this is how I'd end up in bed with you," Harry couldn't help but tease him, it was just extremely arousing how uncomfortable Daryl got, how his face went red…like now, in fact he looked ready to bolt. Placing his hand on Daryl's shoulder, "I'm joking, I told you before and I meant it, I'm happy to go at your pace." didn't mean it didn't get a little frustrating especially when he wanted to show Daryl how much he wanted him, how much he cared. Scooting forward, ignoring how tense Daryl was, he wrapped his arms around him and leaned his head on his shoulder. "Tell you what; I'll give you information about me if you do the same."

"Ain't anything to tell," Daryl said, refraining from shrugging as Harry's head was on his shoulder. The warmth from Harry's body was unbelievable, warming his back and where his arms were around his stomach.

"You mean nothing good?" Harry corrected him quietly, "As shit as my childhood was…I think I have a few tales I could entertain you with." Merlin, Daryl was actually letting him touch him for longer than a few seconds, each section of his body was rippled with muscle, not that he ever dressed in clothes that made it impossible to tell. He was always showing off his arms, probably why it was so difficult for Harry to keep desires in check. He would have thought he did it on purpose, but no, both Merle and Daryl did it, and had probably done it for years before the apocalypse.

"Got lost in the woods once," Daryl said after a few minutes of silence. "For nine days,"

"And they didn't realise did they? Or did your brother look for you?" Harry asked he didn't need further confirmation on why Daryl would consider it a good memory of sorts. Despite himself he would have been hurt that nobody looked for him, yet at the same time, there was a certain freedom to it.

"Merle had already left," Daryl said bitterly, "Didn't even come home after ma died."

"What happened?" Harry asked quietly his tone solemn.

"Died, burnt the house down falling asleep smoking, by the time I got there the house was consumed with flames," Daryl admitted.

"I'm sorry you went through that," Harry replied.

"After what you went through? It's nothing," Daryl scoffed.

"That's where you're wrong, you were a kid, nobody deserves to lose their parents, what I went through shouldn't come into it. Plus I had no idea during my childhood that they were murdered, I was told they'd died drunk driving, almost killing me in the smash up." Harry revealed, "It's too bad you don't have any pictures, I would have loved to have seen what you looked like as a kid." grinning sheepishly.

"Didn't have any even before the apocalypse," Daryl told him, "Didn't have much of anything let alone a camera."

"So what happened when you got lost?" Harry asked, changing the subject since there was nothing he could say about that, it was pretty much the same for himself. The only photos he had dated back only to when he attended Hogwarts, eleven years old. Or the ones he'd had taken of him when he was a baby when his parents were alive.

"Not much, wandered around, ate wild berries," Daryl said, "Wiped my ass with poisoned oak," expecting Harry to laugh, everyone else did.

Harry winced, "Poisoned oak? Seriously? Bloody hell, that must have been painful," shuddering a little at the thought of such a tender place being filled with rashes, blisters and oozing sores. "You must have been really young to have used that without knowing what it would do."

"Younger than Sophia when she got lost," Daryl informed him, "Made my way back home, went in and made myself a sandwich, my dumb-ass father didn't even know I'd been gone."

"So your father didn't teach you how to hunt? I sort of assumed he would have taught you the basics," Harry admitted, wondering if the father was responsible for the state of his back, his thoughts were yes, no caring father would not notice their kid was gone for nine days.

"When he wasn't completely smashed he'd take me campin' taught me that, but it was Merle who taught me how to track and hunt properly when he got out of prison and the Military." Daryl revealed.

"Was that the only family you had?" Harry queried, not wanting Daryl to stop talking, not now while he was actually getting to hear a bit about his life. That and he honestly didn't want Daryl to leave, he was very comfortable, he doubted Daryl felt the same; he was wrapped around him like an eel. Yet he wasn't too tense, so Harry took that as a good sign.

"Yes," Daryl confirmed.

Sensing that Daryl had reached the end of his tether for taking about his family, and getting ready to put distance between them, both physically and mentally. "One of my favourite days was when I was in primary school, my teacher, an elderly woman, hated me because of the rumours my aunt and uncle spread…pissed me off, and you know what happened to me when that occurs, as I was a kid I had no control over it…didn't even realize what I was doing either…not consciously…I turned my teachers wig blue, nobody knew how it happened but as soon as I got home Dudley told his parents and I got into trouble for it."

Daryl snorted in amusement, just imagining it happen, too bad Harry hadn't been there when he was in school - on the days he actually attended, now that would have been worth going for. "Why didn't you use your magic on them?"

"Growing up I was made to believe that I was a freak of nature, abnormal, I was afraid of my magic, as it stands I never actually used my magic on them. They made me furious, terrified but nothing ever happened, fear locks up your magic, and makes you incapable of thinking. The only time I ever actually used magic on them was to blow up my aunts sister in law, she was talking about my mum and how she was 'bad blood' that if there was something wrong with her then there was something wrong with me." Harry mused thoughtfully, "By blow up she began to inflate, like a balloon, once she expanded she began to float across the ceiling, through the conservatory and up into the sky, the Ministry had to find her and deflate her, unfortunately she didn't get to remember her cross country trip. They Obliviated her, made it so she couldn't remember." he finished sardonically.

Daryl's shoulder shook as he tried to contain his amusement, which he did successfully, Harry wouldn't have realized if it were not for the closeness they were sharing.

"My personal favourite though…had to be the time where I actually got to go anywhere that wasn't school or at Privet Drive. Usually when they went anywhere I was forced to stay at a neighbours, Arabella Figg, she was weird even by my standards, a cat woman, house smelt like cabbages, had disgusting flower couches, I always got the impression she didn't like me much. It wasn't until I was fifteen that I learned she'd been placed there to keep an eye on me by Dumbledore, she was a squib and part of Dumbledore's group." Harry said, "Anyway I was just days away from turning eleven, Dudley's birthday and she broke her leg, couldn't take me, and Petunia couldn't get anyone else to either. They had to take me. Got my first taste of ice cream as well, Dudley decided he didn't like it, so it was thrust in my direction. Make a long story short, when we got to the reptile house…Dudley was banging viciously on the windows, because the snakes wouldn't move, he lost interest and I unknowingly began to speak Parseltongue, snake language, and it obviously spoke back about it being born imprisoned in the zoo, Dudley barrelled right back, knocking me onto the floor, he was a massive boy, obese, extremely over weight, I'm surprised he didn't break any of my bones." he said thoughtfully, suppressing a yawn.

Daryl waited impatiently to know what happened, he wanted to know more. "What happened?" he actually asked.

Harry grinned, "I got pissed off, made the glass Dudley was leaning against disappear, and he fell right into the snake habitant. The snake quickly sensing its chance of escape disappeared out of the enclosure and began to slither out of there. Everyone else was too busy gawping at Dudley, who was slamming his fists against the glass that had reappeared leaving him trapped inside the enclosure. Petunia was wailing like a banshee, demanding that someone help her son, Vernon was red faced and furious, it was well worth it. He was terrified of me after that, he found out what I was a few weeks later…so did I come to that."

"Then you faced teachers, Trolls, massive snakes and dragons," Daryl summarised from the stories, shaking his head. "And that felt normal to you?" because it certainly didn't to him.

"Normal? No, I didn't have a normal experience in the magical world, Daryl, I was manipulated on all sides, between Dumbledore's tests, to irresponsible and dangerous teachers…Death Eaters, and to being entered into an extremely dangerous tournament against my will…everything I did was to survive. Nothing more nothing less. Its primarily why I basically went into seclusion after everything I'd been through…but being with you it the first true slice of normalcy I've ever experienced…well except the walkers, but its not just me that's going through it…it's everyone in the world." Harry stated honestly.

Daryl snorted derisively, "You thought being with me and Merle was normal?" he found that hard to believe.

"You know what I can do; didn't you ever ask yourself why I didn't just Apparate away? Once I had recovered enough I mean…" Harry pointed out.

"Thought it once or twice," Daryl admitted.

"Budge up," Harry said suddenly, groaning a little, removing himself from the back of Daryl, his legs were cramped and felt extremely uncomfortable. Sighing softly, now that was much better, both of them were sitting on the bed, their legs hanging over the end, Harry kept one arm around Daryl though, not wishing to relinquish any progress he'd made with him. Plus he had a feeling this would be the way to be and have any contact - on their own. To his immense surprise, a muscled arm wrapped around his shoulders, and Harry felt extremely satisfied, he must be doing something right after all?

"You and your brother are brutally honest; I think that's the first thing I really began to like about the both of you. You might think you needed your brother most, but the truth is your brother needed you more. You should have seen how pale he went when he saw your back, then he became an enraged bull, I honestly thought he was going to go off on a rampage, although I managed to calm him down and get him to talk to you." Harry said offhandedly, getting a little off topic. "You had a very simple life, a lovely secluded cabin, with everything you needed, hunting for your meals; I really enjoyed my time there. Especially the few times you went into town, except the day Merle got into a fight and got us kicked out." Harry chuckled dryly. It was a few days before shops began to close down when the infection grew too great that it was on every news outlet in the area.

Daryl felt something deep inside give a little, he wasn't sure what the feeling was, he'd never experienced it before, but it was very liberating. It was similar to the feeling he got after catching a big buck, was it pride? He still thought Harry was odd, nobody lived like that unless they had to - or had no other choice. The people in the area he'd grown up in had mocked him for who he was. He's spent his time with people who had been in the same situation as him, all of them called rednecks. Yet here was a guy who had money, who had actually enjoyed living in a small cabin, hunting with him and his brother and visiting the town the few times they had? It made him feel less ashamed of himself.

Harry yawned tiredly, shifting again, despite his reluctance to do so and lay down on the bed, his legs open with a V shape, where Anubis lay. "Will you describe the cabin you grew up in?" and unaware of what he was actually doing...causing Daryl's self confidence was skyrocket.

And Daryl did, he spoke about the various cabins he'd lived in over the years, well into the night, and continued even after Harry fell asleep for a short while.

He actually stayed there, falling asleep himself, propped up against the headboard.

Nothing too drastic i'm afraid but I think everyone was already aware that this would happen i mean its far too soon for Daryl just to give in so to speak :D and OMFG! I'm still reeling over the first episode of season 7! :O :O bloody hell! and the comments on FB and that? About how it was Daryl's fault? I get frustrated and amused in equal measures over it! It's hilarious because one of the folk that died actually wanted that to happen (wanted to leave the way they did) and the writers wrote it...yet they're still blaming Daryl? :D haha yeah *sigh* I'm going to miss em though i must admit! you know I actually wanted that scene to be where Harry shows his magic, then all hope was utterly lost but I've changed too much for them to land in that situation...do you want me to write the scene as how I would have done it on a separate one shot? I already know where Harry will show his magic and it won't be that far away...in fact i dont even know if Negan will be in it! What do you guys think? Do you want to see Negan in it? will we totally skip the Gov and go straight to Negan or what :D hehehe or will the story actually go on long enough for someone in Harry's group to encounter the saviours? Harry isn't one for playing the hero anymore...at least not really - not actively searching for it! Or will it be Hilltop that they learn about it? ahh so many things that could go into this story that might not :D maybe thats what makes the story different from the others who follow it with just added people something I definitely didnt want :D R&R please!