Wendy, Harry, and Carla's Tale (Part 1)

Winter was not helpful in Harry's travels with Wendy and Carla. He'd wandered on foot into the snow ridden countries to the North when he'd been travelling alone, but the temperature shifts had been gradual that way so he'd had time to prepare. This time they'd hit like a truck when he apparated Wendy, Carla, and himself to the nearest town that he'd been to that laid in the direction of the coordinates he had. Where ever they were heading laid far to the North and they had to stop soon after they arrived outside the Waas Forest so that they could buy heavier clothing.

Harry was able to cast some warming charms and an impervious charm to keep the cold and melting ice from doing too much damage. Magnolia, being much further South, had a more temperate climate so they'd been ill prepared for the wintery snows of the North. Harry probably should have seen that coming, but then so apparently should Wendy and Carla. If what he was deducing from the cat's constant worried bickering was true this was fairly close to where Wendy and she had grown up.

It was true that a lot had been happening before they departed for this trip, but overlooking the fact that winter had set in for most of the continent bordered on negligent. It wasn't a great start to the trip, and Carla hadn't failed to point it out either.

Once they were more appropriately attired they began hiking. Harry's magic could only get them so far. He'd explored the Northern end of Fiore in his travels, but not overly well. He'd mostly stuck to the Eastern side of the border and their destination laid to the West. So, there was no shortcut. They were hoofing it.

Carla became an incessant nag about appropriate meal times and taking breaks. Harry reluctantly allowed her to set their schedule. He figured if he didn't allow her this modicum of control over the situation she was likely to be much worse about other things in the future. Besides, it was nice not to have to worry over it. He kept them on course and safe. Wendy kept their spirits high, and Carla made sure they followed a strict schedule that included everything from waking times to meal breaks and when they should finish hiking for the day. At the very least Harry had been able to talk her into allowing an hour or two of training each day. Sure, it slowed their progress down a bit. But Harry knew he desperately needed to work on his magic control and Wendy needed to learn how to channel as well.

So, each evening after a long day of walking, they would train. Wendy got the grasp of channeling fairly quick. Within the first two weeks she'd gone from unsure and unable to sense energy to capable of sensing the flow in the air around her when she focused intently. Harry knew that some of the hold up was an inability to explain things in a way that worked for her specific branch of magic. He didn't know how magic felt to someone who used dragon slayer magic, let alone her specific branch of it. So, he was limited to the most basic of basic explanations and clarifying when she asked questions.

It didn't matter over much though. Wendy turned out to be a fairly adept student. She took Harry's vague explanations without a single complaint and she worked her own meaning from them. It seemed to work well for them.

It took about three weeks for them to get close to their destination and in that time Wendy had started to channel ethernano from the air on a sustainable level that didn't make her own body teeter on the point of implosion. Harry would call that progress. He suspected that her attempt to enter what she called 'dragon force' had been too much too quickly. Her lungs and body, unused to the massive amount of raw power she'd channeled through herself, had been incapable of adapting quickly enough to avoid injury. So, Wendy had come out the other end barely able to move and severely hurt by her actions. Harry suspected that if they reintroduced the channeling in a more controlled way and slowly upped the amount she took in she would be able to gain results without it being a last resort.

When Harry wasn't helping Wendy figure out her next steps in training he had been working on his control. He'd been upset with himself when he saw how close he'd come to injuring the people he cared about. He had no idea how bad the incident with Cana could have gotten if he hadn't snapped out of his weird fugue state quickly, and every time that he let his magic snap at a random thought or because he'd had a nightmare he played a game of chance that he might set a friend on fire, or twist the reality of someone's being instead of turning a mirror into mercury. Harry refused to put the people he cared about in danger on purpose or through negligence. If training his conscious and unconscious control of his power made them all safer it wasn't even a question.

"Are we there?" Wendy asked, confused.

The forest stretched around them for miles and all they'd been following for the last three days was Harry's vague redirections based on his coordinates and a modification of the tempus spell that Harry was fond of.

Harry hummed and rechecked. "We should be nearly on top of it." He nodded.

"I don't see anything but trees." Carla said with a huff.

"I'm sure if it really is from my people then there's some sort of spell hiding it from easy detection." He said squinting at their surroundings and trying to detect any glimmers of disturbance in the air.

"I don't smell anything different here." Wendy was sniffing the air.

"Well, I suppose there's one way I can think of to tell for sure." He muttered. "Revelio."

A dilapidated building shimmered into view. Its walls were collapsing inward and it seemed to be on its last legs. It was precisely why Harry hadn't just cast a finite incantatum. Magic was certainly holding together any structure as old as this one. He was honestly surprised the group who'd stolen his clock's manual had made it through the wards. It must have been by chance since they were still in place.

Slowly the building faded from view again.

"That was so cool!" Wendy was staring at the spot the building had disappeared into.

"If the other group got through the wards we likely just need to walk closer." He said, taking a few steps forward to lead the way. Sure enough, he passed through the building's wards and it was revealed in all of its rotting glory once more. He waited a moment for Wendy and then Carla to come through after him. Wendy was staring at the building in wonder. Carla had a look of utter disgust on her face.

In Carla's defense even Harry could smell the slowly rotting building from here. He didn't need heightened senses to pick up the pungent scent of rotting wood and mildew. He cast a bubble head charm around each of them and some of the disgust faded from Carla's face. Wendy gave him a bright smile.

"Careful steps inside. There's no telling how stable the place is." Harry said and stepped through the doorway first.

The inside of the building was only mildly more intact than the outside. Harry could see faded banners against one of the walls sporting the Gryffindor sigil. What must have once been a rich maroon and gold was now a dusty rust red color with equally washed out embroidery that looked almost white. It was sad to look at. Harry ran a hand over the cloth delicately, aware that it was likely barely holding together.

"It must have been a library." Wendy said, opening the door on the bottom half of an intricate bookshelf. The inside was empty of everything but dust and a few spiderwebs. Harry turned curious eye on the nearly empty shelves. He huffed an amused laugh at the first tome his eyes landed on. It was even bigger than the copy Hermione used to cart around. A History of Magic laid on its side, the only book on its shelf. Wendy slid it down gently.

"I bet Levy would sell her left arm for a chance to read this." The girl said with a smile.

Harry hummed in amusement. He willed the book to restore itself. "We'll take what we can find." He said motioning for Wendy to hold on to the book. "It deserves to be safe guarded."

"Someone's been here recently." Carla interrupted Harry as he brought down a tome from higher up. He gave her a curious glance. She'd activated her wings and was hovering at about Harry's eyeline. "The dust is disturbed."

"The group that took Harry?" Wendy asked, voice uncertain.

Carla shook her head. "This is too fresh."

Harry drifted her way and surveyed the shelves she was eying. Sure enough there were drag marks through the dust where books must have been removed. "A few weeks maybe…" he guessed. He wondered if maybe he shouldn't have put off his trip here after all. Hopefully nothing too sensitive had been taken. "We'll see if we can track down what was taken once we've cleared the place out. One problem at a time. Good catch though Carla."

Carla seemed to preen at the praise before she saw Harry watching her. Then she scowled and dropped back to the floor.

They took another half hour carefully packing away everything they could find on the first floor of the building. There wasn't much. Harry took a moment to debate taking the Gryffindor tapestry. He stared at it consideringly.

"Is it something you recognize?" Wendy asked, having finished packing the last of the books with Carla's help.

He nodded. "It's the sigil for… well, my school sorted us into 'houses'. This is the house I was in 'Gryffindor'." He gestured at the faded banner.

"What did you have to do to be put in Gryffindor?" she asked, awed.

He shook his head with a grin. "You didn't really have to do anything. They had this hat that could read your mind and it sort of determined which house you were most suited to. Gryffindor was the house of the brave and chivalrous so of course I told the hat I wanted to be in that one."

"It could read your mind?" Wendy looked terrified at the thought. Harry just offered her a smile.

"It could also read your family lineage and had a pretty good grasp on personality traits. I had a long talk with one of my friends about what sort of spells they suspected had been used to enchant it." Wendy looked a bit less scared at that explanation.

He turned his attention back to the tapestry and willed it to repair itself. The holes slowly knit back together and some of the color returned. It looked a lot better, but it still looked incredible age worn. He delicately took it off its hangers and folded it before putting it in his bag. He'd try to get it to restore again, but maybe some things just couldn't be forced past a certain point of recovery.

The entire upper level of the building was gone. Even when Harry forced it to repair there was nothing to be found amongst the newly intact rooms save a few scraps of paper. Harry pocketed them anyway. He'd make sure they didn't have spells meant to hide their contents before he disposed of them.

"I found stairs that lead down into a basement, but it's too dark for me to see anything inside." Carla offered as Harry came back downstairs.

He motioned for her to show him and followed her around to the back of downstairs rooms. Sure enough there was a large trap door Carla must have pulled open with Wendy's help while he'd been perusing upstairs. Steps led down into the gloom of a basement.

Harry cast a strong lumos spell and watched the inky blackness recede. The stairs ended abruptly about halfway down. Harry was glad Wendy hadn't tried to climb down them by herself. There was a ten foot drop on the other side and if she'd been taken by surprise she might have hurt herself.

Harry repaired the stairs and preceded the other two in case there were any more nasty surprises waiting for them. The roof wasn't on the verge of collapse down here and though one of the walls seemed less than perfect he deemed it safe enough so he called them down. There was more to find here than there had been upstairs. A few spell books littered the shelves near the stairs. Harry was drawn toward some artifacts a little further in. He made to reach for one until he spotted a familiar hand reaching skyward on the shelf. He'd seen it once before. He squinted at it, trying to dig through memories and figure out why it was so familiar. Then it came to the forefront of his mind and he frowned. It was an artifact he'd seen as a child when he'd ended up on Knockturn Alley. It was cursed if he recalled correctly. He'd seen it in Borgin and Burkes when Draco Malfoy had stumbled in and nearly gotten himself trapped by it when he went poking around.

Harry reached out with his magic. The dark aura around the hand was still prominent and intense. To his surprise most of the items in the room lit up in his mind's eye. He reached out and grabbed Wendy's wrist just before she touched a sphere of glowing purple light to his left.

"Don't touch." He said, eying the room more closely. Wendy withdrew her hand and gave him a curious look. "This seems to be their dangerous magical objects vault."

"That could be a problem." Carla was frowning as she floated closer. "Whoever was here recently definitely made it downstairs. There are things missing from some of the shelves back there as well."

Not good indeed. He frowned. He'd have to find ways to contain all the dangerous magical objects here. Clearly, they couldn't be left here. People had found the place more than once and they'd definitely find it once Harry brought down the wards protecting it.

"I'll have to remove everything here myself. I don't want either of you to touch something that could harm you." He said, eying the artifacts cautiously. "Could you search around and mark anywhere you notice something missing? We'll try to puzzle out what's missing once we've made sure everything else is safe."

He summoned a piece of chalk and Wendy took it gingerly. "On it." She said with a determined nod.

Harry spent nearly two days carefully placing every single cursed object in its own special, fortified containment field. Some were mostly harmless. Others were staggeringly dangerous. The orb he'd narrowly stopped Wendy from touching seemed like one of the more dangerous ones. Harry wasn't sure what the exact purpose of it was and he didn't much want to find out.

To his surprise and relief, not every object in the basement had been cursed. Some were just objects that could be dangerous if used incorrectly. Harry found a large batch of veritaserum that was still viable to his wonder. Whoever had cast its stasis charm must have been powerful.

Harry had crafted a third extended bag to store just the dangerous items in. Everything else went into his normal bag. He'd have to find somewhere to store the dangerous bag eventually. He very much didn't like the idea of carrying around dangerous cursed items everywhere he went. It was just asking for trouble, surely. When he was just finishing up placing the last of the cursed items in their own bag Wendy joined him at the table he'd been using. He was tired and really wanted to catch some sleep, but she looked eager to present something to him so he sat down and raised an eyebrow inquisitively.

"We found this while we were looking around for things that had been taken." She said, sliding a long, rolled scroll of paper. About eight items seemed to have a small mark next to them. "It's a list of everything that was here. We're pretty sure."

Harry scanned the list more closely this time.

"All the spots were numbered so Carla and I marked the ones that were missing." Wendy gestured to the small dots of ink.

"Fantastic." He said with a smile. "That saves a lot of trouble. Thanks."

Wendy beamed. "Carla sent me to come get you." She said, smile turning a bit more apologetic at those words. "She said you need to take a break and dinner is almost done anyway."

Harry groaned, but stood anyway. Carla was ruthless with her damned schedules. Harry was happy to follow them for the most part, but he'd appreciate feeling like he had the autonomy to determine when he should eat and take breaks. His stomach growled as if to contradict him. Wendy snickered. Damn traitorous stomach. "I finished anyway." He sulked. "Help me carry everything up?"

He reached out and took the curse bag. Wendy grabbed his other bags and rushed up the stairs, leaving him to follow at a more sedate pace. His lower back ached. He knew Carla was right about needing to take breaks, but he refused to admit it. Carla was already insufferable about it now. He couldn't imagine how smug she'd be if he admitted she was right.

"Oh good." Carla drifted his way as he made it outside. "You can help move the stew off the fire. Wendy nearly fell into it yesterday."

Wendy blustered an excuse behind the cat, but Harry laughed and floated the stew off the fire to rest in a more comfortable spot near their makeshift table. He knew the cauldron he'd transfigured could get heavy when it was weighed down with food. He certainly didn't blame the petite girl for being unable to lift it easily. She was deceptively strong, but the balance of trying to keep a hot, forty-pound pot from touching you was a delicate thing for someone her size. She didn't have height or arm length on her side.

They sat and talked about mundane things. Wendy was reading through the History of Magic book she'd found the first day. She was excited to hear Harry's personal details about the different things she'd read. She'd asked about goblins when she made it to the goblin rebellion. Harry had told her about how they'd run the wizarding banks in Britain and how he'd rode a giant dragon through the roof of their biggest bank. Wendy had been properly awed by the story. Carla had told him it seemed irresponsible at best. Which… wasn't an inaccurate statement. He'd probably caused more property damage that day with his friends than Natsu managed on a typical job. Or even ten typical jobs.

Their night wore on with Wendy talking enthusiastically about what she'd read, sharing with Carla. Harry would chime in occasionally as he ate, but mostly he just listened to Wendy talk about his world with the same enthusiasm a busy haired muggle born had once used. At some point Harry drifted off listening to a story Wendy had found about Grindelwald.

What felt like only minutes later someone shook his shoulder gently and Harry peeled his eyes open reluctantly expecting to see Wendy. Carla was standing on the table in front of him with a much less severe look than usual. "You shouldn't sleep here. You'll hurt your back."

Harry considered that for a moment along with the almost polite tone the cat had used. "Mmm…" he hummed and pushed himself up. He gave her a tired wave and made his way over to his bed before collapsing facedown and falling into a deeper sleep.

Most of the artifacts taken could be classified as moderately to negligibly dangerous. There were a couple that Harry didn't know and couldn't find any information on in the texts they'd found in the basement. Harry was putting together a plan for how they'd approach the search for the missing artifacts. He figured it made the most sense to track down the unknown ones first in case they posed a greater risk than the moderately dangerous ones. Then they'd tackle them from most to least dangerous. There was no telling who had taken the things or for what purpose, so it was best to locate the ones that posed the most threat first.

"Harry…" Wendy was reading the massive history text again. She'd been enthralled in it since she first picked it up. He glanced up from his reorganized list. "Your name is in here."

His eyes skimmed the book. She was already almost halfway through, reading with a speed that would make Hermione or even Lucy enviable. It must be a moderately well updated version of the book for his name to appear that early. "It is." He said casually. He shifted a few items around. They would be leaving soon and Harry wanted certain supplies quick to grab. It took time to find things in a bag as cluttered as his was now. "A few times actually."

He turned his gaze back her way and she was just… staring. He felt himself take a step back at the intensity of the look.

"We should get ready to move, Wendy." Carla said. She'd been making sure they hadn't forgotten anything at their campsite. "You'll have to put that book away."

Wendy broke eye contact with him and pouted in Carla's direction instead, but it was to no avail. Carla stuck to her guns and Wendy was forced to put the book away.

"I take it you have a plan to at least get us close so we aren't hiking all the way across Fiore multiple times?" Carla fixed him with a look.

Harry shrugged. "I'll see what general direction a point me spell sends us in and if there's a location I've visited we'll see if its closer. That's really the best I can do." He said, slinging his bag over his shoulder and fixing her with a smile. "For the most part we'll be walking."

Carla looked a bit put out that he didn't have some sort of instant travel option.

"It's good for us." Harry said, finger coming up to make his point. "Wendy is in the middle of endurance training anyway. She's nailed down the channeling while sitting still. Her next step would be to do it while we're moving anyway."

"I get to move on!" Wendy cheered, fist pumping into the air. She'd kept asking what the next step was all of last week. Harry just kept telling her to make sure she'd mastered what she was already learning before trying to rush to the next step. A solid foundation was always more beneficial than a shaky special move.

Harry nodded at the enthusiastic shout. They were ready to go. Even Carla had her little pack on. Harry used a point me spell on their first objective, using the name listed on the document Wendy and Carla had found. Southwest. From where they were now the only place he could think to go would be Blue Pegasus. Harry winced internally at that idea. Still, he'd been all around the guild during the trials. No need to stop in and say hello or anything. He'd just pop in somewhere near where they'd had the tunnels and see where his point me spell sent them.

He gathered his two teammates and apparated with a quick twist. They landed in a familiar clearing. Wendy clearly recognized it. She sent Harry a curious look, but he just cast the point me spell again. Still Southwest but with a sharper curve to the West than South, and closer this time according to the shortened spinning. So, they'd closed some of the distance apparently. Still, Harry hadn't spent long on the West side of Fiore. That was looking like an oversight now. If their search was going to take them across the Western side of the nation it would primarily be walking since he didn't have any reference points to apparate to.

Sure enough their hiking took them through long stretches of uninhabited areas on their trek West. At least between Harry's moderate pace and Carla's insistence on breaks and sleeping regimens they stayed relatively well rested. Harry's ridiculously over stocked food pantry was also beneficial and Harry made sure that they stopped often enough to take baths (even if they were just quick ones with summoned water) and he kept their clothes as clean as he could with scouring charms.

All things said, they definitely could've been travelling in worse conditions and in their time marching West they all seemed to ease into each other's company a bit more. Carla didn't seem as dead set on glaring at Harry every chance she got like she had back at Fairy Tail. Wendy no longer seemed to be anxious about upsetting either of them just by existing or asking a question. Harry found his nightmares fewer and further between. He also found that he didn't mind answering Wendy's relentless line of questions about the book she was obsessed with or his parts in it.

"And so, when we found that we were able to make certain muggle items work even in the presence of magic they started to develop prototypes at the lab to push the limits. It was easier and easier over the years to find ways to integrate the two as magic grew weaker. It interfered with the technology less." Harry explained. He'd gone through enough history lessons over the past few weeks that Wendy and Carla had both picked up on most of the common shorthand from back in his day. Wendy was nodding along. Carla looked thoughtful, as she often did when Harry gave a history lesson that had nothing to do with a war or some other sort of violence. "Anyway, you should be channeling. I can tell you've stopped."

Wendy squeaked and the draw in the magic around them picked up again.

"I've been meaning to ask." Carla drew his attention. "Could you explain the channeling a bit clearer for me?"

Harry gave her a curious look.

"I was…" she looked a bit uncertain, but she pushed on. It was a strange pause for Carla to make. She was usually headstrong even when she was wrong. Not that she was necessarily wrong often. "You know that Panther Lily has a combat form?"

Harry nodded. He'd only seen it a hand full of times, but he was aware of it.

"It's transformation magic." She said, meeting his eyes. "It requires the focus of magical power."

"Ah…" Harry thought about that for a second. "So, channeling magic has two sides. Sensing the magic inside of yourself and sensing the magic outside of yourself."

Carla nodded, attention fully turned his way as she floated along beside him.

"Channeling requires sensing the magic outside of yourself and bringing it into your own magic center to be turned into the spell you want to cast." he said, trying to find the right words. "It's more difficult than our own subconscious use of internal magic. It requires active thought and effort. The most important thing is to realize that even though you're directing that energy it isn't fully yours. When you stop channeling it, that magic returns to nature instead of being trapped in your body."

Carla nodded again. She seemed lost in thought.

"Wendy is channeling large quantities to try and expand her own natural magical reservoir, but that's probably not the right way to go about it for you." He admitted. "Your transformation magic is unlikely to need the massive amounts of power that Wendy's dragon force requires."

"I should hope not." Carla cringed. Wendy laughed.

Harry hummed in thought. "Maybe this will help…" he forced some of his own magic out into the air. It was potent and hung heavier than the raw natural magic around them. "My magic should be easier to sense than the natural magic. It might help you get a feel for finding external sources."

They'd stopped walking now so Carla could focus. It took a couple of minutes but then Harry felt a slow tug on his magic. With a sharp popping noise Carla turned into a young girl, probably about Wendy's age with long white hair and a look of intense concentration written across her face.

"OH MY GOD!" Wendy crashed into Carla. "You're so cute Carla!"

Carla popped again and she'd turned back into a cat. She gave Wendy a put-upon look and Wendy looked the slightest bit sheepish.

"That was a solid first try." Harry laughed, helping the two up. "Maybe we can call it a bit early on the walking for today and Carla can get some practice in on Channeling."

"That would be acceptable this once." Carla nodded perfunctorily, but Harry could sense the preening and the obvious excitement at having succeeded.

By the time they'd recovered the first two artifacts Carla didn't need Harry's help with identifying external magic. She was capable of locating and drawing in the natural magic around them. So long as she was focused she was capable of maintaining her transformation magic. Each day she practiced seemed to make it a little easier. Wendy too had improved by miles and was actively using her channeling to enter her dragon force form now.

Not only was Wendy channeling while moving she'd started sparring with Harry in the evenings. Harry quickly learned that his normal attire was far from favorable for the amount of exercise he was getting. He was casting so many scouring charms on his vests that they'd started to show wear. He'd repaired them of course, but to save himself the hassle for the time being he'd switched to more casual clothing. Spring was starting to set in and they'd moved further South again so Harry found himself several sets of basic clothing and they'd found some new clothes for Wendy too. She'd ripped most of her dresses trying to do complicated maneuvers in her sparring matches with Harry so he'd bought her some new ones along with some shorts and shirts of her own. Wendy had seemed awestruck by his willingness to pay for the clothing. Harry had assured her that money wasn't an issue. He'd been stockpiling since he joined Fairy Tail in case he'd decided to go wandering again. He hadn't foreseen the circumstances that led to him wandering, but here he was with more than enough savings to buy some clothes for the girl.

"East." Harry said, staring at the point me spell.

"Specific." Carla replied, tone a bit caustic. Harry could tell it was mostly directed at his spell. The majority of the country laid to the East since the first two artifacts they'd tracked had both laid along the Western coast. The spell couldn't have been more vague if it tried.

"We do know some towns on the Eastern side of Fiore though." Wendy supplied helpfully. "As long as it's not in middle of Fiore we should be able to tell which side would be shorter to walk from at least."

She wasn't wrong. Harry thought a little bit painfully of their departure from Magnolia. He'd promised several people he'd pay visits. Maybe he was overdue for that anyway.

Hi guys! I'm back.

The short stories ended up being five different installments. They're already done and I'm working on the sequel. I'm not sure if things are going to slow down update wise or speed up. I have several doctors appointments and possibly a surgery in the near future. I'm just waiting to hear back about some stuff. The semester is over though and my grandmother's funeral is done. So other than the holidays and doctor stuff my schedule is pretty open so I might find more time to write (theoretically).

Either way, I'm happy you guys are here reading again and I hope you had no issues finding this. Lots of fun to come. :)

~Kanathia