"Voldemort," Dumbledore sighed, "Mangled Harry's body until it was unidentifiable, before turning his wand onto Chris. I don't want to make you any more upset then you already are."
"My baby's dead?" Lily continued to cry as James held onto his wife tightly.
Chapter 4
Days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months, but still Lily Potter couldn't feel a thing. Her body was still numb, and her mind was blank. It had been two months since Dumbledore had told her that her eldest son was dead, and Lily's mind still couldn't comprehend this fact, her body still ran on autopilot.
Each morning was the same; wake up, get Chris ready, make breakfast, see James off, clean the house from top to bottom without magic, make dinner, put Chris to sleep, go to bed, and then repeat the next day.
As each new day passed, a little more of Lily Potter died.
Though unknown to Lily, her son was alive, safe and sound on the island, Valhalla.
Valhalla itself, was not exactly an island, it was more of a very large continent, floating above the Earth within the clouds, watching for wars or battles to sprout up. Valhalla was considered one of the best magical places ever to be created, and because it was created purely from magic, the environment and weather could be changed in a instant. Perfect for training large amounts of fallen warriors. The magical properties that kept Valhalla hidden, also helped keep the warriors at the age they died at.
Despite the belief of many and the stories told about the Home of the Fallen, Valhalla was not just the home of the fallen male warriors of the human race. The Valkyries that lived there also collected the spirits of fallen magical creatures and human females that had proven their worth in the middle of a war.
Valhalla was home to a number of both light and dark creatures: banshees, sirens, seers, genies, leprechauns, witch doctors, mermaids, wood nymphs, satyrs, unicorns, muses, fairies, elves, vampires, centaurs, dragons, dwarfs, giants, imps, pixies, sprites, thestrals, veela, werewolves, and wood nymphs.
Each of them fought for the side of light when it came to their war and all died with honour, for their people and their cause. It was considered a honour to be chosen to be a warrior of Valhalla, and most warriors never turned down the opportunity.
Harry led a normal life for the first two years he lived on Valhalla. He lived with Sirius, Remus, Volo and Mist in a small cabin in the middle of the forest. He had been already walking before he arrived in Valhalla, so a month after arriving, Harry learnt to run. At one and a half he could speak full sentences and at three Harry could read by himself. Harry spent years growing up with stories from the time when Remus and Sirius were at Hogwarts, and all of the pranks they they pulled.
As Harry grew, Sirius and Remus went through hell and back in order to complete their training before Harry started his. While his parental figures trained, Harry stayed with Queen Leysa and her inner circle of Valkyries, and the cute little boy had all of them wrapped around his little finger, without even trying. Harry also became friends with the Queens' daughter, as they grew up together, the closer they became, one was almost never seen without the other.
The Queen's daughter, also trained. She had a special mission she had to start once she reached the age of 11, that would continue for at least 3 years and she was not going to fail.
In each area Harry worked in, the council found the best of that field to train him.
At age three and a half, Harry's own training began. To begin with, the young savior went through light workouts, that would make his body ready for the harder stuff that was to come, and slowly the workout levels increased.
At age four, Harry's schedule started to include martial arts; he began with Tae kwon do, and kick boxing. Everything was light, but gradely increased in difficulty. Harry was a natural at his martial arts training and improved with ease.
Upon reaching the age of five and a half, Harry started his magical education, nothing too major, just some basic theory and history. He also started learning Occlumency and Legilimency. Most Valkyries were taught this skill upon reaching their teenage years, but because of who Harry was, Volo and Mist suggested to Remus and Sirius, those two skills would be very important later on in life. Not only that, Queen Leysa had said it would be easier to learn at a younger age.
One day during a history lesson Harry asked his history instructor a question that had been on his mind since he could read.
Six year old Harry sat in the shade of his favourite tree with his history book placed across his out stretched legs. His face formed a frown as his eyes skimmed across the text:
Valkyries: Warrior maidens who train the spirits of fallen warriors in preparation of the final war of wars.'
"Mika," Harry called his history teacher over.
Mika was a young looking Asian Valkyrie, created in the 1650's by Odin. She was a complete history buff, give her a date in time and she could tell you what happened in that year. When Harry and her first met, they hit it off quiet well, exchanging knowledge about time with each other. Now they were even closer.
"Yes, young one."
"How come there isn't a lot of information on Valkyries in this book? There's one sentence in total."
Mika frowned and asked, "What is the title?"
Harry titled his head to the side and squinted, as he tried to read the loopy writing of the title, "'Mythical things related to Death.'"
Mika snorted at the title, "No wonder. That stupid book was written by wizards, full of bull shit, if you ask me."
Harry pouted, "What about Valkyrie history? How were they created? Where did they come from?"
Mika smiled, "Well young one, Valkyries don't write down important stuff like that, in case it falls into the hands of muggles or wizards. Instead Valkyrie history is told from adult to child."
Harry's eyes widen at the chance to learn new information, "Will you tell me? Please?"
"Of course young one, that's what I'm here for, to teach you."
Mika sat down next to Harry and began her tale.
"No interrupting while I speak," Harry nodded enthusiastically.
"Now, Valkyries have been around for a very long time. Long before Mist, Volo, or me, even before the Hogwarts Founders or Merlin, himself.
Our ancestors, The Ancient Ones, who lived thousands of years before us, were created by Odin, himself. He created them, and then left them without warning, to see how they would grow without outside influence and guidance. That was his mistake.
"The Ancient Ones' became sinister spirits of slaughter, dark angels of death, who soared over the battlefields or stormy seas, like birds of prey, meting out mens' fate in the name of Odin and weaving the web of war between countries and people.
"Behind their grisly image, lay the ghastly necessity of death and revenge. The Ancient Ones' grim mission was reflected by their menacing names; such as Shrieking, Screaming, or Raging. The Ancient Ones were wild, gleeful spirits of disorder and destruction, who rode upon bat-like dragons.
"Two hundred years passed and we, as a race, stayed the same; war-driven spirits just itching for the next batch of heroes to die from their very own made bloodbath. . . . . Then Odin came back, to them, . . . to us. He told them, that he had seen enough, and he was disappointed and saddened with his own decision.
"He claimed he wanted to help change them. . . . .change them into something good and so he purified them; from malevolent spirits of death to beautiful warrior protectors of life, but deep in every Valkyrie subconscious there is still a part of that evil they were before. . . lingering in the deepest parts of their minds.
"Now, when a war or battle comes, we soar proudly over the battlefield, through the storm clouds upon flying steeds. Our pearly white horses represent the rain clouds, spraying dew and hoar frost over a thirsty earth. No longer do we spread a warning of dread, but hope for those lucky enough to be chosen by us for Odin's army.
"The changed Valkyries are what all Valkyries now are; alluring warrior maidens, who feed, shelter, clothe and train the chosen heroes for The War of all Wars, but all new generations of Valkyries have a dark secret. If they are angered enough into a fit of rage, their mind will reverts back to that of the Ancient Ones', and they will go on a rampage, trying to create a bloody war to gather more warriors for Odin.
"That is why, when every new Valkyrie girl is born she is given a amulet. The amulet is not only the way we travel, but it also controls the rage inside of us."
"Wow," Harry said in amazement.
At 9 years of age Harry added weapon training to his schedule and practical magic. By this age, Harry had also master the art of Occlumency and Legilimency as well as kick boxing and Tae kwon do. With Remus' guidance, his magical education went on smoothly and with each day that passed, Harry got better and better, by this age Harry had already completed up to grade five school work at Hogwarts.
While Remus taught Harry his magical education, Sirius, who wouldn't let his godson grow up without knowing the ways to charm a woman, started teaching Harry everything he knew on the female race, from how to flirt to tips for comforting a crying girl.
It was also at this age, an amazing discovery was uncovered about the boy-who-lived. It was his Chinese martial arts teacher Robert, a warrior spirit from Australia, who discovered that there was something different about Harry, other then the fact he defeated Voldemort.
"Now remember youngin' when you do a kick, make sure you keep your hips open, then use the movement to bring power behind your kicks."
"Yes, Rob."
"Your doing great youngin'. Now show me the work you've done on your flying kick."
"What type?" Harry questioned.
"Whatever you feel up to doing."
Harry nodded, inhaling deeply, he concentrated. Sweat dripped down his face and down his toned, for a nine year old, chest. Harry had always had some trouble performing this move, but that didn't stop him from doing his best.
When he was ready Harry ran forward, after gaining enough momentum the young boy jumped into the air. Twisting his body around and shooting out his right leg, Harry performed a flying back kick, perfectly.
Then a sudden pain erupted from the savior's shoulder blade. Gasping in pain, Harry grabbed ahold of the area in mid-air. Causing him to come crashing down to earth, with a pained cry.
"Youngin'," Rob ran over to the fallen boy, "You alright? Talk to me."
"It hurts," Harry gasped as his nails dug into his flesh, causing blood to gather at the red marks.
"Don't worry youngin' a medic's on the way," Rob soothed.
True to his words, a minute or two later a brown skinned Valkyrie, from Queen Leysa's inner circle, ran out from the surrounding forest, a white bag held tightly in her right hand. All Valkyries had linked monitors on Harry, always knowing where he was and how his health was and the moment Harry felt the pain erupt, the closest Valkyrie was on her way.
"What happened, warrior?" Her voice all business and straight to the point, as she knelt next to the fallen boy.
"Not sure, ma'am," Rob answered, with a bowed head, to show respect, "The youngin' was practicing his flying kick, but before he landed, he yelled in pain and fell to the ground."
The healer Valkyrie nodded, "Harry can you roll over for me?"
With a pained groan, Harry shifted his body to roll onto his side, his nails still digging into his shoulder blade.
"You need to remove your hand for me, Harry," Harry slowly removed his hand with a whimper, before his body went limp from the pain and he passed out, "Good boy."
The healer tutted at the mess Harry had made of his shoulder. Sighing, she placed her hand on the marks and her hand glowed deep green. Slowly the muscle and skin knitted itself together, as if there had been nothing wrong to begin with.
The healer smiled at her work, but frowned when she noticed a small marking on Harry's shoulder blade. The marking was coloured black and looked like two crescent moons back to back. It was the symbol that marked all Valkyries. The symbol appeared when the new Valkyrie reached the age of nine, but Valkyries had only ever been girls. Never before in the history of Valhalla the healer could remember had there been a male Valkyrie.
"This can't be right," The healer whispered.
"What's wrong, ma'am?"
"I'm not sure yet, warrior. Go get the Queen, immediately!" She ordered.
"Of course." With a nod of his head Rob disappeared into the forest, in search of Queen Leysa.
Minutes later, the Queen arrived, followed by a worried Remus and Sirius.
"What's the matter?" Queen Leysa asked.
"We have a problem," The healer declared, "What do we know of Harry's heritage?"
It had been discovered, after many weeks of researching, that Harry did in fact Valkyrie blood in him. It turned out that Rose Evans, Harry's grandmother, had been a Valkyrie. While the Valkyrie blood seemed to lay dormant in both Lily and Chris, it came forth within Harry. Which made Harry the first male Valkyrie since Godric Gryffindor, and Salazar Slytherin.
It wasn't a known fact, but all four founders of Hogwarts had been Valkyries and were offered the role of teaching the new generations of children magic, as a token of Odin's appreciation to the magical people that helped fight against the evil of that time. When they accepted the position with pride, they then built Hogwarts as their teaching grounds.
But the story of Rose Evans was just as famous throughout Valhalla, as the Valkyries turned teachers. The story went, Rose was stolen from Valhalla at the age of five, by someone powerful enough to breech the magical protection Valhalla had. After that day, Odin, his council and Valkyries that weren't on missions searched everywhere for Rose but she was never seen again.
It was the first and last time something like that would happen to one of Odin's Valkyries. Stronger protection barriers were put up, security was upgraded and Valkyries never trusted anyone outside of Valhalla again, other then their most trusted contacts throughout the magical world.
At ten, Harry had been told how he ended up on Valhalla with Remus and Sirius. He was also told the prophecy that Dumbledore had manipulated for his own gain, as well as the fact everyone thought he was dead on Earth.
It was also at this age that Harry discovered one of the many 'Viewers' Valhalla housed. Viewers, just like the name suggested, let an onlooker view any part of the world with a voiced command. There were many of these Viewers situated around Valhalla, for easy access for all Valkyries. The Viewers were used to monitor war activity on earth at any time of the day or night.
The warriors that inhabited Valhalla knew nothing of the Viewers and usually walked passed at least three a day. A Viewer, to the normal eye, looked like a small pond, only those that could 'see' or sense magic were able to find and use them, and all Valkyries had the power to 'see' magic.
Being the curious boy that he was, Harry often found himself looking at earth through the Viewer he found, even though it was forbidden for anyone that wasn't a initiated Valkyrie to do so. But Harry used it after training practices or when ever he had any free time, that wasn't spent with Remus and Sirius, of course.
The Savior usually caught himself gazing at the interesting world of non-magical people. Harry, having grown up with magic surrounding him all the time, found normal people to be entertaining and quiet smart, but he found some to be weird.
Once Harry reached the age of 11, his life became a bit empty. The Queen's daughter started her mission and was away until she completed it. Instead of being a normal year filled with training and learning from the other humanoid creatures that trained on Valhalla, something weird happened to the boy-who-lived.
Once again Harry found himself gazing into the Viewer. He had just finished a hard training session the best sword master on Valhalla, and was happy he had finished for the day. A small smile graced his face as he watched a family of muggles spend a quite picnic near the beach. Harry laughed as the younger brother splashed his sister, in the shallows. The image then flickered, causing Harry to frown.
The beach flashed to an image of a dark chamber. Harry could make out two figures in the chamber, one an adult and one a child, no older then Harry himself, both standing in front of what appeared to be a mirror.
Harry frowned and reached out to touched the liquid surface of the Viewer. The water rippled and Harry watched in fascination and horror as the clear liquid slowly climbed up his fingers. Once his arm was fully covered, Harry felt a jolt of magic course through his body. Closing his eyes at the sudden magic overload, Harry almost missed the sudden pull from behind his navel, that caused the young boy to curse in surprise.
The savior's hit the ground with a thump but was able to stay on his feet. Straighting up, Harry watched with cautious eyes as the man sent a red spell at the boy. He raised an eyebrow as the boy was not able to dodge a simple stunning spell. Harry almost snorted as the spell hit the boy in the chest and sent him flying, but all of his past training kept him from doing this action.
The man spun around sharply at the noise Harry made, his wand raised instantly ready for any danger. But at the sight of young Harry, the man's guard dropped slightly.
With a sneer the man asked, "What are you doing here, boy?"
Keeping his face blank, Harry raised an eyebrow. His eyes quickly flicking towards the fallen boy, Harry relaxed only slightly as he saw the raise and fall of the boy's chest. In the corner of his eye, Harry caught a glint of red and his eyes fell on a red object grasped within the boy's hand.
'What the hell is he doing with that?' Harry asked himself, as he recognized the object the boy held as the Philosopher's Stone from his studies.
"It's rude not to answer when spoken too," The man hissed.
Harry shrugged, "People might think it's rude to attack a child that clearly cannot defend themselves."
"Do you know who that 'child' is?"
"I could really care less," Harry answered.
"That child is . . . ." The man began.
"Leave him," Another voice commanded, "Just get the stone."
"Yes master."
With that said, the man rushed towards the fallen boy, his hand stretched out in order to grab the stone. Harry blinked at the sudden change of attitude, before reaching his own hand out and performing a quick pulling motion. The red stone instantly flew from the unconscious boy's hand and straight into Harry's.
"Give that stone to me and I will spare your life," The other voice demanded.
Harry frowned, "No. It does belong to you."
"Ahh!" The man lunged at Harry, intending to grab the stone.
Instead, Harry grabbed ahold of the man's outstretched wrist and twisted it, hard. A loud crack was heard throughout the chamber, along with the man's pained cries. Harry narrowed his eyes, when he felt a stronger, more powerful presence from within the man. Not taking any chances with letting the man go, Harry pulled out a cleansing dagger from his boot and impaled it through the man's heart.
Harry let the man drop to the ground, as the cleansing dagger did it's job. Pure light magic pulsed throughout the man's body, trying to expel the evil essence. Harry watched as the man's body force the evil out, by burning the body from the inside to the outside. A burning light shone through the mans' chest and continued to crawl throughout the rest of man's body. Harry could only watch as the man in front of him slowly crumbled into ash.
"Well, that went well," Harry stated to the silent room, the death of the man not affecting him at all.
Looking at the stone in his hand, Harry missed the shadowy cloud rise from the pile of ash and escape through the opposite wall.
"Now to get back home," Harry stated after he had checked to see if the fallen boy was indeed alright.
Once Harry had gotten back to Valhalla, he had sent the Philosopher's Stone back to it's rightful owner, without a second thought.
Harry continued to train and have fun on Valhalla and in his spare time he continued to secretly watch the strange boy he had saved in the chamber. Every year the boy always seemed to get into some form of danger and watching the boy try to over come these dangers seemed to amuse Harry.
Upon reaching age of 14, Harry requested to be initiated into the ranks of the Valkyries. This was highly unusual because initiations usually happened when a Valkyrie turned 17, to ensure that they survived, but Harry insisted to try at this age and try as they might no one could change his mind. Harry had proven he was more than capable of handling anything thrown his way and he was getting frustrated at the no challenges he found on Valhalla.
So the Queen set the date and Valhalla was buzzing with excitement. Initiations was the best form of entertainment on Valhalla that everyone enjoyed. A messenger was sent to Harry to inform him of the date.
"Harry Potter," The messenger recalled, "Your initiation is to be in a months time. Make sure you are ready, once you accept you can not back out. Do you accept?"
"Yes," Harry smirked, "I can't wait."
TBC . . . . . . . .
Thank you everyone for reviewing, so many reviews for one chapter, I'm so happy.
How was this chapter? Good? Bad? Was it to fast? Does it read okay and make sense? It might sound a bit jumpy but I wanted to explain in summary form about Harry's training. I hope you like it.
Also with what happened at Hogwarts while Harry was in Valhalla:
Year 1: Harry saved Chris and the Stone, without knowing that he saved his brother. Harry sent the Stone back to Nicolas Flamel.
Year 2: The Chamber of Secrets was not opened, instead when Ginny chucked it in the toilet Chris didn't find it and Ginny didn't come back for it. So with no one to pour their soul into it, it lost all power.
Year 3: Peter escaped from prison and tried to kill Chris as a deed of good faith to his Master, but failed. He was not captured again, instead his escaped into the forest and went looking for a way to bring back his Master.
Read and review, please