Hy! I'm posting this second chapter quite quick, I have sooo much inspiration for this thing. Too much possibilities, and not enough canon to stop me *evil laugh*

Also, I'm in holidays so it may help ( even if I have so much work that I can't see the end of it)

Thanks to the few followers already! (It's funny, I'm starting to see a real difference between here and AO3 on the sucess of different types of stories!)

I still have for beta the wonderful Adlertypewriter!

Reviews: The Emperor Vin: Well, I don't know, I like to make non manicheist characters, and if a character is grey in that timeline, it would clearly be Dumbledore. But, well, we'll see!

Also, you can follow me on Tumblr at blog/ladybraken (I post a lot of art fic on it )

I hope you will like this chapter! Don't forget to review!

~LadyBraken

CHAPTER 2: Ennemies

Harry caught his breath. He was ready to strike. Every alarm in his body was screaming bloody murder. His wand seemed light and hot in his hand, whispering, almost begging that it would be so simple to just make the problem disappear...

Forcing himself to stay calm, he didn't turn around yet.

He couldn't know if the man was a wizard or armed in any way. Something was sure: the man spoke English and knew Harry did too somehow. Which wasn't good, or could be... even worse. The real question was: what was the extent of his knowledge? To tell the truth, Harry had expected to arrive unnoticed by the wizarding world and stay low the time to gain England. So much for that.

Sometimes, he wondered if he should even try to make plans.

Making sure he was alerting the other of his movement, he slowly turned around, a protecting shield ready on his lips.

On the bank, sitting on the bare ground and leaning on a tree was a man. He was quite charismatic, his head tilted to the side in consideration, his golden blond hair reaching his shoulders and framing his face. He was wearing an open military uniform, but it looked used, old his shirt was let open. The shadow of a beard underlined his strong jaw, clenched in concentration, or maybe it was his natural expression.

He was playing with his wand, making it wing between his fingers like the young man in front of his couldn't be a threat. The wooden stick passed from one finger to another with a surprising regular rhythm.

His piercing grey eyes never left Harry.

Harry was pretty sure he had seen him somewhere, which probably meant that he was a wizard (that and the haircut- typically wizard), but his mind was racing too fast on too many places for him to remember that particular information.

The man was a wizard, and he had caught Harry in a moment of weakness. He hated that.

What he hated, even more, was the impression that he was inspecting him like a piece of meat, or a very peculiar insect. Harry didn't try to protect his modesty, it was far too late, it didn't really matter and the stream was covering the... most important part. He was used to not being shy about his body, to a point where he couldn't even think of it as something that people could be attracted to.

The idea of a body, he had said once to Poppy, who was trying to give him a blanket to hide him while she treated one of his wounds, was to be functional and alive.

Each and every one of his muscles was tense. Harry was very glad that he had learned occlumency, because he was pretty sure that the man was trying to read his mind. Or wanted to, anyway. Harry could recognize the stance, the gaze. The man was at least a soldier, and probably the type that loved his work. Maybe an Auror? Harry certainly hoped so, which meant that he probably wouldn't be.

They stood in silence, evaluating each other.

"Do you intend to dissolve in water, boy?" finally asked the man with a too feral smirk for Harry's tastes.

"Depends if you intend to stay here or not, I guess." He shot back.

He decided that he really didn't like the man. Not that he had done something... but his guts were telling him that something was wrong, and he preferred to be biased than in danger. It's easier to apologize when everyone is still alive.

The man chuckled at that, but it didn't reach his eyes.

The situation, albeit dangerous, was very awkward. Harry didn't know what to make of anything but certainly, wouldn't mind retrieving his clothes right now. But he couldn't let it show.

He stood his ground, making it known that he wouldn't move if the man didn't back up. The problem was the fact that he was disadvantaged as long as he was naked.

Deciding to go for it, Harry reached for his bag, never letting the blond man out of his sight.

He could appartate. He should appartate. Everything not to use the Elder Wand on someone. Yes, it was definitely the best thing to do.

"Do you have some food?" The man asked finally, stopping Harry in his movement.

"Are you proposing some or do you need some?"

Harry was actually starting to wonder if the man wasn't as lost as he was himself. He didn't look... clean, nor well fed.

The man stopped to play with his wand and got up. "The second one, I'm afraid." He said, and with one last glance up and down Harry, he just went back into the forest.

And that was the end of Harry's warryness. He couldn't for the life of him deny his help to someone in need, and that man seemed to really need food. He sighed. All his reason was telling him to get out of here, to find somewhere safe, away from the man that had looked at him so oddly, but he knew that if he did that, his conscience wouldn't let him in peace.

He walked to the land, grabbing his bag on the way. It took longer than expected because his feet sank into the cool mud, making him wince.

He dressed, noting that the stranger, if he had gone away, had done it deliberately slowly. He dried his hair with a wand and tucked it behind his ears so it did not fall in front of his eyes

Harry sped up to catch the stranger. The man walked with his back straight, as steady as he was casual, and if he did not hold his wand openly in his hand, Harry could see the slight flexes that indicated he had it within range.

Definitely a soldier.

But Harry noticed something else. There was no sound in the forest. Not that the animals were silent, it was the whole forest that was silent. The wind played needlessly in the leaves, the birds had stopped. Harry felt the energy running under his feet, invisible.

The man ends up stopping in front of a wall of the mountain. He made a big wave. Slowly, the gray stone slowly disappeared, giving way to an opening that overlooked a natural cave. The man put his hands on his hips and looked at Harry smugly, raising an eyebrow.

Completely unimpressed by the display of wandless magic, if only because the man's expression made him think of Malfoy (the hair may have had something to do with it), Harry simply nodded before entering the cavern.

He was the one with the food, for Merlin's sake.

The place was not very big but was obviously inhabited for some time and made homey to serve as a hiding place. Some shelves were lined up on one of the walls. On the other one, there was a hole covered with stone to make a fire and a makeshift camp bed, only accommodated by some old blankets. On the whole, it was sober and poor, all placed so as to be useful and to allow the occupant of the place to react and provide shelter whatever happens.

It was the kind of place that Harry himself had arranged for the war.

He gave a little appreciative whistle before sitting down in front of the embers that were still warm, leaving his bag to fall to his right, out of reach of his host.

He did not ask why the man was living in a combat situation when the war would not start until the 1930s, he was not familiar enough with the fighting and the witch politics of that time to make a comment, and it was better not to give suspicion. Maybe he was an Auror on a mission. After all, even in his time, the Black Forest always was a strange and dangerous place - a dementor nest for what he knew. Well, the dementors came here after the destruction of Azkaban, a few years after Dumbledore's death, but it said a lot about the place.

And of course, of every bloody forest in the entire world, he had to land here. Well, at least the climate wasn't extreme, it could have been worse.

The man strode confidently towards the back of the cave and came back with a slightly rusty saucepan. He murmured something and in a wrist movement, the object was like new. He handed it to Harry.

Harry stomach gurgled at the simple idea of being able to eat something, which gave the unknown man a half smile. Harry pulled one of the tin cans out of his bag and emptied it into the saucepan, stirring the red beans with some of the herbs he'd taken with him that had no other use than to make the food better.

A sweet smell began to rise from his little preparation and the man finally sat on the other side of the fire. He sniffed and emitted what Harry interpreted as a satisfied grunt.

"What are you doing here?" The man asked with a thick accent.

Harry shrugged. "I got lost. You?"

The man gave him a calculating glare, not quite frowning. Harry noticed a little scar on his chin, cutting his beard. "I'm looking for a wand."

"Shouldn't you go to a wandmaker instead of a forest, then?"

"Shouldn't you use a map instead of getting lost in a magical forest?"

They looked at each other for a moment before chuckling. Just as Harry thought, a conversation wasn't going to lead them anywhere. There was a reason if the man hadn't even thought about asking his name.

"How did you know I was English?"

The man tilted his head to the side. "The scar on your back. It's an English word."

Harry paled a little at that, but he didn't lower his gaze.

"Muggles?"

The young man nodded. "Stuff happens." He said quietly. "Oh, but the food's ready."

Harry hadn't missed the glint of anger in the man's eyes or the way he had coerced Harry into giving him information. He wasn't sure if he was comfortable with that, but there was no getting out of this once he had seen the scar. But to Harry's surprise, he wasn't surprised. He didn't ask how a wizard could have been hurt by muggles that way.

He just accepted it.

With precise gestures, Harry pulled the saucepan out of the fire and filled two bowls that the other had handed him. The beans actually smelled very good, and he once again congratulated himself on his cooking-with-nothing skills.

When he handed the bowl full of steaming food to the hungry man, he saw his eyes put one second too much on Harry's ring before quickly landing elsewhere. Harry pursed his lips.

There was technically no reason to worry, the fact that a vagabond wearing a ring so rich was to attract curiosity. But the Hallows did not agree. They tended to ... protect themselves. They wanted to stay together in a strange way, like a wand and its owner.

Like the Horcruxes.

Harry withdrew his hand as much as possible without suspicion, pushing the little voice in the back of his head that told him to kill, destroy, annihilate the stranger on the spot. He kept his hand away from the wand. Well, not too far away.

He still couldn't replace the man.

"So, where do you want to go?"

Harry looked up from his bowl to discover that the other had already finished his. He will never understand how people can eat so much and so fast.

"I don't really know. Get out of the forest and get to the nearest town in the hope of having a roof over my head, probably."

"Don't you want to join your master?"

Harry's heart skipped a beat.

"My master?" He asked, suddenly aware of everything around him.

His mind is racing. He couldn't make mistakes, he really didn't want to resort to violence to escape if necessary.

The man must have felt him tense because he raised his hands as a sign of appeasement.

"I would have thought you would be more open about it, considering that you're wearing his mark on your ring." He said with some sort of deceptive calmness.

Wearing his…

And suddenly, everything clicked into place in Harry's mind.

Of course, in this time, the symbol was known as Grindelwald's. And…

Oh, fucking Hell.

A Blond man hiding in the Black Forest looking for a Wand…

He was staring at him intently.

… Hating muggles, vain, with a scar on his chin like in the pictures…

If Harry was not so shocked that chance had obviously made him fall on a Dark Lord among all the people he might have met, and the fact that he had just cooked for that person, he would surely have panicked slightly.

If Grindelwald was looking for the wand, he was in danger.

He had to play along. He had to play along until he found his way back to England because he was pretty sure that otherwise Grindelwald would kill him right there and now, or try to and either way he didn't like the idea.

But he couldn't let the man think that he was the bowing type.

"I have no master." He answered stiffly.

Like that, he didn't quite say yes or no. He wasn't supposed to know who the man was anyway.

A silence echoed in the cave. The fire, which had come to life again thanks to the young man's care, painted darting shadows on the stone walls and created a sharp contrast on the angular face of the dark sorcerer. His face was not legible and he was looking at Harry with a new intent. The coldness of the floor was passing through the fabric of his pants and Harry suddenly felt very uncomfortable. He focused all his concentration to place occlumency shields in his mind - nothing very powerful but at least it would prevent the man from getting unwanted information without engaging in a direct attack.

"Is that so…?"

The man actually looked pleased.

Young Harry would have slapped his face and try to run away. But now, he actually could determine when he had no chance to escape.

The temptation of hitting the man stayed anyway. If he killed him right there and now, he might stop a war, and save hundreds of innocents… or not. He didn't know Grindelwald like he knew Voldemort. He didn't know if the man was a symbol or an actual all powerful leader. if his death would turn this project to nothing or allow him to be turned into a martyr. He could create more bad than good on this one.

The morning sunbeams entered the cave almost horizontally and projected white light flags in the line of the entrance.

"So are you one of Grindelwald's men?"

Harry didn't answer. "I see."

He didn't know what the other man had seen, but he hoped that it would be enough for him to just leave him alone.

"I'll let you have some tin cans and I'll leave you to your research." He tried.

His hand was now tense on his wand, the other ready to catch his things at the slightest sign of danger. The only problem was the Dark lord was between him and the exit.

Which was a problem that tended to repeat itself in Harry's life.

But at least Voldemort was looking at him with hatred, sometimes simple disinterest or frustration. Not like… like that.

Under other circumstances, he would have thought that maybe he could change the man. But not with Grindelwald, he had fooled Dumbledore. Harry cringed at the thought of his old headmaster. He had in front of him the man who had ruined his life and destroyed his family...

A cry pulled him from his thoughts and made him jump. In a fraction of a second, his wand was in his hand, ready to serve, his bag clinging to his shoulder, his back slightly curved to be a smaller target.

Another, even more, pitiful scream echoed through the cave. He glanced at Grindelwald, who had risen in the same way, and without waiting, rushed outside. Shouts echoed throughout the forest, deformed by layers of ageless magic, creating valleys and craters. They ran along the rivers until they became senseless sounds, and damn it sounded like a child.

Harry stopped thinking. He didn't care about Dark Lords or Hallows, he only cared about the fact that there was a wounded kid alone in the fucking forest, crying his lungs out.

But it was impossible to locate the source. The reliefs of the massif only allowed him to give a general direction. Without even thinking that he could get lost in the middle of the forest, Harry kept going, almost running. He made sure to always climb to have a better view of the whole area, but it was still impossible to know where the desperate cries came from.

Frustrated and knowing they were running out of time, Harry climbed into the branches of a tree. Maybe from up there he could ...

He saw it. A black spot, in the distance, motionless, in the middle of a valley.

Harry rushed to the place so fast it looked like he was flying above the ground. As he approached, he could better and better shape.

A thestral?

The animal was lying, one of its diaphragm wings extended in front of it. The creature was breathing rapidly, its protruding ribs almost poking its skin. Its milky eyes were half-open and his nostrils were quivering.

Harry slowed down more and more. Was that what made the scream? He had no problem treating a thestral, he loved them, but it sounded so human …

Wait.

A small, white hand was sticking out from under the creature's wing.

When the creature awakened awkwardly to move away, Harry knelt down. It was a child. He could not really tell if it was a girl or a boy, about ten years brown hair was scattered around his head. They did not move.

Immediately, Harry took their pulse. It was weak but present.

"The child needs a healer." He said to the man behind him.

Grindelwald was only a few meters behind him. He hadn't bothered to run, contenting himself on following the boy from afar. He stood against the light, his big khaki coat flapping in the wind, his face dark. His face contained absolutely no emotion that Harry could decipher (had he ever been able to).

He didn't make any sign to move.

Harry was busy around the child, looking for an injury or cause for his fainting, but there was nothing. Not even something to say his name or where he came from or what he could do alone in the forest. Nothing. The young man's hands were firm and secure, but his breath was shaking slightly in panic.

He couldn't let another child didn't know many healing spells, he didn't know what was wrong, but he couldn't let it happen. He had come here to stop it, stop it, stop it.

Grindelwald still hadn't moved.

"Are you really letting a magical child die because you're looking after a wand? He needs a healer!" exploded Harry.

He turned to the child just in time to miss the smirk on the man's lips.

"Very well. I know a place, we should find a healer there." He said softly.

Harry turned around. The Dark Lord was presenting his hand to take him to some unknown location, but right now he couldn't care less.

He had to save the child.

And without another though, he grabbed the child and accepted the hand. Then disappeared.