Hey everyone,
So the poll has been closed and while it was pretty close, has the poll now gathered 53 votes, 26 votes for Staying Civil, 20 votes for Grow Closer and 7 votes for Becoming Enemies. However, I am a very Poll kind of person, so I have a new poll on my account, this one concerning a CR story of mine called Rituals and Reading.
Thanks for voting,
Venquine1990
PS. For Rules, check chapter 01
Chapter 12
You Can Care
Hermione's POV
It's been some time since Harry's trial, the same from which he disappeared after it had been settled that he was actually innocent and after it was discovered that four of the seven Weasleys were actual traitors to Harry and using magic to control him and steal from him, so what happened just five minutes ago still shocks me.
Out of absolutely no where do Harry, Dobby the House Elf, a girl that looks like Harry, but then a little older, a young boy and slightly older girl who both look as if they just came from a graveyard or something, a boy of Harry's age with sea-green eyes and a boy who has an eye-patch appear in the middle of our kitchen.
Yet while others are shocked at their sudden appearance do my eyes instantly land on Harry and my heart reaches out to him the minute I see his state as he looks as if he just lost Sirius to the Dementors or something, making me and Remus shooting out of our seats and move to crouch on the floor besides him, me softly asking:
"Harry, what happened?" But the boy has his eyes aimed at the floor, his whole body slack and his eyes, which have changed from their usual emerald green into pure sky-blue, vague and unseeing. This gaze of his, the way that he looks at the floor as if seeing his closest friend having died in front of him makes me even more worried.
"There was an incident." The girl besides me then says and when I look at her, I can see that she has the same blue eyes as Harry, even though her style is much more goth-like than Harry and she says: "A friend of mine behaved like your ex-friend to Harry and me and it made Harry decide to get even with those traitors.
Only, when he came to confront them, did his anger get replaced with – well, this." The girl sighs at the end, her voice telling me she had expected something like this and then Remus asks: "Did they get their due?" But the girl shrugs and says: "Harry cut into them slightly with gusts of wind, but else he only shouted at them.
That is, until he started doubting his own words and himself. Then he let go off all of his powers and sagged in like this. We Iris-messaged Sirius and he got this little being here to get us here. Though I can't say for sure I know where we are right now." The girl ends unsure and Remus hands her and the others the usual note.
"Read it, memorize it, burn it." He says with a clear voice and while by now some of the others have calmed down from their shock at the sudden appearance of the teens, do the five of them quickly do as said before, to my shock, the youngest of the girls, the one that looks like she's the daughter of a mortician, burns it in her hand.
Everyone looks at the girl and she says: "Bianca Di Angelo, daughter of Hades and controller of Fiendfyre, nice to meet you all." And with that the others also introduce themselves, the brown-haired boy being Percy, who is Son of Poseidon, the boy with the eye-patch being Ethan, son of Nemesis and the youngest boy being Nico, son of Hades.
Yet it's the girl besides Harry that both shocks and elates me as she says: "Thalia Grace, daughter of Zeus and elder sister to Harry. he controls the wind part, whereas I have more of dad's thunder magic under my control. And trust me, it was very hard not to blast that house apart when I was around those three bastards."
But then I notice something that confuses me and I ask: "Wait, three? I thought four of the Weasleys had betrayed Harry." And then a voice as powerful as a clasp of thunder sounds from behind me as it says: "There were, but Ginerva has also had a personal hand in Harrison's torture by the hands of those Mortals named the Dursleys.
Therefore, we consider her a more serious threat to Harrison and took her in for personal punishment, though the entire council has yet to properly agree over a united punishment so far." And when I turn around, do I see a man with long black hair, grey and black beard and the same electrical blue eyes as Harry and Thalia.
Shocked to have the actual Lord of the Gods in front of me, does the entire room bow before the God, but the man shakes his head and says: "As long as you are loyal to my son and swear to work against those four will none of you have to bow before me." Which makes most of us smile as the man moves forward.
Yet behind him, do I see Sirius appear from what looks like an indoor rainbow and when we look at him, does he shrug and say: "Power of Iris, power of Zeus. You can't deny you wouldn't have used it too if you worried for your own kid." And while most of the adults around me nod, does Sirius join us on the floor with Harry.
Thalia has moved a little to the side by now and I quickly do the same to allow the two parents closer contact with their son, yet even the presence of his own parents seems to go unnoticed by my friend and Sirius sighs as he says: "Looks like our little Wind-elf is fighting an inner battle. We better stay here for when he comes to."
This makes me even more worried and then Sirius moves over to the window to open it and once it's open, does Zeus show us yet another bit of his power as he actually summons a long stream of clouds right from the air pulling it close to his person before using his hands to mold it into a comfortable cloud recliner chair.
Sirius then gets his wand out and uses it to make Harry float a little above the floor and to my slight worry, slight relief does the Lord of the Sky then move the recliner under his son before Sirius lowers Harry back down, yet even the transition from sitting on a hard wooden floor to a cloud like substance does not ruse Harry even a bit.
The King of Gods then summons more clouds to him and makes more recliners, which he puts down next to the recliner his son is dazing off in and while Thalia takes the one on Harry's left, do the parents take the one on the right, Sirius on the one closest to his son and the twins, other Demigods, Remus and I quickly take the others.
The other adults keep their gazes on us for just a little longer, but the twins wave them off and Professor Dumbledore, who had finally decided to come over and tell us what happened at the trial, takes to the signal of the two redheads and restarts the conversations with those we we're sitting at the table with.
Yet, while I can hear their conversations and while I take what the Headmaster tells us about Hermes, the Lord of the Gods and the Weasleys and what happened to them at the hearing some time ago and store it in my memory for later, do my eyes keep themselves on one thing; on the friend I feared I had lost to our other friend being a traitor.
Harry's POV
My body has sagged down after my powers and inner strength left me and while part of me feels aware of a familiar squeaky voice coming from somewhere near me before I feel a kind of magic I have never felt before, but that also feels like Port Key, yet even this I only feel slightly, my mind and heart somewhere else.
My body, however, still feels and so I still feel it when others gather themselves around me, when two warm, familiar presences appear near me and when my body gets lifted off the floor before suddenly getting gently dropped onto something of which the feeling reminds me of when I am on my Firebolt flying through the sky.
Yet while I do feel it, do I not acknowledge it as I am just, mentally and emotionally, too focused on something completely different: the last question I asked the three people that, until some time ago, have been controlling and ruling my life, while keeping me in the dark about this by pretending to care for me and being my friends.
This thought, this fact that these three people – and one other who had not been present when I confronted the others – didn't just steal from me and curse me to make me obey even their smallest requests and orders, but also cursed me to make me believe as if they cared for and as if I was to care for them – that is what hits me.
That is what makes me see them before me, in my mind's eye. That is what makes me see my best friend, his tall lanky frame standing before me, the advice he always gave me throughout the years and the way that he always stood beside me sounding in my head, while in front of me he just laughs honingly and with sadistic glee.
That is what makes me see the elder one of the boys, his tall frame and horned glasses glaring down at me while his voice constantly changes from the helpful advice he gave me in the first three years we knew each other to the honing insults he threw at me thanks to his job at the Ministry and the trouble with the Tournament.
That is what makes me see the eldest of the females, the woman that has constantly mothered over me and that now stands over me as if she wants to give me her famous bear-like hugs, while at the same time all I can see in her eyes is the greed that she feels for my money and the status I can give her and the three other thieves.
And worst of all, is why I see her, the youngest of them. The girl who has been pretending to be a fan girl who slowly grew into being a friend, when all she really wants is for me to be abused and malleable, so that when she takes the title Mrs. Potter, I'll be nothing but her sex/money slave; her sinful laughter echoing in my head.
Feeling as if I am crouched down on myself in a circle existing out of their mentally visual forms, their mental spirits standing around me, their faces portraying one side of them, my head repeating to me all the good times I've spend with them, while around us all the terrible things they did to me are echoing like within a cave.
Feeling myself slinking at the onslaught of this all, the facial features of the four bastards constantly changing between their so-called care and their actual emotions for me, makes me feel weaker and weaker, smaller and smaller, more and more insignificant than even Vernon has ever been able to make me feel as I think:
"They don't matter. They made me have to pretend to care. I don't have to care for them. I should not care for them. I cannot care for them. I cannot care for them or – or anything. Not for them, not for myself, not for my money, not for my fame, not for –." But here I stop as I cannot finish that thought and instead of that, do I think:
"No, I – I should care. For myself. I belong. I deserve to belong – don't I?" And while I try very hard to push the images of these four away with the memories of my reunion with my actual family and all the good times I had at Camp, do I feel myself almost incapable and this makes only one thought escape my lips.
Zeus' POV
"Can I care?" Those three words escape my son's lips after almost half an hour of him sitting in his cloud-recliner and while they shock some of the teens around me, does it make Thalia move closer to her brother in feared concern, yet when I see a hint of awareness shine in my son's eyes, do I instantly respond to this.
I lie a single hand on my son's shoulder, the glint in his eyes returning, but less strong as before as I softly ask: "Do you care for us, son?" And while the glint now seems to come back stronger, causing for my son's eyes to look like the morning sun just after the sun has fully risen before his head moves only ever so slightly.
Taking this as a good sign as it proves that whatever battle Harry is fighting with himself within his mind and heart, he seems to be winning it and while adding the power of thunder to my voice just to make sure I can get through to him, do I still keep my tone soft and caring to make sure I don't scare my son off or away:
"Then you can care, Harry. You just have to start anew on deciding who to care for. But you can care, Harry, you can care." And these words seem to do the trick as Harry shakes his head very lightly, so little even I barely see it before he looks around and while he seems shocked at his surroundings, does he turn to me and ask:
"Dad?" But I just smile at him, having taken Sirius' seat when I heard Harry speak while the man had been overcome with his emotions to hear his son ask such a question and I hug the boy close, feeling happier than ever that the Ancient Law is finally down as I whisper: "It'll take time, Harry, I know it will, but you'll get there.
You'll get there." And those words, the confirmation that he will need time to heal, but the reassurance that I believe he can be healed, is exactly what my fifteen year old son wants to hear as he clings to my robe like he did when we first reunited and starts to bawl his eyes out, everyone else smiling in relief at seeing this.
Relief to see Harry being back.
Okay, that was that!
So, in the end, the whole healing only took one chapter, but I actually think I will have Harry stay at London just a little longer so he, his sister and his Demigod friends can get together, as friends, with his friends from London – as Harry does need the confirmation that not all his friends are actually his enemies.
So next chapter will have a tentative Harry around people like Hermione, the twins and others, especially Lupin because – well, read To Read Into The Universe and you will get why – but after that will it be back to Camp Halfblood, where he and Annabeth will probably have their confrontation/conversation.
Until then,
Venquine1990
PS. See chapter 01 for Rules.
