A/N: Back again and, if you'll excuse me my semi-delirious celebration:
More than 10,000 views on this story and over 200 favourites and follows! I'm so happy!
Ahem.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy the chapter as much as you seemed to the last one. I must warn you, though, that all Japanese places, names and things which you don't recognise from Fate/Stay Night in this chapter are drawn from Google Translate and my own meager understanding of Japanese. Expect errors. Many errors.
Also, I've reduced the rating from M to T, as I don't think that the stuff I've done so far is all that bad. It might go up again later, but that remains to be seen.
Disclaimer: I do not own TYPE-MOON or Harry Potter.
When Harry first saw the Gardens, he thought that he was dreaming.
That wasn't a new feeling for him. Ever since his mother had taken him away from the Dursleys', he'd always been a bit worried about going to sleep, fearing that if he slept he might wake up and find out that it had all been a dream. This was something on a whole other level, though.
The hotel suite thay'd stayed in in London had been massive - bigger than the Dursleys' whole house, in fact - and the house that they were living in here was massive as well, but a giant floating palace overgrown with trailing flowers and fruit-bearing vines was an entirely new level of fantastic. The air was still warm despite the height of the Gardens and small birds flitted from blossom to blossom, occasionally calling out to one another in melodious tones.
And yet there he stood, the freak-boy from No 4 Privet Drive, walking on marble and gold and hand-in-hand with a queen who wanted to make him an actual part of her family, as if he was her real son.
The thought was incredible, and it made Harry want to pinch himself, just to make absolutely sure that he wasn't just dreaming it up.
The pale, vine-traced columns of the avenue through which they walked opened up into a small courtyard, the roof open to the sky. There were no clouds. They clustered close around the edges of the Gardens, leaving the sky bare and clear, letting the light of the morning sun stream down onto the ankle-deep reflecting pool that dominated the centre of the space. Rising from the pool was a stone pedestal, about the height of Harry's chest, upon which rested a golden bowl.
Releasing his hand, his Semiramis turned to the child, her black dress whispering softly against the floor.
"This is where the ritual shall be performed. I shall be controlling the magic, you need only follow my instructions. Do you understand?"
Harry nodded.
"In that case, first things first. Remove your shoes."
Harry bent over and pulled off the velcro straps of his new trainers, bought in London a little over a week ago now. The sorceress' own shoes dissolved into motes of pale blue light and she stepped into the pool, motioning for Harry to follow.
Semiramis directed him to stand next to the pedestal, opposite her.
"Hold your hand over the bowl." she said, holding her own palm-up in demonstration.
In her other hand, she produced a short, leaf-bladed knife. Swaying slightly, she held the blade flat over the basin. Her gaze rose to the heavens.
"O babbanû aštaru, karābu nāši."*
The copper-electric taste which Harry had begun to associate with Semiramis' magic appeared, and he felt an immaterial wind against his skin, even though his clothes. Goosebumps raced down his arms.
Meeting the child's eyes with her own again, she spoke.
"Do you wish to be my son?"
Throat tight with emotion, Harry answered croakily.
"Yes"
"Will you take upon you a name which befits a son of Semiramis, queen of Assyria?"
"I will,", Harry answered, more firmly this time.
"And will you learn the arts of my magecraft, taking upon yourself all the burdens that that entails?"
Strongly now, "I will."
"Kīam , kīa"**
So saying, the ancient queen slashed the knife quickly across their palms and clasped them together firmly, allowing a steady drip of mingled blood to fall into the golden basin. There was no pain to the cut, only an odd sensation of tugging as the knife slid across, and then numbness.
"I, Semiramis of Akkad, daughter of Derketo, widow of Nimrod and Onnes, claim Harry potter as my son for all time and declare that he shall share in my blood, my arts and my power and that his name from this day forth shall be Asharu, the Wind of Morning."
The blood in the bowl boiled and seethed, glowing an angry crimson, with flecks of golden light shining in its depths. Harry felt a strange sensations weep through his body, like the tingle when he quickly went from cold to hot. His eyes, ears and throat stung and itched, wetness tracing down his cheeks. The taint of copper on his tongue rose until it was all he could taste, although he couldn't tell if that was from the magic in the air or his lip where he had bitten it.
An immense, hot pressure seemed to press in on the child, as if a great weight was settled on his chest, constricting his lungs and cutting off his breath. It grew and grew, almost crushing him, although there was no physical pressure. Just at the moment that the weight became overwhelming, something gave and whatever it was rushed into him like a fiery wind, setting his insides alight with an ecstatic heat. His muscles sang and his heart beat with redoubled vigour. Even the air in his lungs seemed sweeter.
There was a moment of calm.
Then Harry's forehead erupted in searing pain and he was conscious only of a high-pitched, grating scream before blackness claimed his vision and he knew no more.
In an office in the central tower of an ancient castle on the outskirts of the Scottish highlands, a delicate silver instrument spun wildly for a moment or two, its wire orreries rotating madly around the tiny red gem at its heart.
It wavered crazily on the edge of the shelf where it was perched before its newfound momentum toppled it from its place and its intricate matrices of wire bent themselves out of shape beating at the stone floor. It looked like nothing so much as a dying bird desperately trying to fly again, before the life finally left it.
When the office's owner returned later that night from his meeting, he picked up the pieces of the apparatus and tried to repair them, but no matter how he positioned the orreries and set them aglow with sparks of magic, they simply spun for a moment, seeking their target, before lapsing into stillness and inactivity once again.
By 1 o'clock in the morning, the man had abandoned his project. It must simply be a fluctuation in the ley lines beneath the castle, he rationalised. Within a few days the magical environment would be back to normal and then he'd try again.
No matter how he tried, though, his efforts would be in vain.
When Harry awoke again, it was to the sound of birdsong and the sensation of a warm, gentle wind on his skin. It was a slow, lazy awakening, his eyes unwilling to open and his body satisfied to lie still, luxuriating in the slow pulse of warmth beneath his skin. The last memories replayed themselves behind Harry's - no, Asharu's - eyelids and he finally opened his eyes, daring his senses to reveal their deception and for the rough, wooden ceiling of his cupboard to stretch above his head.
He lay upon one of the white-sheeted beds of the Hanging Gardens, beneath a star-strewn sky. The moon stared whitely down, turning the sheets to silver and bleaching the golden traceries of the walls. A dove perched on one of the branching struts which extended out into the opening of the ceiling, cooing softly. Sitting up, the young wizard had to brush the hair from his eyes. It had grown and, by the feel of it, reached almost to his shoulders. However, as he was moving the hair away from his eyes, he realised something.
He wasn't wearing glasses, but his vision was as clear as it had ever been. Clearer, in fact. He had always had trouble seeing things far away, even with the frameless glasses that Semiramis had bought him, but now everything was clearly outlined and defined. It was almost disorienting, but it did nothing to stop Asharu from tearing off the covers - he absently noted that he was wearing only his underwear - and running outside to the reflecting pool.
The silver-sheen of the moon was bright as it played across the pool and, there in the water, was his reflection.
It was transformed.
His hair hung in sheets around his visage, chin-length at the front and lengthening to almost reach his shoulderblades further back. Pointed ears peaked out from beneath it, although they did not have the length of his mother's. The planes of his face were a little narrower, a little sharper, although they were more aristocratically handsome than feminine. His eyes, while still a piercing green, were slitted like a cat's and seemed to have a faint radiance to them that had not been there previously. His teeth were white pearls in his mouth when he opened it in surprise, and the canines were sharp than they had been before, lending a slightly feral cast to his face, along with the exotic, catlike slant of his eyes.
The rest of his body had changed as well. He had always been shorter and smaller than Dudley, which the boy had used to his advantage, but now he thought that he would be the taller by at least an inch or two. The twinge in his left wrist from when it had been crushed in the door a few months back had vanished as well.
There was a soft fluttering sound behind him. Turning, the young wizard saw Semiramis standing there, a gentle smile on her face. A dove sat on the wall behind her.
"You take after me, Atmu," she said softly, stepping forwards and kneeling down to his level.
The love and devotion in those words brought tears to Asharu's eyes and he rushed forwards into her arms. She wrapped her arms around him in turn, drawing him into her as he wept silent tears of happiness.
Here, amid the clouds and golden gardens, he was home.
In the days following Asharu's adoption, time seemed to run at a frantic pace. Contact was made with the Japanese wizarding world, which could not be more different than the British one. Unlike their European counterparts, the wizards of Japan were almost an open secret. They had their own department within the government and, although they were ultimately under the authority of the Prime Minister and the Cabinet, they largely governed themselves. That was where the similarities ended, though.
Where the British Ministry of Magic was almost an entirely separate entity to the central government, the Japanese Department of Arcane Affairs was firmly a part of the administration. They had their own branches of the legislative, judicial and executive subsets of the government, but they were not so completely severed. Magical crimes were judged by a jury of both wizards and non-wizards, allowing a balance of opinion.
The root of this peaceful coexistence was an old custom, namely that although the existence of magic was comparatively common knowledge, discussing it openly and casually was viewed as rude and offensive, unless you yourself were a wizard or talking to one for the purpose of asking their services. Thus, the magical and mundane factions of Japan intermingled peacefully, as they had for centuries, and it was not at all uncommon for non-magical people to hang protective ofuda on their houses and businesses in order to keep out evil magic and malicious creatures. The cohabitation was also aided by the fact that, in general, Japanese wizardry tended towards more subtle expressions than the bold and overt magic that was primarily performed through the medium of wands, meaning that foreigners tended to dismiss the charms and talismans as little more than superstition.
Asharu and Semiramis spent a day exploring the wizarding district on the island of Kozushima, to the south of Tokyo. The small town of Kyōi no Mura, hidden beneath polite illusions and entered by means of the Awanomikoto Shrine, was abustle with men, women and stranger creatures going about their business. Fox-eared men traded charms with women in traditional kimonos and drank sake together at veiled booths. Stores sold manga whose pages were alive with epic battles between arch-nemeses, trading silent sword-strikes to the accompaniment of gasping children.
A visit was paid to the Gringotts there, this time constructed in the fashion of a tall white-jade pagoda, both to make sure that funds could be accessed if necessary and to make sure that Asharu's new new identity and blood was registered with the bank, as it was with the government. The business was quick, albeit laden with form upon form, and was concluded long before it was time to return to Fuyuki. The remaining hours were spent browsing the many shops and stalls of
Following the visit to the wizarding district, the days began to melt together, soon becoming weeks and months. Tutors were hired for Asharu to learn of the mundane world and lessons were held in their house in the shadow of Ryuudou Temple. He learned basic maths, English, Japanese - he had quite a bit of trouble with katakana at first -, art, etiquette, some science and various sports and physical pursuits.
One of the young magus' favourite subjects was aikido, which he was taught by Murakami-sensei, a young woman with unusual blonde hair and a hyperactive attitude which one would think would be more suited to a student than a teacher. Regardless, she was an excellent instructor and Asharu progressed quickly, gaining a green belt within a year. The motions of the style felt natural to him, as well as the way that the very heart of the art was the redirection and utilisation of an opponent's energy and movement.
That same flow and movement was very much evident in his lessons on magecraft with his mother as well. Having the primary alignment of Singularity and the secondary alignments of Water and Miracle - this last being shared by all wizardkind - meant that much of his magic was centred around the redirection and control of flows and attractive and repulsive energies.
At first, he had had a great deal of trouble with the use of magecraft. He could utilise prana within himself - in fact, Semiramis said that he was a near-prodigy with internal magics - but when it came to expelling it and forming spells outside the microcosm of his own body, his circuits just didn't seem to want to comply. Even the simplest of spells, Structural Grasp and Reinforcement, eluded him. His mother was of little help, as her style of teaching was mostly based around giving him the resources and knowledge he needed to solve a problem and then letting him use that to find his own solution. It had troubled him for months by the time he finally realised his problem.
The most basic nature of his magic was 'Singularity', the warping of reality around a point, and he didn't have a point to work from.
That realisation in mind, he went to his mother and asked her how he could make a Mystic Code to help him. He knew by her smile that she was proud he had realised on his own.
A week later, with Semiramis' help, he had crafted his first Mystic Code. It was a simple thing, a marble-sized ball of fired clay which had been mixed with a little of his blood and inscribed with minute cuneiform, to shape the magic within. It was little more than a channel for his power, a 'point' from which he could act, but it made the use of his magecraft vastly easier. He had started off with making the little Code - he called it a Qabsu, 'centre' in the Akkadian which he was learning from his mother - move around, first rolling and then levitating. He could make it move quite fast, as well as make it give out a sort of 'field' which could draw things to it or push them away.
He hadn't spent all his time working, though. He was a firm friend of Issei, who lived in the temple, and he had made friends with someone else as well, although that was quite a different story.
The snake lay basking in the sun atop one of the smaller pillars of the Hanging Gardens, its scales disguising it against the verdant greenery. It was one of the many venomous creatures that Semiramis had summoned for the purpose of protecting her Gardens and it enjoyed its new life. Food was plentiful in the small birds that flocked to the flowers and fruits, water could be taken from any of the many pools dotted around the Gardens, it was rarely bothered and the sun was warm.
It was disguised so well, in fact, that Asharu didn't notice it until he had put his hand on its tail. Then it made itself known, drawing up a third of its four-foot length into the air as it swayed threateningly.
§Begone, or this son-of-earth-and-sun will strike you!§
Panicked, the young boy had stumbled back and, although rationally it would do no good, called out.
§I'll go! I'll leave you alone.§
The snake's hissing took on a new tone, a curious one. Asharu's mind was catching up with his actions now, bringing with it confusion. The snake had spoken, even though he knew for a fact that it was only a mundane one, not some kind of Phantasmal Beast. And how did he know that it was curious?
§A speaker-to-the-sons-and-daughters-of-earth-and-sun?§
The speech was odd, as although he could understand what was meant, there were no words to go along with it, only a soft hssss-shhhss. Licking his lips nervously, the young wizard picked himself up and, deciding that he might as well try, spoke back to the snake.
§My name is Asharu. What is yours?§
To his surprise, the words came out in the same hissing rasp ass the snake's.
§A speaker in truth? I am called scent-of-green-vine. Should you desire my wisdom, I shall be here in the warm-sun-place.§
§Do you mind if I call you Seru?*** It's just that it's a bit shorter than what you said.§
§Call me as you will, young-hatchling-speaker. Now, leave. I must warm myself while new-sun lasts.§
Following that, Asharu often spoke to the green snake while he sunned himself on the pillar. Seru was quite the character, tremendously lazy and arrogant, but possessed of an odd, intuitive intelligence which often offered a useful alternative perspective on his problems. In fact, it was some of the serpent's advice which had lead to his realisation of the nature of his problem with his magecraft. Conversations with Seru were always entertaining, though, as he found the aspects of human life that Asharu told him of utterly perplexing, and he just couldn't seem to get his head around the way that humans seemed to enjoy meat that 'had all the juiciness seared out of it'.
Occupied with friends, studies and his magecraft, the years turned quickly until, altogether too quickly for Semiramis' liking, it was time for her son to become a part of the Japanese wizarding world in truth, going to the afternoon schools which all such students attended, in addition to his mundane studies.
* Oh beautiful goddess, bless us/this.
**Be it so.
***Snake (not that creative, I know)
A/N: From now on, Harry will be referred to as Asharu, except when people who don't know his new name speak about him (i.e. most of the wizarding world).
For clarification, the 'hot pressure' and the 'flecks of golden light' was the Divinity in Semiramis' blood entering into Harry (he's about ¼ divine by the end of the adoption) and the high-pitched scream was Voldemort's Horcrux being expelled by that Divinity. I can't imagine the blood of the Gods coexisting with something which is repeatedly referred to as an 'abomination'. The apparatus which Dumbledore tried to repair measured the state of the Horcrux and the protections binding it. It went haywire because those protections were overloaded by divine power, a thing beyond human magic.
Note that in this story, I'm treating Divinity as 'a capacity by which one can potentially exceed human limits and attain godhood', not 'bestowal of godhood/posthuman ability'. Also, Harry has a comparatively low Divinity - about D rank - so the effect won't be particularly apparent beyond a natural self-possession, boldness and confidence. High Divinity would lead easily to overweening arrogance, like Gilgamesh. Divinity is by no means the same thing as Authority, the powers of actual Divine Spirits.
I'm not sure if Harry is nearsighted or farsighted in the films, but I'm going to assume that he's nearsighted. Sorry if that offends any die-hard HP fans out there.
Talking of die-hard HP fans, I know that Japan has a wizarding community and so on which is detailed briefly on Pottermore and that their school of magic is Mahoutokoro. For the purpose of this story, pretend that there isn't. It's mostly for the sake of some interactions that I want to have later, some cultural dissonance and the way that I imagine how Japanese magical society would be, given that the country has a strong tradition of magic and never experienced the witch hunts which drove western wizards into hiding. And frankly, the way that Japanese wizarding society is described strikes me as faintly vulgar and incredibly Britain-centred for a country on the other side of the world. I'm afraid you'll have to buckle up and accept that this is fanfiction. Angry reviews on this subject will be filed in the 'to be ignored' folder.
That request for a beta reader is still open, if anyone's interested.