Ballad of Dusk and Dawn
Disclaimer: Definitely don't own any of this.
Warnings: AU, Crossover, Slash, Character Deaths (Off Screen)
AN: Based on a prompt by NaTeO11 on AO3. This also has some very strong influences from The Wizarding Prince of Twilight by Marsflame18 and Scion of Somebody, Probably by Drag0nSt0rm.
It's the starlings who tell Harry that another elf has come. It's late in the evening, and they're settling in to roost when a pair lands on his balcony. They're happy to help, tweeting and dancing around like little eager spies. He thanks them with some seeds he keeps for just the occasion.
It isn't his business; it isn't. He shouldn't care if Fingon has late night liaisons. This is his home. His estate. He can entertain whomever, whenever he wants.
And yet… yet…
First the surprise arrival of Findis and then being ambushed with Nerdanel…
His inner Slytherin shakes a finger at him in a manner that is not unlike a scolding Malfoy. The Ravenclaw part tells him he's being foolish and that any knowledge is good knowledge. Hufflepuff puts hands on his hips but agrees that everyone can get along only if everyone knows the plan. Gryffindor just shrugs and says he might as well.
Harry sighs.
Corvids have a poor association with elves, but fortunately for Harry, since coming to Arda, he's gained other forms. Avians are the easiest, which is not unexpected. Owls are something of a favorite and always will be.
It takes a moment to reorient himself since he hasn't changed for months; he stretches his wings and turns his head this way and that. His feathers are glossy and black, but he purposefully shifts his eyes to a luminous amber just in case. He doesn't want to be seen flying from the room though, so he appartes to the shadows of the roof. The finches nesting there are delighted enough to show him the correct room, preening against his wings and bobbing their heads for several minutes before he can finally shoo them away.
The roof itself is clean, almost unnaturally so, likely from all the recent rain. Nevertheless, Harry's grateful for it as he carefully walks over the tiles, meticulously picking his way around the edges to keep his talons from catching. His goal is an ever-darkening corner as the night deepens, and he settles in with his back between the two walls. It's warm, as it always is in Tirion, but the breeze is pleasant. The balcony door is open just as he hoped it would be.
"For surely, Ma-"
"He continues to deny him," Fingon cuts in, and his tone is very tired.
Harry obviously can't see them from this angle, but despite his form shift, his hearing is sharp as ever. He catches a loud exhale and knows that it's from Fingon.
"But Tyelpë also denied his father after the kinslayings, and he never took the Oath."
The other elf sounds very similar to Fingon. Voice near enough that he must be a close relative, but Fingon has no children and has never married. Another brother then. Harry knows that this isn't Argon though. Has spent too much time around him now not to recognize him immediately.
Harry has never met Turgon, however.
"Do you think perhaps he was too young to know when they were separated?" the stranger asks next. "He may've even still been a babe."
He can hear Fingon moving in the room. Walking to the far corner where Harry knows he keeps the expensive alcohol. Sure enough, there's the sound of a cabinet opening.
"We don't know how long he was in the Halls, and I only know he was there because of how he spoke to Irissë of Lord Mandos," Fingon says, distant in a way that has nothing to do with his location in the room. There's liquid pouring into a glass, first one and then another. "We know so little of him. He tells us only hints and falters when he realizes what he's given away. I don't even know his age. Where he lived on Arda. Nothing! Celebrían was the one to tell me his craft, and she didn't even hear it from him either but her cousin through marriage."
There's a thump and the sound of a chair against the carpet. Like Fingon has fallen into it.
Harry doesn't know what to think. He scarcely dares to breathe. His heart is beating wildly, wings shivering as he tries to pull them closer. It's summer, but he's unexpectedly chilled. It feels like every happy emotion has emptied from his body. As if a dementor is standing just behind his shoulder and out of sight.
Are they… Are they really taking about…
"What do you know then?" the visitor inquires after a long pause. "Share what you have and not what you don't. Extrapolate from there."
Harry can't see them. Can't see Fingon's face or his eyes. Can only imagine how he must look in this instance as he tells this elf – this stranger – every detail he knows.
Harry can't decide which is worse. The hearing of it. The telling. Or that he could've lived on forever in blissful ignorance.
Fingon is measured, considering.
Damning.
"He's a gifted artist but shies away from acknowledgement. He rebuilt Formenos by himself and possibly before I even met him. He wears no jewelry and refuses treasures of his House, even those that uncle and Curufin didn't make. He knows how to hunt and killed a fox that not even Irissë spotted. His manners and dress are appropriate for a prince, but he rarely braids his hair and is reluctant to allow me or even Gil to do it. He knows the history of Valinor and the kinslayings chillingly well, but he hates going to Tirion unless wearing his hood. He goes only to buy books, and he spends more time reading those at night than resting."
Fingon pauses to take a sip, and the wait is agonizing.
"So Makalaurë obviously taught him something," the other elf offers, "to have all of this. What does Gil-galad say?"
There's a laugh. It's an exhausted, mirthless sound.
Harry clamps his beak shut to make sure it didn't come from him.
"He hoards his knowledge like a dragon does gold. Gil says nothing that was given in confidence, which is everything."
A tap of fingertips on wood then, but Harry isn't sure who it's from. A steady rhythm in time with his pounding heart.
"He avoids touch, and even Gil's is rarely permitted." It's halting now. Hesitant. "He steps away but never pushes, and he looks at us like he doesn't understand what's being offered."
Silence. Tense. Threadbare. Like a cloak unraveling.
Someone is breathing hard, and Harry isn't sure if it's him, Fingon, or some combination of both.
"He doesn't speak of his mother," Fingon murmurs. It's muted, distant. "Never. Not once. Not a single word of her. There's…"
He exhales. Long. Slow. Inhales again.
They're speaking from the room beneath Harry, but it's so far away even without moving.
"There's what, hinya?"
Another pause and a clank of glass.
"There's… an unusual quality to his fëa," Fingon admits.
Harry wants nothing more than to fly down. To see his expression and know what he's thinking in that very moment. It's only because his wings won't support him that he doesn't.
"…but I've met so few peredhil and never spent much time with any of them. Perhaps… perhaps his mother was the child of an Avar and an Atan?"
There's a shifting as the second elf abruptly leans up in his seat.
"You don't think his mother was Atani?"
"No Atan has eyes like that," Fingon tells him with absolute confidence, complete and utter conviction, and Harry struggles not to make a sound, can't be sure whether it'll be a laugh or a cry. "They certainly didn't come from the line of Finwë."
It earns him a snort instead from his visitor. Harry can hear him take a long drink from his wineglass before setting it on the table a little too heavily.
"Ingoldo has green eyes," the stranger reminds him. His tone is gentle. Manner like one holding a soap bubble and trying to keep it intact.
"Those are the closest in any Ñoldo," Fingon acknowledges after a minute, "but his are much lighter in shade. You'll see yourself soon enough."
Harry shivers as Fingon sighs. He can imagine him with that far off stare he often wears. Like he's gazing beyond Harry to some other time and place. Like he's lost himself and isn't quite sure how to get back.
It's an uncomfortably familiar look. One Harry has seen in the mirror too many times.
Very unexpectedly, there's a knock at the door. Sharp, agitated. It's jarring enough that Harry nearly jumps.
He hears a clink against the table.
"I'm sorry to bother you."
It's muffled behind wood and distance.
"Celebrían?" Fingon questions, and he honestly seems perplexed. "Come in, come in."
The sound of a door opening, then footsteps. Quick. Restless.
"My apologies, cousin and-"
She gives a little gasp, clearly surprised to see this elf, too.
"Niece, please, no need for that."
"Celebrían, whatever's the matter?" Fingon interrupts as his chair is being pushed back, and Harry hears him rising.
"We can't find Hérion," she answers in a rush.
"What?"
Fingon is startled, strangled.
Harry feels his heart stop. Stutter. Restart.
The wards.
They never come by his room at night. He hadn't bothered to recast them. He hasn't ever needed them.
Not until now.
"We went to see him this evening, but his room was empty. He's been quieter since your return from the lake, and he's been even more withdrawn after Nerdanel spoke with him. We… we grew concerned."
There's a roaring in his ears. His feathers are puffed up, wings stretching out as if faced with a predator.
"His horse?"
It's Fingon but further way. There's the flutter of a robe being thrown on and the jingle of sword as it's tied to a belt.
"Irissë has gone to check the stables, but his room is empty of most of his things." Celebrían moves towards him two steps. "Uncle and Arakáno are heading to the city proper in case he went there. Findis is alerting the staff to help us search. The others are all looking as we speak. Gil-"
All of three of them are far away now, hurrying off. A door opens.
"He would truly leave at night? Without saying anything?"
Then, they're gone. Whatever response is lost, never to return.
Harry is left alone. Still on the roof. In his corner. In the dark. With no clue what to do now.
-o.O.o-
-o.O.o-
Vairë sings while she weaves. Her voice is light, gauzy. More delicate than dew on leaves or gossamer made into lace. A silken soprano who never misses a single pitch and every note is a perfect seam in the fabric of her song.
Harry sits and watches her for what must be hours, but it never drags as her fingers dance. She never loses her veil, but he knows that she smiles at him as she works. She's more patient than a spider spinning a web as she teaches him the rhythms. As she corrects every hitch and smooths any missed beat.
Nienna is their most frequent companion, and the songs are more varied then. Some wordless. Others in languages he's never known. From beings. From concepts. From the universe itself.
Even more often, they simply speak with him. Ask him all manner of things. They're ever curious about the world of his birth, about the life he had before coming here. About the school and teaching and being a headmaster. About his career before that. His apprentices. The conflict with Voldemort. The devastation of the Muggles. Of Earth… Of her loss.
His magic surprises them the most, he thinks. The ease of it. The utility.
Their songs can build entire worlds, but his can light a room so simply. Can make water and flowers and a purple armchair from nothing.
The ladies are mesmerized.
Both wands have made it here, and his holly one is quite taken with Nienna. He teaches her Lumos first and then Wingardium Leviosa. She masters them perfectly with the first cast. The next is silent. The third is without the movement. Her delight is the sun on a winter day as it dries the earlier sleet.
Harry watches it in awe. He's had many students over the years. Most young but some older. Late to magic for one reason or another. Some denied it due to their blood or finances. Others forbidden until the laws relaxed and times changed.
Never has anyone cast so flawlessly. So easily in the beginning. Even those with other types of magic like goblins or gnomes or vampires had struggled at least a bit with the change to wands.
Nienna took to it like a conductor directing a symphony. A harmony rising to answer the flick of her wrist.
Harry's never seen anything like it. He doubts he ever will again. But then, the Ainur are not like anyone he's ever met before. They are magic. In a way that even Harry isn't.
While Nienna studies spells, Vairë prefers his cloak. Loves running her fingers over the invisible runes and impossibly small stitches. It truly is a work of art. Of three genius masters who turned themselves into legends. The material intrigues her, but even Harry isn't sure what it's made from. A lethifold perhaps. Or maybe even a dementor. He certainly knows it wasn't fashioned from any demiguise.
Their grimoire was old, missing key pages, so these artifacts will never be duplicated. Harry thinks it was done on purpose. Perhaps by the brothers themselves. That or one of their descendants.
It too has made its way here with him. Had been tucked into his pocket when he made his journey; it'd been too dangerous to just leave behind in the eventuality that someone in a distant future may come back to find it. The brothers were powerful wizards, necromancers who delved far too deeply in their craft. Best not leaving such tempting and damning material just laying around.
But it's protected now, given to Námo for safekeeping.
Harry has no want for it or most other things now. His needs are simple, and the Halls provide for him.
Nonetheless, the ladies repeatedly bring him gifts. Clothing is the most common, and Harry thinks Vairë enjoys having something else to make for once. The very first thing she brings is a robe of viridian with black pants and silver thread. It's an exceptionally Slytherin design, and Harry knows she's been listening to his stories very well when he spies the serpent pattern hidden in the edges. Why she chose this in particular, he isn't sure, but the material is soft, and it's finer than anything Harry's ever owned. He wears it gladly; both seem very pleased with it.
There are other things, too. Blankets. Books. A sword and spear from Eönwë that Harry takes somewhat dubiously. Oromë brings a bow with matching quiver as if trying not to be outdone. Hunting knives from Aulë but these are brought by his wife.
Even more.
Harry honestly isn't sure what he should do with all of it. If he didn't have magic, his room here would very quickly be filled to the brim. It's a puzzling thing having so many things and so little need for them but such eager gifters. Ones who seem to want absolutely nothing in return.
Then, one day, Nienna brings him a harp.
It's small. Meant to be held in his lap while played.
Harry remembers instruments in hazy recollections from primary school. He loved music and art even then, but it'd been hard to hide his drawings from the Dursleys. He never would've managed anything larger. In Hogwarts, there hadn't been time and certainly not with Voldemort. Afterwards was recovering and while he'd taken the opportunity to travel, to find himself, that had not been long in the scheme of things. He'd returned for his mastery and there was always something else to do after that. He had drawn more though; doodles in his spare time or before bed to relax. Music just never seemed to be a higher priority.
But then, other things came, and leisure was a finite thing for so long. Slightly less so as a professor. He'd actually managed to take his own art classes. They'd been added back to the curriculum by that time and expanded for adult students. He'd first done it as a show to the community, as a way to draw interest, but Harry'd found an old passion. He'd continued those classes for years. Gone to other schools on exchange for a semester or two or three with day trips whenever he could steal them – Lourdes, Boston, San Francisco, Rome, Athens, Alexandria, Lima, Kolkata, Osaka, Shangri La, Kaifeng, Xi'an, Melbourne, everywhere and anywhere that would have him. Taken up traveling again during the summer to learn more.
It was one of the few things he'd done for himself. Until the semesters away stopped. Until he was head of house and he couldn't do that to the students. Couldn't be gone so long. The summers remained his own even as headmaster, but other holidays were always spent at the school save for a day here or there. Maybe a weekend if he was truly lucky. Even those stopped in the end, too busy trying to save the world to enjoy it.
And now, he's in Mandos.
Now, the only responsibilities are the ones he takes on.
The harp in his hands is cool, a mix of metal and preserved wood kept new by some elven technique. It's old, Harry thinks, but he can't tell by how much. Only knows by some sixth sense as he moves to hand it back.
Nienna, however, refuses it.
"This isn't mine but rather for you," she says like frozen mists. Her tears are slow today, a scant trickle; there's always a lingering sadness to her, nonetheless.
"But I don't know how to play," Harry admits as he runs his finger over the unusual star carved on the head.
A noncommittal sound, neither pleased nor solemn.
"It is enchanted." Her fingers rise like fog on a lake, and harp glows golden for an instant before it fades away. "The one this belonged to before will be your teacher."
She plucks a single string. Soft and sweet. Pure.
Harry feels it then. Echoing out. Calling from a distant shore.
Harry isn't quite sure how to describe him. How to describe the sensation of someone suddenly being there without Harry even seeing his face.
Melancholy deep as the depths, dark, sinking. Salt like an ocean of sorrows. A hurricane of loss and recrimination. A swelling squall that floods his mind in a tsunami. Guilt. Grief. Despair.
But… but… but there's also sunlight on the surface. The break of gentle waves on the shore in a steady thrum. The call of gulls in flight.
Harry opens his eyes. He hadn't even realized that they were closed.
He inhales shakily. Overcome with emotions that aren't his but might as well be.
"For every sorrow, there will one day again be joy," Nienna murmurs as she places a hand over his. The autumn in her voice is greens and golds, glorious even as the leaves fall. "For every loss, we will gain."
Harry can still smell the sea as he gazes at her. The harp in his lap is heavier than it should be, weighted by history, by a past Harry doesn't even know.
His hand traces over the edges. The strings. The star.
He thinks of the elf who once held this and imagines what he must be like. What kind of life he lived to feel such a way.
Harry knows what that's like.
To lose everything.
To have it all ripped away.
To grieve until you wish you could just die from it.
"Is he…?"
"He has refused the call here when it was finally offered," Nienna tells him, and it's remote, haunting. She turns her head to look at something very far away, but the deluge of her tears is telling. "He doesn't wish for forgiveness."
"But forgiveness is given," Harry reminds her, "it's not earned." His fingers curl before he forces them open. His voice is near trembling as he fights to keep himself from remembering things best forgotten, "And sometimes, it's hardest to earn from yourself."
Nienna's hand on his stills. Her hair is white beneath the gray of her hood, but there aren't any shadows as she looks back.
"Sometimes, the burdens we take on aren't ours to carry." He can't see the color of her eyes behind her weeping, but he knows she's looking directly at him. "The blame for them rests with others, and we are only left the ashes of choices we never even made."
Harry breathes out in a rush and turns his hand over to squeeze hers. "But that's something he has to realize for himself. No matter how many times you tell him, it won't be true until he knows it here." He points with his free fingers over his chest.
She's silent for a very long time after that. Tears drip down her face in a steady stream as she gazes at him, searching. She's hazy rain on a December day as she leans up to press a kiss to his forehead.
"You are far too wise, dear, and too kind."
Then, she's gone. Evaporating like mist in the sunlight.
Harry is left behind, alone, still holding the harp.
-o.O.o-
-o.O.o-
In the end, his decision is simple. Harry heads higher.
It's an easy matter to fly to the highest part of the roof, to very top of the dome on the property's lone tower. There's a flat area that's perfect for sitting, and he draws his knees to his chest, hands folded on top.
He's high enough that the world underneath is forgotten, is a faint memory. All he can see is a kaleidoscope of twinkling lights on all sides. Everything else is so remote. So far below.
He can think. He can breathe. He can let the last few hours fall away from him like a serpent shedding his skin. Time flows on as he tips his head back and lets the stars and the moon sing to him.
The birds are all sleeping now. The crickets have finished their serenade. Even the fireflies have given up for the night.
The top of the trees are dark green waves when he occasionally glances down, and he can't even see the lights of the estate. They don't call for him, and he's grateful for that. He hopes it means they've all gone to bed. To be honest, he's high enough to not even hear them without the help of magic. Which he definitely doesn't use. He's earned his own punishment for that earlier and doesn't care for a repeat performance, thanks ever so much.
He's such an idiot.
No matter how old Harry gets, he'll still be a boy chasing mysteries. Creeping down hallways at night. Going into secret passageways under the school. Hiding under his cloak and listening in to conversations that shouldn't concern him at all.
How much does he have to be hurt to learn this lesson?
The stars and moon don't have an answer.
He doesn't know how much time passes. He's fixed in the same spot. Frozen like an elven statue in the night.
He's so tired but can't rest. Can't find the energy to apparate. Much less climb all the way down and locate his bed.
Hours pass. Enough time for his heart to start easing. For the tapestry of starlight above him to whisper soothing melodies to his mind and lullabies to his troubles. For his worries to seem so much smaller and farther away. For his head to rest on his hands and his eyes to half-shut.
It's Gil-galad who finds him. Who Harry feels arriving with the roil of storm-clouds.
Harry looks down from the sea of stars above him to Gil-galad appearing over the edge as he pulls himself up. His coronet, bracelet, and outer robe are gone from earlier, and two of his braids are also missing. His footfalls are whisper-soft as he steps over the metal of the dome, and his shoulders are level, back straight as he climbs.
Harry finds that he's sitting up automatically.
There's a scent of ozone. Sizzling and sparking. Like the aftereffects of a lightning strike.
Anger then. He honestly isn't surprised. Harry deserves it, he supposes. Deserves their rage for hiding like a coward.
Gil-galad is next to him now. His face is pale, irises just a ring around the pupil in the dark as he kneels.
"I-"
There are arms around him then, tight, almost but not quite suffocating. They circle around his middle as forearms clench at his back. Pulling him close. Closer. Almost lifting him from the roof until he can get his knees underneath him. A face presses into his neck, and Gil-galad lets out a shuddering breath.
Harry freezes. There's thudding in his ears as he feels the elf in his arms shiver. He swallows hard. Somehow, he finds his hands lifting of their own accord. His fingertips tangle in dark hair, wrists digging into shoulder blades.
The air is heavy, dense. A brewing thunderstorm without a single cloud on the horizon.
"I'm sorry," he murmurs and means it. His throat is thick, aching, raw. "I'm sorry."
Harry's chest is tight. His eyes burn. He grips so firmly he knows he'll leave bruises.
The face in his neck pulls back. Gil-galad looks at him, unreadable, near and yet so far away. Then, a hand lifts from his middle to brush up his arm, past his shoulder, and cup his face. His head is tipped so they're the same height, but the fingers on his cheek are gentle, curling around his jaw.
"Tell me before you do this again, Mírimo."
It isn't a demand. More like pleading.
His voice is low, husky. Breath fogging. His hand trembles as he strokes Harry's skin.
"I…" Harry can hardly speak over the shards in his throat. "I will."
An exhale then. A bated breath. Hold, wait, and then release.
A forehead taps against his and remains. Fingers ghost over his face and feather through his hair. Eyes look at him in the dark, and Harry sees nothing else.
Finally, Gil-galad pulls back but not away. It's slow, deliberate. Lingering.
He brings Harry to his feet at the same time that he also stands. Leads him down the dome to the edge of the roof. They descend together to the balcony below. Gil-galad follows him silently until his feet touch down on the tiles. He takes Harry's left hand in his right, grasp firm but not unyielding as he opens the door and leads him inside.
He doesn't let go.
-o.O.o-
-o.O.o-
The third Muggle world war lasts for four days, fifteen hours, and twenty-seven minutes. It would've been shorter, but there was no leadership left to end it. Half the population dies immediately. Another half of the remainder in the resulting chaos and famine. More still from radiation sickness, subsequent cancers, and other previously preventable issues.
Magicals make it out unsurprisingly well. They've had enough warning after all, decades of prophecies and forewarning. They've already withdrawn to the far reaches or burrowed in deep. Harry himself is sitting in the office of Steelclaw – the new, young Director of Gringotts – when it starts. They simply look at each other in horror over their teacups as the air around them screams with a billion voices and goes hollow, deathly silent.
Harry is still the chief Healer at Saint Mungo's then. He's lived through a war, but that doesn't prepare him for this. Nothing ever could. For the utter devastation. For wasteland of London. Of Paris. Of Europe. Of the world.
For the smell of blood and rot and ash that even Bubblehead Charms can't block out. For the grey haze of the landscape and the crumbling wreckage of the cities around them.
They live in tents, and there's rotating teams that do nothing but maintain the wards against the radiation and dust. The magical world helps. It isn't an island that can survive on its own with the entire Earth falling apart at the seams. Tieflings, humans, gnomes, pixiu, werewolves, the list goes on. It doesn't matter at this point. They take anyone and help anybody they find.
Harry honestly can't remember much of that first year aside from a steady stream of dying patients, pleading families, and passing out from exhaustion. Sheer will gets him through the next two before he actually has to take time to sleep, and it's because his apprentices force him. He always makes sure they have food and rest, but that's a luxury he doesn't have. There's never enough time, resources, staff, hope.
Magic is a refuge, a haven, an eye in the tempest. It's just distant enough for a sense of almost normalcy. There's still birthday parties, weddings, graduations.
Harry misses all of those.
He doesn't even return to his own house for nearly four years, and it's likely only still standing and his taxes paid because Steelclaw is truly a gentlegoblin, one who remembers every slight but always rewards every courtesy. And Harry paid his dues in full to the goblins. With interest and very sincere apologies. They don't often get those.
Harry keeps working. Keeps helping. Keeps healing and mending and training students and sleeping on a cot.
It takes nineteen years to stabilize the Muggle world into something resembling order. Magic's a pixie well out of the bag by then, but it really doesn't matter by that point. Magic is what keeps the rain from turning to acid, the lands fertile and green, the air breathable. It turns the tide in their favor and keeps the Earth habitable – for a time.
Harry retires as soon as the first election in almost two decades is held in Great Britain. He starts at an integrated Hogwarts as the new Potions Master the following September. His first class is Teddy's twin granddaughters, Rose Weasley-Turpin's youngest and only son, and Steelclaw's nephew.
It's a double class, and he spends the first hour in simple preparation. In showing them the proper way to select and process their ingredients. In cauldron checks and equipment set-up. Then, once he's sure that they're all comfortable with the process, they start brewing.
Their very first potion is the revised Wit-Sharpening Potion.
It's Harry's own creation. Made as one of his Potion's Mastery projects.
The students have no idea, of course. Have no idea the history behind this choice. The weight of it. That this potion was quintessential in saving lives because it has fewer ingredients than the original, a faster brewing time, better shelf life, and it's overall easy enough that even a novice with minimal experience can make it. That there's no risk of addiction and it's as effective if taken sparingly or regularly. That they drank this day after day for years to keep their focus as the world collapsed around them.
He adds the instructions to the board with a wave of his hand.
1. Add six pieces of ginger root to cauldron. Potion should turn from blue to green.
2. Add five grams (one third of a tablespoon) ground petals of Perovskia flowers. Potion turns to purple.
3. Add armadillo bile until potion turns yellow and stir clockwise.
4. Add seven chopped leaves of Perovskia and stir clockwise until potion turns purple again.
All of them submit complete potions. Not perfect. Not by a mile. But they're all at least variations of the correct color, and Harry knows they'll work even without testing. He praises each of them individually and as a class just as the bell rings.
They're all so bright, so eager as they file out. They're cherished children, sheltered from the harsh reality of the outside world. They'll never understand what things were like before.
They'll never know that without the new laws, their Muggleborn classmates wouldn't have been identified until age eleven. That their Muggle parents wouldn't have been approached shortly after their births or sometimes even before. That there would be no magical primary schools to prepare them.
That only humans would be in these seats.
That Squibs would still be on the fringes of magical society, shoved out the door in adolescence or stricken – sometimes literally – from memory.
That half this class would've likely never been born when their parents died in the blasts.
That the world outside these walls and magical sanctuaries is a wild, desperate, dark place but it's slowly getting better, and he'll do everything in his power for them never to see the horrors of when it was even worse.
He's told by his colleagues that the first class is always special. The first day is always the hardest.
The first night at his desk, he cries with his head in his hands, remembering all the children he couldn't save.
Outtakes (Or Bits Don't Fit Anywhere Else)
Gil-galad – My dear, I've come to spend time with you. Knock, knock.
Door – Creaks open ominously.
Room – Completely empty.
Things – Packed because Harry keeps it that way in case he needs to make a quick escape.
Gil-galad – My dear?
Bird!Harry – Up on the roof, having totally not recast his wards. I'm sure it'll be fine.
Narrator Voice – It was not fine.
-o.O.o-
-o.O.o-
Nienna – Forgive us, but Harry is…
Vairë – It doesn't sound very elvish.
Harry – Stares at them blankly.
Nienna – You said you wished to blend in as much as you could.
Harry – Had not considered the name change very much.
Narrator Voice – Several minutes later.
The Three of Them – Looking at Quenya names in a baby book.
Vairë – What about this one?
Harry – Making a terrible face. Himbo has an unfortunate translation in my first language.
Nienna – No, this one!
Harry – Making a worse face. So does Teleporno.
-o.O.o-
-o.O.o-
Random Elf – So what's your name?
Harry – Hérion.
Nienna – At the same time. Marcaunon.
Both – Look at each other.
Nienna – In a whisper. Elves usually have two names.
Harry – Sighs. Fine!
Nienna – Teehee!
AN: Historically, snakes/serpents have represented rebirth, healing, transformation, resurrection, and immortality. Silver for purity and protection. Viridian for vivacity, healing, and new beginnings. Vairë knows what's up.
I'm having way too much fun looking up all the Quenya names. Just saying.
Also, this story is going to take a decidedly darker tone for some of the material in the next chapters, but on the other hand, the romance aspect is going to be a lot more in the forefront as a balance than I originally planned. I may take a poll to see how explicit we want to be with it.
-o.O.o-
-o.O.o-
Hérion – chief (one of the meanings of Cedric).
Marcaunon – ruler of the home (Henry/Harry).
Mírimo – valuable one = Mírima (Valuable) + O (Masculine)
Himbo – adhering/sticking one = Himba (Adhering/Sticking) + O (Masculine)
Teleporno – silver tall = Tyelpë (Silver) + Pron/Porn (Tall) + O (Masculine)
Ever Hopeful,
Azar