A World of Shadows
Chapter Two
Harry awoke to silence.
Not the hollow quiet of an empty room, nor the stillness of a battlefield after the last scream has faded.
No—this was something else. A living silence, vast and unbroken, stretching beyond the limits of his senses.
The ground beneath him was cool, damp with the scent of earth and rain. He stirred, his body aching, his magic thrumming in confusion.
Then he felt them.
Wings.
His breath caught as the unfamiliar weight of them settled against his back. Massive, powerful, black as the abyss itself. They twitched at his command, the feathers rustling like whispering shadows.
Slowly, he pushed himself upright. The world around him was unlike anything he had ever seen—mountains that kissed the sky, forests ancient beyond reason, a land untouched by the passage of time.
Middle-earth.
His magic reached out instinctively, testing the fabric of this new reality, and what he found made him inhale sharply.
This place… it was alive in ways his world had never been.
The magic here was not confined to wands and incantations. It was woven into the land itself, into the trees, the rivers, the very air. It welcomed him, recognized him as something beyond mortal, something that did not belong—yet belonged more than anything else ever had.
A rustle in the undergrowth snapped him back to the present.
He was not alone.
A presence loomed in the darkness, watching. It was not human, not elf, not beast. It was something else. Something ancient.
Then it stepped into the moonlight.
A wolf, black as the void, its form shifting with the darkness, its silver eyes gleaming like stars against an endless night. It was massive—easily the size of a horse, its fur rippling like liquid shadow.
And Harry knew its name before it even spoke.
"Moros."
The wolf regarded him in silence, then lowered its great head and pressed its forehead against his chest in silent reverence.
A bond was forged.
And Harry Potter, Master of Death, was no longer alone.