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Harry Potter and Druidic Magic | ||||||
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Category: Alternate Universe, Post-Hogwarts, Magical Creatures Challenge (2017-3), Magical Creatures Challenge (2017-3) Characters:Albus Dumbledore, Draco Malfoy, Harry/Ginny, Hermione Granger, James Potter, Lily Potter, Luna Lovegood, Minerva McGonagall, Neville Longbottom, Ron Weasley, Severus Snape, Sirius Black Genres: Action/Adventure, Angst, Romance Warnings: Death, Intimate Sexual Situations, Mild Sexual Situations, Violence Rating: R Reviews: 16 Summary:  stunning banner by Asphodelic @tda The story begins from the time when Lily and James on the run from Voldemort. Half of the story will be categorized as AU. Chapter 4 and 5 were written for Magical Creatures Challenge 2017-3. Hitcount: Story Total: 14272; Chapter Total: 1634 Author's Notes: Finally I could be back to this story. Beta reading has not been done yet, so I really appreciate for your kind feedback. Thank you for reading. :) Many thanks to Grace for beta reading. |
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Chapter 3 The Phoenix's Song Harry placed the broken holly wand on the Headmaster’s desk. The two halves were just connected by the very thin thread of phoenix feather. All he wanted was to fix the wand he had cherished for so long since he first began learning magic. When the tip of the Elder Wand touched the fine thread, he said, ‘Reparo.’ Red and gold sparks flew about, and his wand was successfully repaired. He picked it up and rubbed the surface of it. He felt the familiar warmth in his fingers. He felt like he could listen to a phoenix song from it. Grinning wide, he spoke. “I’m putting it back with you, Professor.” He looked up to the portrait of Dumbledore, who had been watching him with huge affection. “If I die naturally like Ignotus, its power will be broken, right?” Dumbledore smiled and seemed to nod in the portrait. Ron said, “ Are you sure?” His voice held a slight expectation that Harry would change his mind. Before he answered, Hermione added, “Harry is right. The previous master won’t have been defeated. There will be no evil wizard who could use it.” When the trio came out of the room, McGonagall was climbing up the spiral staircase. She looked extremely fatigued as she told them she spared the rooms for them to rest. “Only the Slytherin common room and the dorms were left unharmed. You might dislike it, but the Great Hall and the other dorms are occupied with the wounded and … the dead people. Have a shower and get some rest.” She held up her hands as the trio began to interrupt, and continued, “Don’t worry yourselves with helping us. You must be tired after the task, Potter. Granger and Weasley, watch him to make sure he doesn’t delve into any more heroic things tonight. You all need rest. No, Potter. You must be tired,” she insisted when she saw Harry try to say something. But Harry interjected. “Professor, I have the last task. I have to …” His words were cut off when Ron kicked him in the shin. While Harry was staring at his best mate, Ron took over, “I’ll watch him, Professor. We are going to help you tomorrow. Hermione, Harry, let’s go.” He urged Harry to descend the stairs. “Good,” McGonagall said shortly and entered the room. “Why did you kick me?” Harry suspected that Ron was reluctant to put the Elder Wand back into Dumbledore’s tomb. “Use your father’s cloak.” Ron whispered back. “Oh, yeah, right.” He was ashamed of himself for having doubted his best mate. When they reached the Great Hall, Hermione stopped them. “Wait! You’d better go with Bill to Dumbledore’s.” She found him among the Weasleys, who were surrounding Fred’s body in mourning. Not having slept, the exhaustion came back with heavy feeling that he had lost so many people he loved. He felt Ron pull the Cloak from the pocket of his jeans. Harry took it from him and slid it over himself. He went with Ron and Hermione to the spot where the Weasleys had been grieving over Fred. Hermione got closer to Bill and whispered something. Bill glanced back and stared at the space near invisible Harry, who was standing behind Ron. When Molly noticed Ron, she drew him close to her and tried to smile at him. But the attempt failed and a tear rolled down her cheek. Hugging his mother, Ron mouthed “go” to Harry over her shoulder. Harry nodded and waited for Bill, who was coming with Hermione to him. Bill whispered, “You must be tired after you finished him. If we can get the job done without you, go and rest, Harry.” “No. I won’t rest until I see this wand be put back with Dumbledore.” Harry whispered back and sought for Ginny among the Weasleys with his eyes. He caught the sight of her putting her hand on George’s shoulder. “Is she… okay?” “I think so. Mum will be alright.” Bill answered and corrected himself immediately, guessing from Harry’s tone of voice. “Oh, you meant my sister. Yeah, she’s alright.” They marched through the long tables. Behind them, Madam Pomfrey was occupied with caring for the injured students. Some Ravenclaws including Cho Chang were helping her. When they came out of the castle, the setting sun cast the lingering glow of it on the surface of the Black Lake. Bill hauled in the rope which was connected to the edge of a small boat. Harry took off the cloak and got into the boat after Bill and Hermione. When Bill started rowing toward the island where Dumbledore had been sleeping, they heard the beautiful song of the phoenix. Harry rubbed his tired eyes and stared at the spot. To his surprise, one phoenix was getting closer and landed on the boat. “Fawkes?” He asked. The phoenix’s scarlet feathers glowed and it’s golden claws and beak were gleaming. The loyal bird answered by singing a beautiful healing tune. Listening to it, they felt their fatigue lift and slowly dissipate. When he finished singing, Fawkes took off for the island ahead. When they arrived there, he started singing again. With the healing song, they could regain power to continue examining the white tomb broken by Voldemort. After elaborate examination, Bill turned to Harry, I don’t think there are any curses left,” he assured him. It was a cue for Harry to put the Elder Wand back where it belonged. Hermione muttered something Harry couldn’t hear when Bill sealed the gravestone. He reckoned she prayed for Dumbledore. Bill swished his wand, drawing arcs in the air. He chanted a long incantation Harry had never heard of before. When he finished, Bill explained, “I cast the strongest protecting charm I’ve ever learned. Nobody who has a guilty conscience can’t open this tomb.” “Thank you, Bill. I think our task is complete.” Harry looked up at Fawkes who had been soaring high in the air. “Are you helping us? We need you to heal people at Hogwarts,” he spoke to him. Fawkes answered in song and followed the boat to the shore. He kept circling over the castle. His song was heard by people inside the castle, and everyone listened attentively to the phoenix’s song. It seemed that everyone was cured and healed by it, even if just for a little while. Suddenly a male voice broke the peaceful moment. Seamus Finnegan looked intensely sad and shouted out in the Great Hall. “Fawkes, please cure her!” When Harry looked at the spot where Seamus’s voice came from, he was stunned to see a girl student, fatally injured on the floor. Savaged by Fenrir Greyback, Lavender Brown was in a wretched way. She looked almost dead. Hermione uttered, “No!” and she ran up to them. Professor Trelawney put her hands on Seamus’s shoulders trying to calm him, and said, “Let her go in peace, Finnegan.” “No!” Seamus shook himself free from Trelawney’s grasp and ran out of the Great Hall, yelling loudly “Fawkes! Fawkes!” Harry followed him and shouted together with Seamus. “Fawkes, save her!” He had a ray of hope, remembering the magical tears had healed his wounds inflicted by Basilisk. Called on by two Gryffindors, Fawkes soared back and swam into the Great Hall. His soft clattering sounds of claws echoed through the hall as he touched ground. Stared at with awe by many people, he hopped towards Lavender. Inclining his head to her mercilessly torn neck, he dropped pearly tears one after another. After a long, drawn out silence, a miracle happened. Lavender stirred and opened her eyes. Though she had a hollow in her neck, the surface of the skin was smooth. After that, Fawkes got busy with curing some people mortally injured. When he shed the last tear for a poor boy student whose legs had been crushed by a giant, he took flight and left. When Harry saw Fawkes vanish beyond the Scottish night sky, he felt someone grasp his left hand. It was Ginny. He held her hand back. “McGonagall urged me to ask you to go to the dungeon. You need sleep. Take a shower. No more heroic things, Potter.” She said, mimicking McGonagall’s tone. “Oops, it was lucky she didn’t reprimand me.” Harry said comically. People smiled at them and cleared the passage for them. Harry was relieved to know that people in the castle were willing to leave them alone. Descending the dark stairs, Harry was still in a bright mood. He guessed the phoenix’s song lightened his heavy feeling after the battle. Ginny whispered to him, “I hate the dungeon. It reminds me of my first year. You know, Tom’s diary…” She held his hand tight. Harry held her hand tight back and said, ‘“No evil thing will happen here. And you are not alone. I’m here with you, Ginny.” Answering, he got a feeling that he was entirely free. Though he couldn’t speak Parseltongue any more, he felt he was himself, not under control by the other man. They reached a wet stone wall and Harry asked, “Do you know the password?” “Yes, I heard it from Professor McGonagall. Caput Draconis!” When she spoke the password aloud, it revealed a concealed stone door, which slid open. When they came in the long room, greenish lamps had been lighting the dark underground room. In the center of carved chairs, Luna Lovegood was reading the ‘Quibbler’ upside down. She talked to them over the old newspaper in her sing-a song voice, “I used a boy’s dorm shower. You can’t use a girl’s dorm, Salazar Slytherin was afraid that his house’s girls would be assaulted by Muggle-born wizards, so you need another password. Even McGonagall doesn’t know it. A new Minister should ban such special privilege from Hogwarts. You can use a gorgeous bath tub though. It’s made of marble stone. We don’t have such a rich treatment in our dorm.” “Oh, really? Thank you for the information. You go first, Ginny.” Harry hesitated to have a shower first, caring her. “Go, Harry. I wait for you until you sleep. I promised McGonagall to make sure you rest. Harry, no more saving people.’” She copied the way of McGonagall’s speaking tone. “Okay, okay.” Hardly stifling his laughing, he left for the bathroom. When he opened the door, he was astonished by the grand sight. The bathroom had seven cubicles divided by green frosted glass and each cubicle had a luxurious marble bathtub as Luna told him. Then Neville came out of one of them. He was wearing Slytherin robes. Before Harry asked, he explained, “House-elves are bringing in clean clothes for us, but they are all Slytherin robes, it’s the best they could do given the circumstances.” “I don’t mind, are there only us in here?” He was afraid that girls might be using one of the bathtubs in the bathroom. “No. Only Malfoy right now. I guess he can’t get out until you finish.” “What? How did he dare stay here?” His irritated voice echoed through the bathroom. He was still irked remembering Malfoy had prevented him from seeking for the lost diadem in the middle of the battle. “I reckon Malfoy can’t get out because he feels ashamed of himself. But he can’t leave here. He is in a complicated situation, you know?” Neville spoke for Malfoy. “Where is he?” “At the end.” He pointed to the end of the cubicles. Harry thought of asking Malfoy to get out of there, but rethought it. He remembered his younger days in the cupboard under the stairs, living with the Dursleys. He knew the locked up feeling. He decided to ignore Malfoy. He chose the nearest cubicle and entered. Taking off his dirty clothes, his stomach grumbled. He regretted he hadn’t thought of stopping by the kitchen under the Great Hall. He wondered if Kreacher would come to deliver sandwiches after a shower. The marble stone bottom of the tub was warm under his feet. Taking a shower, he took care of his bruises on his body. Without glasses in the steam, he was vaguely aware of a big scar across on the left side of his chest. He touched the surface of it gingerly. It had formed a scab. His heart started pounding, remembering the moment when he was hit by the Killing Curse. It was still eerie looking back at the fact that the maniac wizard had hunted for him for years. Suddenly he got nervous; he had survived but had no family. After he finished Voldemort, he was alone in the world. The only reconciled relative he had was Dudley. But he didn’t know where his cousin was.He missed Dudley, who had left cold tea in front of his room. Dudley was reluctant to leave Harry alone last time. And he worried about his life in the future after Hogwarts. Hogwarts castle was his home. But he had to leave here soon. After the Dursleys left number four, Privet Drive, it wasn’t his home any longer. And he was not sure whether the house still existed or not. It might’ve been blown out by the Death Eaters. He missed his godfather, Sirius. Without Sirius, Harry didn’t want to live in Grimmauld Place. Dumbledore, Lupin had gone. The conversation with Dumbledore in front of Mirror of Erised flashed in his mind. He would still see the same people, his dead parents and dead relatives on the mirror. He missed even the sarcastic professor, Snape, who showed his affection towards Harry in his memory reviewed in the Pensive. The hot water was dripping by his side. He was standing under an everlasting waterfall, trying to shake off his anxiety. Then someone’s voice called his name. “Harry, are you okay?” It was Ginny. “Kreacher told me you didn’t show up yet. I brought you clean clothes. He found Gryffindor robes for you.” Her voice was a warm candle in the dark forest. “Thank you, Ginny. I’m okay.” He remembered his last moment in the forbidden forest. Before the curse hit him, he had imagined Ginny in a white wedding dress. The thought brought his bright mood back. He opened the shower curtain. Ginny was still there with clean clothes in her arms. Her face was flushed with embarrassment seeing Harry in the nude at first, then she looked worried as her concerned eyes flashed down his upper body. “You need to go to Madam Pomfrey.” And she handed him a towel. Her alarming tone of voice made him uneasy. Wrapping the towel around his hip, he asked her to grab him his glasses. When his vision came back, he recognized pus gathering in the big scar on the left side of his chest. It seemed that it got worse by moistening the scab. It was not a stinging pain, but a recurring dull pain. He told her, “It’s alright, Ginny. I’m hungry. I’ll call Kreacher. Do you like sandwiches?” But Ginny disregarded his words, her face flashed with concern and spoke in a fretful voice, “It’s not okay, at all, Harry. I told you to stop your heroic attitude. Why didn’t you ask Fawkes to cure the big scar?” He was very surprised by her unusual tone. Her voice was trembling, filled with tears. “I thought you were dead when I saw Hagrid carry you in his arms. I thought you might have been killed in the middle of the task. I regretted letting you go with my brother and Hermione alone. I regretted failing in bringing back the sword of Gryffindor from Snape’s office. I regretted that I couldn’t save Fred. I regretted that I couldn’t stop Tonks. I regretted …” “Ginny, stop. Please.” Hastily throwing on the clean clothes, he hugged her tight in his arms. “I’m sorry, Ginny. Please don’t cry.” He was at a loss. He had never seen her cry like that for years. And he remembered the first year Ginny was sobbing after he broke Tom’s diary. He cursed himself for making her worry so much. He sought for the way to calm her down in his mind, but he couldn’t think of anything. He kept stroking her head leaning on his shoulder. Then she looked up and her swollen eyes stared at his green eyes through glasses. She spoke, “Am I still your girlfriend?” The tone of her voice showed she regained her tough temperament. Harry answered by kissing her. Ginny kissed him back. Her lips tasted salty after crying. His lips caressed hers gently like the kiss would be able to heal her pain. Before their kiss was going to be deepen, they heard a male voice behind them. Harry grabbed his holly wand off the washstand reflexively and took a defensive posture protecting Ginny. When he observed the intruder, it was Malfoy. Harry felt his face flushed remembering Malfoy had been shutting himself at the end of the cubicles. He imagined the old nemesis might have been watching them kiss. He managed to ask, “What are you doing here, Malfoy?” Malfoy looked worn out in his Slytherin robes and his face was paler than normal. He answered in his small voice, “I asked you to put my wand back.” Harry uttered, “Oh, your wand.” He couldn’t remember where he put it. While he searched for the best excuse, Malfoy got irritated, “You must have lost my wand! If you didn’t save my life, I would have killed you by now!” He turned around and stormed out of the bathroom. “Did you take his wand by force?” Ginny asked him. “It’s a long story. Come on. I’m starved.” Seeing at her questioning look about his big scar in the chest, he tried assuring her. “I’ll go to Hospital Wing immediately when I feel pain.” Ginny consented reluctantly. “Okay, food first. But you have to go to Madam Pomfrey tomorrow morning after enough sleep.” She let him promise. When they came out of the bathroom, Ron and Hermione were eating sandwiches with Neville and Luna. Ron looked up and said, “We saw Malfoy storm out of here. What happened? Did you fight him in the bathroom?” “No. He asked me if I had his wand.” He sat down on the two-seat chintz sofa with Ginny on the opposite of carved chairs, where the other Gryffindors and Luna were sitting. He took a piece of sandwich and started eating. Then he was slightly disappointed at the filling of his sandwich. It had only cucumbers. When he tried taking another, Ron told him, “I checked. No ham.” “Oh.” His stomach growled as if it got angry being short of meat. Ginny finished her sandwiches and told Ron. “Watch Harry until he falls asleep. Me and Hermione will take a shower.” When they left for the bathroom, Ron asked Harry, “Did you get back together?” Harry finished the second sandwich and his hand reached for the third. He answered, “Ah, sort of…” “What do you mean? Didn’t she forgive you?” “I’m not sure.” Luna poured pumpkin juice into a goblet and passed it to Harry. She asked him in her dreamy voice, “Are you humming, Harry? I’ve heard a beautiful tune from your pocket since you came back from the bathroom.” “No.” Harry thought Luna was indulging in her flights of fancy, but he was surprised by Neville’s next words. “Harry, I can hear the song from there, too.” Perplexed, Harry started examining his pockets. He wondered if someone left the joke goods from WWW’s inside the pockets of robes. He ended the search by pulling out his holly wand. When he was going to open his mouth, he heard a song. The pleasant tune was coming from his wand. |
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