Pre-Chapter A/N:This one's a whole day late. Got my portfolio assessment tomorrow (think of it like a halfway test in my country's law school to decide if we're eligible to take the bar) so wish me luck. The next one might be a day or two late as well. More chapters on my patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga)— same username as here and link in bio.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck," I whispered as I reached down to my wand with my right hand. I felt the familiar warmth and thanked every god I knew. If its loyalties had switched after that, I would be capital-F fucked. The yew burned against my hand, seemingly affronted at the idea that it would switch its loyalties so easily. I said none of my thoughts, casting a diagnostic charm on my left hand. It fizzled out at first, the wand movement coming out clumsily. Fuck.
I took another deep breath. I pointed the wand again, and this time I cleared my mind before focusing my attention. Yup, my feelings had been right. He'd crushed every bone from my wrist up. I hissed, realizing my only option. I didn't know any numbing charms strong enough to let me keep focusing. The fires had escaped the hearths and were now burning across the stone, defying everything I knew about how fire worked.
"Brackium Emendo," I said, using an incantation so I wouldn't mess it up, while intentionally bungling the wand movement and focusing my intent on getting the spell to fail in a very specific way. Thankfully, I was able to recreate Gilderoy's failure with some success. The hand flopped downwards, all the bones that gave it structure now gone. The pain was gone as well.
"You need to leave here now," I heard his voice to my side.
"You put me in this mess, you fucker," I snarled at him.
"I had to disappear. If I drew that man's attention, the things he would have done would have been too terrible to even call cruel. I have seen what he does to things that draw his curiosity. That Dumbledore fellow must be some wizard to get him to back off," he said.
"You should have just led me out of here when I asked," I hissed, pushing myself to my feet.
"And then left myself here? With that psycho?"
"So you admit you did it only for your own good?" I accused.
"Would you have done any differently in my shoes?" he asked back, and I turned to the side.
"Where is the exit?" I asked, not bothering to answer the question.
"There is none," he said.
"What?"
"Are you a wizard or are you not? This building can only be exited by magical means. Apparition, Portkey, Floo travel, the likes," he said like I was stupid.
"And the wards?" I asked.
"A diagnostic charm, if you would." I scowled at the imperious tone, but this was not the time nor place for it. The fire was building and spreading across the room. I didn't even want anything to do with that if I could find a way out of here first. I held tightly onto my wand and attempted the wand movement twice before I was able to cast the spell.
Gellert's projection took a step until he was standing right next to me. The wards were reflected on the ceiling and in the air around us. They were gleaming gold and contained so many charts and calculations that it was practically making my head spin just from looking at it.
"Curious," Gellert said.
"What is curious?" I asked. I swept my wand to the side, creating a gust of wind that blew some of the flames backward, sending the blue fire away from me and giving me even more breathing room. Trying to still them with my own magic had failed somewhat spectacularly, so I resorted to this strategy instead.
"The wards. They are both weaker and stronger in some ways."
"Both weaker and stronger? Time and the leylines?" I theorized, pushing back even more flames.
"That might be the case. I have just never seen this before. Now, unluckily for you, the anti-Apparition ward is one of the stronger ones. I assume you know how to Apparate."
I do.
"The ward around Floo travel is much weaker. Have you any Floo powder?" he asked, and I gave him a deadpan look.
"Sure, I've got some in my back pocket. Just give me a second, let me get it out," I said sarcastically.
"Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit," the projection said before returning his attention to the wards.
"I can break the Apparition ward," he said next.
"As a projection? Even a Horcrux can't do that much," I said.
"Yes, yes, I have no magic of my own other than that which continues my existence. I will need you to put on the necklace and take down your Occlumency," he said, and I broke down into laughter. What silliness. And then I noticed he was not laughing. In fact, he had quite a serious look on his face.
"Never."
"Would you rather die here than just allow me to help you?" he asked.
"If you helping me involves handing you my body, then I would rather it just die here. Tell me how to break the Apparition ward and I will do it," I said.
"Even with your inability to perform complex wand motions?" he asked, pointing at my mangled left arm.
"I will manage."
He was the one to laugh this time.
"And you think you will break a ward for the first time with that attitude?" he asked.
"Fiendfyre on the wards should work," I said.
"Cast with your non-dominant arm? Sure, it could work. But you need to basically burn the entire building down to reach the hearthstone or the wards themselves."
"I could direct it straight upwards. Straight to the top of the wards and break them down there."
"Sure... But then these flames would burn you something fierce before you managed to wrangle the Fiendfyre into going that high. And that's even if you could manage it. You only have one choice," he said.
"And how do I know you won't just abscond with my body the second I give you control?" I asked.
"With how much you know about the Dark Arts, you should know that it is virtually impossible for a piece of a soul like me to control a fully intact soul like yours when you resist. Just let me get the both of us out of here. Because while these flames might not be Fiendfyre, I am far from eager to see what they'd do to the necklace," he said.
I sighed, thinking long and hard. He was right. Even if it felt like there were a million ways for this to bite me in the arse, he was right that if I wanted to reassert control, there would be little he could do to stop me from doing so. And with that being the case, there was no reason for me to say no and keep risking our lives.
I felt the flames get even closer again. The ceiling was beginning to cave in at certain points. Fuck it.
"Fine."
"Common sense prevails. Huzzah," he said.
"Just put on the necklace, and don't fight me," he instructed, and I stilled my hesitance and moved forward. I closed the clasp around my neck and instantly felt a foreign presence touch my own. Don't fight it, I reminded myself.
I felt my body relax as his soul took over.
'So much magic. I've forgotten what this feels like,' his voice echoed in my mind. And then he began to move my wand. He drew runes in the air faster than I ever had, and then dismissed them or kept them depending on what happened next. Some fizzled out. Others seemed to adhere to the intangible feeling of the wards themselves. Those he kept.
All the work ended up taking him only a few minutes as I felt him straighten. And just as he was about to turn on the spot, I reasserted control of my body.
"You think I'm foolish enough to let you Apparate me God knows where," I said, unclasping the necklace and slipping it into my pocket before visualizing the foyer back home.
In a pop and crack, I was gone.
I landed on my feet, but only just. And then I was on my arse, not even sure when I'd gotten there. Fuck. I could only feel the barest embers of my magic within me. That had taken… a lot.
"What in Morgana's name made you Apparate such a long distance?" I heard Gellert's voice in my ear. I turned, expecting to see him there, but nothing.
"I can't project here. Not enough ambient magic for me to feed on," he explained, answering the unasked question.
"I thought we were still in Europe," I said. An Apparition in Europe shouldn't have taken that much out of me.
"Where are we now?" Gellert asked.
"Greece. My godfather's place," I said.
"You Apparated from Siberia to Greece in one shot? I don't know if I should be impressed or appalled at such a risky endeavor."
"It can't be all that far, can it?" I asked, going over the distances in my head. I could Apparate from London to Greece with little trouble most of the time, and that was only half the distance. Even if the journey took three times the magic—which could well be the case because of how distances and magic tended to scale off of each other—it shouldn't have made me feel like this.
"About six thousand kilometers, give or take."
"I Apparate from here to London no problem," I said.
"Yes, but what do you have in your pocket?"
"Your Horcrux?"
"Indeed."
"But a Horcrux shouldn't work like this."
"A Horcrux shouldn't be able to speak in your mind just because you are close to it, should it? The best way to put it would be that I am quite special," he said, and before I could reply, there was a vortex on the other side of the foyer. A whirlwind of space dropped Sirius and two others who I barely got a chance to see before my godfather had wrapped my body in his, squeezing for dear life.
"Harry. You're okay."
"When am I not?" I asked, sporting a cocky smile. A feeling that died quickly when I remembered just what had happened. The thrill of escape had taken my mind away from it briefly, but nothing could ever make me forget what that man had done to me. He had waved his wand twice and I was done for. All my training. The time spent practicing wand movements till my wrist went numb. Chaining incantations and learning how to do everything silently until my mind was foggy. All of it, useless. Because in one move, he had snapped my wrist into a thousand pieces. My most powerful spell he had disregarded like a Tickling Jinx. It was a wake-up call.
Not just because I had lost, but because of the words he had said as well. He had spared me because he feared drawing Dumbledore's attention. He had feared Dumbledore. Fucking Dumbledore. I had no illusions that a year of training made me as strong as he was, but the fact that someone who could do that to me—just treat me like a schoolboy who was picking up a wand for the first time—was still scared of that fucker. Even with all the resources Japan had at their disposal, they were scared of Dumbledore. And that scared me now. Because it meant the man was worlds more dangerous than I had imagined. And silly me had gone to break bread with an enemy of his.
I had no doubts that regardless of what he said, Croaker would expect my help with executing whatever his vendetta was when the time came, and wasn't that a scary thought?
"What happened to your arm?" I was jolted from my thoughts as Sirius lifted up my arm, showing the floppy attachment that was my wrist, absent all the bones that would normally give it structure.
"Oh. That."
"What happened, Harry? Who did this?" The rage in his voice was almost… parental.
"Technically, I vanished the bones myself. But that was because someone shattered all of them," I explained.
"Ojin was the one who took you?" one of the people with Sirius asked, and I turned to see that it was Nicholas.
"Yes. Yes, he was the one," I said, and then it hit me. "How did you know?"
"Shattering bones was one of those things he was just fond of. I found it off-putting at the beginning, and I still find it off-putting."
"Don't tell me…"
"Yes, he was an apprentice of mine. The one I took on immediately after Albus, in fact. I assume that if you faced him, then my stone is in his possession."
"You could at least pretend to have more confidence in me," I sulked.
"I know all my apprentices and what they are capable of. A father knows all his sons, if you would. And I know that if Ojin sets his mind on something, then there are few in the world that could deny him of it."
"Hold on. What's going on here? I brought you with me because you said you knew where Harry was and could make a Portkey there. Speaking of which, how did you even manage to Portkey into my home?"
"Nicholas and Perenelle Flamel. Nice to make your acquaintance, Mr. Black. Would have loved to meet you in better circumstances, but this must suffice. Now, I promise to answer the rest of your questions, but I think it would be better if Perenelle got a chance to look at young Mr. Potter first. That cannot be even close to healthy," he said, pointing at my hand. A hand that had begun to stretch and droop towards the floor. What the hell?
"I know you aren't stupid, so what foul demon could have possessed you into vanishing your own bones?" Perenelle hissed in my ear as Sirius stepped aside, still struck dumb by the introduction. Yeah, the name Nicholas Flamel was probably causing a factory reset or something like that in his head.
"The pain wasn't letting me think or do anything, and I really needed to get something done," I said.
"Are you unfamiliar with the concept of a Numbing Charm, perhaps? Here's a hint as to what they do: they let you ignore the pain without vanishing your bloody bones," she said, examining the hand for a few seconds before picking up my other hand and looking at it closer.
"What are you looking at? That one's fine."
"Nothing about you is fine, Mr. Potter. Not when you think vanishing your own bones counts as a proper reaction to anything," she said, not answering my question and continuing to examine the completely fine hand.
"Nicholas Flamel? As in the Philosopher's Stone?"
"My stone, yes."
"As in the stone you were asking Harry about?"
"Precisely the one."
"You have the Philosopher's Stone?" Sirius asked, turning to me next.
"Had," I corrected.
"And that piece of shit Julian Russo stole it from you when he kidnapped you with that Portkey?"
"No, that couldn't have been Julian. Julian died before that, I'm afraid," Nicholas cut in.
"Wait, what? Russo's dead? How? How do you even know that?"
"I killed him. He knows because he asked me to do it."
"Wait. Hold up. You did—?" He stopped short of completing the sentence, looking between Nicholas and me. Sirius had a good sense for when he was being pranked.
"You guys are doing this on purpose," he said, shaking his head, a smile forming on his face. A smile that Nicholas and I matched easily.
"I feel like with every question I ask, I just end up with a million more, and you guys aren't helping with that. Can you just explain everything from the beginning?" Sirius asked after a few seconds of silence.
"I thought you'd never ask," I said, before hissing as Perenelle waved her wand over my hand and began to mutter.
"What the hell are you doing?"
"Conjuring your bones, of course. Now hush," she said. And true to her words, I could feel bones begin to grow within the hand.
"Wait, you can do that? I thought you needed Skele-Gro to regrow bones?" I asked. She scoffed at the question.
"I am conjuring bones, Harry. Not regrowing them. Why would I use Skele-Gro? You'd spend the whole night moaning in pain if I did that. Now hush again before I make one of your fingers too long by accident," she said, and as far as threats go, that one was effective enough. So I kept silent as Nicholas explained the bones of our meeting and alliance.
—
"So Ojin has my stone?" Nicholas said the words before I'd even reached his position. Sirius had been more than willing to have the Flamels stay over at the Villa once Nicholas had explained the whole thing. Of course, he wasn't a fool, though, and had been more than scathing once he realized the depths of the mess Nicholas had put me in with his whole apprenticeship offer. And he had been less than enthused to find out the entrance exam was murder. Only the fact that there was no way to trace anything back to me kept him calm.
"He does. You didn't tell me about him," I accused more than said.
"If I decided to tell you about all the enemies I've made in my two millennia of life, we'd be here for a century. Ojin is just another in a long list of enemies."
"So what do we do?"
"We?" he asked, turning to me.
"I am your apprentice, am I not?" A question that had him smiling, wide and a bit crazed.
"Good. You and I will be getting the stone back, of course. But we'll have to do a few things to get you ready first."
"Does that mean—?"
"Yes, we're going to Japan," he said.
A/N: You see the vision? Next four chapters up on patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga)(same username as here and link in bio), support me there and read them early.