HP/Skyrim Fic- Untitled

HP/Skyrim Fic- Untitled
Genre: AU, Romance, Crossover
Notes: Canon AU where Harry handles the Chamber very differently. He’s furious at everyone for the Hermione thing and realized they had absolutely no rights in Wizarding Britain– that they were not safe. He grabs Hermione and fucks off to Skyrim about it. As always Keira Marcos has rewritten my brain re: HP worldbuilding and magical systems, so if you see anything familiar it’s because I’m pulling from that just as much as canon.
Warnings: Rough draft, so present/past tense issues probably
Words: 7,800
Summary: Instead of killing the diary, Harry makes a deal. Hermione Granger is still petrified and that is intolerable. First year introduced him to the wizarding world, but second year showed him that neither he nor his best friend were safe in Wizarding Britain. So they run.

–

Fairy lights dance over the Chamber of Secrets. Their inclusion born of practicality, the person who cast them was ambivalent to the beauty as it cast flickering, magical light across the great cavern. In the middle is a ritual circle, large and hastily drawn but painstakingly precise in its rune placement.

At the center point of the circle is Hermione Granger, as cold and still as death– but very much alive. Only petrified.

“Only” petrified.

Dumbledore had given the diagnosis like a benediction, all reassuring smiles– as though his inaction and incompetence hadn’t come close to her death.

As though being attacked and petrified was any better.

If it were anything but muggleborn students hurt in such a way, the school would have already been closed– if it were anyone people– magical people– cared about, if the parents had any way of being informed or any power over the situation at all.

“Lucius’ get being petrified would have sent the entire school into closing. Pity.” Tom sneered at a rock and nudged it out of the way with his ghostly trainer.

“Don’t you start.” Harry sighed. The Tom Riddle who framed Hagrid to keep the school open– to prevent it from closing at all costs– was not so far off from this version, a distance spanning months rather than years, yet so much bitterness separated them. This Tom Riddle wanted Hogwarts to burn.

More than a little blame for the current situation could be laid directly at the feet of the spirit.

“Fine; I’ll be ‘good’.” Riddle rolled his eyes. “Are you ready?”

“Nearly.” Harry placed the final preparations and drew a deep breath. “Let me alone for this part, I can’t afford a mistake.”

“As you wish.” The cool voice sounded, pointedly and coldly aloof in a way that Harry already knew meant his pride was singed. Yet practicality won out over hurt feelings as the other boy indeed stepped out of the way– and vanished back within his diary.

Harry drew his wand through the air, summoning runes and collecting them. He went through the correct phrases feeling as though a great hand was at the small of his back– guiding him and his purpose.

Finally the runes sank into Hermione’s chest. He expected her to gasp awake all at once but hers was a slow rousing; first color returned to her cheeks, then her stiffness gradually abated until she was sleeping a natural sleep.

Her lashes fluttered.

“Harry.” Hermione breathed, a sigh almost as if she was still dreaming. Her brown eyes found his and she did not startle upon waking.

Trust.

Trust and safety in his arms, in the widecast net of his magic all around them.

“You once told me you had nowhere else to go.” Harry spoke, careful to keep his voice down, but low and serious. “We have that in common, you and I.”

He took a breath.

“If I said you never had to go back to your parents,” He began. “that you could learn magic away from the walls of Hogwarts, that I could shelter you and stand by your side–would you accept?”

Her eyes wet with tears. Her hand found his, too weak to rise just yet but able to squeeze gently around his fingers.

“Harry. Yes.”

“Come away with me.” He murmured. “The journey will be fraught with peril but the magicals here will never find us. I can’t say we’ll be safe but we will be armed and able to protect ourselves.”

“I trust you.” Her hand slid from his and traveled up his wrist, until she could hold firmly onto his elbow. “I couldn’t find a way out with what we had, not yet, but those bastards would let every one of us die before they could be browbeaten into common decency. They didn’t even call the aurors.”

“Seeing you lying in that bed in the hospital wing made me homicidal.” He confided into her. “I considered a dozen– a hundred– other ways of burning it all down but in the end I couldn’t make the plan for you– I could only plot and scheme and hope I’d have an option for you when you woke, because you’re right– the magicals here are intolerable.” He exhaled sharply. “But then so are the muggles we would have to return to. Will you make a new path with me, away from this all?”

“Where you go, I follow.” Hermione promised fiercely. Her eyes were molten copper in the light, like the fire staves they’d found in old reference books, from before wizards stumbled blindly into the secrets of wandlore.

“I take you, Hermione Isobel, into the House of Potter. Do you accept the shelter of my magical house?”

Her eyes didn’t widen but the budding tears did well over, making her voice hoarse.

“I do.”

“Then may every member of the House of Potter, living or dead, past present and future, accept you as our own. You are mother, sister, wife and daughter– you are ours. Your battles will be our battles. Your enemies will be our enemies. Your debts will be our debts. So shall it eternally be.”

“So shall it be.” Hermione shuddered as the Potter magic flowed into her, led easily by the current of the ritual circle. It was primed, feral to get to her– as eager as it had been under Harry’s skin from the first time she hugged him, and yet he’d somehow held it back.

Now there was no need, and he wasn’t afraid. Even as he watched the wild fire of it gentled as it reached her skin, pouring into her but softly, carefully, as though she were just as precious to it as to him.

Exactly like that, actually.

He felt the hook of Potter magic settle in her core and relaxed for the first time in weeks.

She closed her eyes and adjusted to the weight of it as he dismissed the runes and closed the circle. When he stood, she took his hand without struggle, coming easily to her feet. Petrification was unlike a coma in that her muscles hadn’t weakened– she’d been more in a state of suspended animation, unaging, frozen.

“Congratulations on your first ritual, Lord Potter.” Tom Riddle faded into view. Hermione shifted closer to him unconsciously but didn’t react. Harry shot the spirit a droll look.

Of course, only Harry could see the apparition.

“Wait until I get the chance to explain it to her, you ass.” Harry hissed. Hermione startled, glancing at him. He held her hand, guiding her over a large spattering of debris. They’d moved aside the largest pieces for the circle but some small patches remained on the outskirts.

“Later.” He promised. “There’s much to tell you but I want to get away from here first and well out of range before we’re intercepted.”

He scooped up the diary, ignoring Riddle’s offended huff at being manhandled.

Hermione clearly recognized it but kept her own counsel for now, likely putting puzzle pieces together in the dangerous and brilliant mind of hers.

“We stole you in the dead of night.” Harry explained. “Dosed Madame Pomphrey with a sleeping draught. It should be at least three more hours before you’re discovered missing, at the earliest.”

“Assuming Dumbledore doesn’t have charms on you to know when you’re out of bed.” Hermione countered at once. Harry paused.

“Given.” He nodded. “I made enough late night jaunts into the restricted section and, yes, the Chamber itself that he shouldn’t notice anything awry.”

“He’s been encouraging you to adventure under your cloak for years now.” Hermione bit her lip, caught herself, and shook out the tension in her frame. “So this is Slytherin’s chamber. I expected more grandeur, less… “

“Obviousness?” Harry prodded, and grinned at her little glare. He was drunk on ritual magic and the thrill of having her awake. He’d missed her like a limb. “Come on, that’s why I’ve been visiting. None of the interesting parts would be so blatantly in plain sight.”

“Chamber of Secrets,” Hermione mused. “And I supposed you’ve ferreted them all out?”

“Surely not all of them but I had some help.” Harry said. “It turns out the Heir of Slytherin could be an unexpected ally with the right motivation.”

Hermione’s hand tightened in his.

“You’ll give me the full explanation as soon as it’s safe, Harry James.”

“Of course.” he led her to a carving behind the statue and hissed a password to it– nothing like the gaudy trigger Riddle had assigned the basilisk’s hiding place.

“Oh.” Hermione stepped into the personal study, untouched by time, with an air of wonder. “Oh, Harry– books.”

“She’s like this, you know.” Harry explained helplessly to Riddle. “Her awareness of everything else just faded away as soon as she saw the true treasure– a wealth of knowledge.”

“Charming.” Riddle hissed back, smooth and syllabic inside his head. An undercurrent of amusement followed, along with a thinly hidden vein of curiosity.

Harry turned to their mutual ancestor, watching with ill-disguised humor from his portrait.

“Lord Slytherin, may I present the newest member of my House, Hermione Isobel Potter.”

“Oh.” Hermione squeaked, eyes dragged forcefully away from the shelves. Her mouth dropped open in a perfect pout. “Lord Slytherin. As in Salazar Slytherin?”

She turned to Harry in demand, realized the rudeness, and addressed the painting directly.

“It’s lovely to meet you, ser.”

“Likewise. My heirs have told me of your charms, but I see now they were understating things.”

Hermione flushed.

She had questions about the painting– about the study– and most absolutely about the books, but Harry settled his palm over their still clasped hands and cautioned her silently to wait. She plainly vibrated with it.

He was asking so much of her, but they weren’t yet safe.

“Dobby.” Harry said quietly.

The house elf popped in, already wearing the uniform they’d selected– modified with elf magic far faster than even magical tailors could achieve.

“Master Harry, the vaults be almost finished packing.” The elf rocked forward and back on his feet, still outright glowing with his magic. For that matter, Hermione had a silver glow to her that was mystical and charming.

“Good job. Any progress with the others?”

“Dobby be finding four that want to bond, one that still thinking ‘maybe’.”

“Bring them to me.” Dobby nodded and popped away as quickly as he’d came. In short order, chests started appearing in the far end of the chamber.

“Dobby is a house elf. The way they’re treated in some households is a genuine crime against magic. I freed him from his old master Lucius Malfoy.”

“And enslaved him yourself?” Hermione drew back from him, but even as she said it there was no heat in the words. Harry pulled her close, one hand in both of his.

“No, of course not. The magical bond is a symbiotic one. He says he’ll wither and die without a bond to a wizard and I believe him.”

Hermione nodded– accepting and trusting him.

Dobby arrived once more with five other house elves, each equally downtrodden.

“This be Yosei, Calantha, Elegast, Nimue, Táriel–”

“This be Yoey, Cally, Elly, Tari and Nimmy.”

“Elves use diminutives as callsigns to avoid being summoned when they’re just mentioning each other amongst themselves– or if we talk about them, but I suspect it’s been generations since they worried about wizards having any kind of respect.”

In short order Harry was kneeling.

The first elf, called Yoey, stepped up to him cautiously.

“What are your strengths?”

“I was majordomo to a household– arranged for everything. Butler, steward, seneschal.”

Hermione, having only heard Dobby speak, made a surprised noise she hastily covered up.

“All valuable talents. Will you lend them to my house?”

“Wizards don’t want educated elves. Don’t want to treat an elf like an equal. Will you?”

“On my honor.”

The elf raised his hands, which Harry took.

“My name is Yosei.”

“I take you, Yosei, into the House of Potter. Be welcome among us.”

The elf shuddered as the bond snapped into place.

Next, Cally.

“What do you offer us?”

“I be a scholar– learned on books and experience, learned about potions, ingredients, gardening– beasts and creatures, their parts and pieces.”

“Are you a boy or a girl?” Harry asked, curiously.

“I be neither. You can be calling me Calantha.”

“May your education continue within the embrace of our magical house, and serve us both well in the future. I take you, Calantha, into the House of Potter. Be welcome among us.”

The third elf stepped up, no longer wary.

“Elly be a cook, and run the kitchens. Make sure the food is good, the money be flowing, the resources there to work with. Elly be making sure the family is fed and watered.”

The elf was also not clearly male or female which was interesting. They grinned when Harry hesitated about asking. It turned out that their full name was Elegast.

“That’s good because I don’t think either of us can cook at all. I take you, Elegast, into the House of Potter. Be welcome among us.”

“I be a smith, Lord Potter.” Nimmy lifted her chin high. “I be building furniture and tools, and though it be forbidden, I be making weapons as well.”

“I never want to be without a weapon again.” Harry told her seriously. “What’s your name?”

“I be named Nimue, after the high elf who be forging the kingsword.”

 “I take you, Nimue, into the House of Potter. Be welcome among us.”

Last was the elf who wasn’t sure about joining them. She looked wary of speaking, but gathered her courage.

“I be Tariel, call name Tari.” She said. “I be trained to be a nanny elf and a handmaiden, but no witches be using elfmaids much anymores.”

“Oh.” Hermione said softly. “Like Dobby is for you.”

“His full name is Koldobika (Koldobyka).” Harry confided. “It means ‘one who is famous in battle’.”

Hermione covered her own mouth to hide her smile.

“Do you expect many fierce fights, then?”

Harry nodded solemnly.

“We had to find out his callname from his grandfather. He was born into the Malfoy family, you see, so they gave him a callname at birth and never used the other one except for the binding.”

“That’s horrible. Do you prefer your true name, ser?”

The elf in question swallowed.

“Dobby has been Dobby his whole life.” Dobby said quietly. “Dobby doesn’t know how to be anyone else. Dobby was not even knowing…” He frowned heavily.

“Dobby works for now.” Harry assured him. “No one will force you.”

Hermione scowled but took a deep breath and wiped it away. She sunk to her knees beside Harry, facing Tariel.

“I’d love to have you as a lady-in-waiting.” She said quietly. “I’ve never had a haindmaiden, either, so we’ll have to learn together.”

Tariel looked to Harry, who nodded, but before he could move, Hermione reached for the elf’s hands.

“I take you, Tariel, into the House of Potter. Be welcome among us.”

The Potter magic shifted in him and Harry exhaled shakily. When it was over she looked at him for approval and he wasn’t able to mask his shock in time.

“Oh, should I not have done that?” Hermione fretted.

“No, it’s fine, I was just surprised.” Harry schooled his face. “It just speaks to your connection to the family magic.”

Hermione offered him a shaky smile which he returned helplessly.

The witch stood.

“Can any of you pack away these books safely?” She asked. Harry and the painting on the wall made identical sounds of surprise but the diary was only smugly satisfied.

“You would rob this room from my future descendants?” Slytherin demanded, but already he was losing steam as he reached the end of his sentence. “Oh, very well then.”

“I’m the last of my line.” Harry reminded Hermione as she thought about it, the theft of knowledge. He stood and caught her hand again, warm in his, thrilling in the contact– the way she was awake and vibrantly alive to boss him around. “There’s not a single living member of Potter descent. The other branches of Slytherin died off generations ago.”

“A generalization but not untrue,” Tom hissed unhappily. “Certainly my line bred inwards to our own extinction. Take it ALL.”

“Tariel, could you begin with the books? They’ll go to your lady’s personal trunk. Pick one out amongst the empty ones from the vaults.”

“Master Harry can be calling me Tari. It be flowing naturally.”

“If you’re sure.”

She nodded and so Harry could do nothing but agree. Hermione slipped out of his hand to supervise the newest addition to their family book hoard– when she found out about the vast Potter library, heartily added to by a number of truly dedicated bibliophiles over the century, she’d lose her mind.

One of his great-aunts in particular had made it her life’s mission to acquire damn near every book published in her lifetime or before– granted it had been in the sixties but she’d had nigh a hundred years previously to collect and curate.

“Where are you taking us that you’re emptying all your Gringotts vaults, by the way?” Hermione’s question was surprisingly idle, casual as though she wasn’t burning to know. The trust it implied nearly floored him.

Harry took a moment to gather himself. As always she saw right through him.

“You already know our plan was for me to claim the Potter lordship as soon as possible. Since I’m the last of my line, I could petition the family magic at any time, though I couldn’t vote on the wizengamot until I came of age magically.”

“Right, we’d agreed you’d try it on your 13th birthday. What changed?”

“A lot happened while you were lost to me.” Harry’s throat closed up. “I defeated Voldemort for the third time and became Lord Slytherin by conquest. It turns out my mother’s line originated from that family some six hundred years ago, giving me claim.”

“That’s why you’re a parselmouth.” Hermione realized. “Through your mother. Do you know why the gift didn’t wake in her?”

“We can’t know it didn’t. I only found out I could talk to snakes when I was eleven. If we hadn’t been to the zoo, I don’t know that I would have noticed for years, which is absurd. We’re just… so much more urban than we’ve ever been before.”

“Wizards like the Weasleys are the only ones I’ve seen who farm the land themselves. Even the Longbottom greenhouses have wards to keep unwelcome wild life away.” Hermione frowned. “You’re right that there’s no way to know and that’s irritating. They were barely twenty, which seems so grown up but is only seven years older than me.”

She turned to him.

Harry wet his lips and continued.

“When the ring appeared on my finger I knew I had met the approval of magic, so I claimed the others. I learned something fascinating and unexpected from the Slytherin family grimoire.”

Tom Riddle had never gotten the chance to open it. Though he’d been heir of slytherin, by the time he went to claim the title he’d already split his soul, and the magic would not recognize him.

It had left Tom seething but years in the diary had tempered him somewhat, enough that he was willing to do anything, work with anyone to get out of it. And they’d worked it out in the vast, quiet space of the chamber– plotting and learning to work together until they’d discovered the study, which Tom had known about but never found a way into. The door reacted only to the Lord’s ring on Harry’s finger, an extra precaution set by their ancestors.

They’d had long conversations with the portrait of their forefather, Harry translating and answering questions from one enchantment of ink and memories to the other– the irony was not lost on him.

“We’d like to take you as well, Sire.” Harry addressed the portrait respectfully. “We’ll not set you up until we have a safe warded home but I dare say it’s more company than you’ve had here– and with both lines fallow, you’d never meet another descendant if you stay.”

“Very well.” Salazar hissed, waving a hand. “It’ll be good to speak with family again. There were family quarters here once, connected to the rest of the castle, but the remodeling some upstart decided to implement has moved everything wrong.”

“Yes, sir.” Harry said dutifully. “If we were staying, I’d try to fix it– but as it is I hope to see Hogwarts again sometime, from a position of strength and power enough to do something about it.”

“You’re a child yet, Harrison.” Slytherin waved a hand. “I understand why you’re retreating in this way. It’s not safe and that’s frankly fucking intolerable.”

Hermione blinked and shot him a sharp glance, and Harry frowned inwardly.

“The translation charm you had me use is far too good. You made a founder say ‘fuck!’”

“He said fuck all by himself.” Tom rolled eyes he didn’t have, the emotional response clear as day. “Blame any malfunction on your inept casting skills, if you must.”

“I’m twelve.” Harry said to both of them.

Slytherin frowned thunderously, his features darker than Harry would have expected– if he’d expected anything at all. Britain tended to white-wash every figure of history so he’d certainly been surprised at first to find Salazar Slytherin had hailed from somewhere near modern-day Iraq.

“You’re of the founding line.” Slytherin snapped. “A direct descendant of the main family and Hogwarts should always be the safest place for you.”

Harry held up a hand.

“Hogwarts was my first home and I agree with you. We flee now but I have to believe we will return someday– when we’re ready to face the threats that await us.”

Salazar settled moodily in his frame.

“Take me down from here and put me in a damn trunk, then. I’ll not let your education suffer in another world.”

“Harry James.” He turned to find her eyes wide with disbelief.

“Don’t worry so much, Mi. The Slytherin line actually comes from a world adjacent this one. Our many-times ancestor–”

“My grandfather.” Salazar rolled his eyes.

“– came through the veil between worlds. At the time his line was in danger. Assassins and traitors had tried, not for the first time in history, to cull the entire family. When the next son was born they spirited him away in the hands of a trusted friend.”

“Godric’s great-grandfather. Who, incidentally, fathered your paternal line, young man. You’ve the blood of Tamriel twice over.”

“The Potters are descended from Godric Gryffindor?” Hermione snapped. “Oh, that wretched old man. That wasn’t anywhere in the geneologies we researched.”

“It’s in the family grimoire, which I read as soon as I put on the Potter ring.” Harry consoled her. “Most public records don’t go back further than the 1400s, Mi, you know that.”

“It’s ridiculous.” Hermione huffed. “If all these families know their history, why not share it with the world?”

“Privacy. Feuds. Maybe some other reason I haven’t even thought about because my head’s not buried all the way up my arse?” 

She glared at him and he raised both hands in supplication.

“The average wizard isn’t smart, Mi! Who knows what justification they have for hiding away history and magic and voting for stupid-arse legislation that you and I can look at and recognize as dragonshite with a glance?”

“Fine, yes, there’s probably a stupid reason. Are you not the Earl of Gryffindor, then?” She demanded, still hot. The silver glow was fading but her hair was curly and bouncing around her shoulders in a fetching way.

“The last five generations of Potters didn’t claim the title, for whatever reason. They stuck with Lord Potter and didn’t touch the Gryffindor title. I’m not sure why as it’s not annotated in the grimoire– while it’s very dry and factual about what happened and when, it rarely gets into the reasons. It might be listed in someone’s personal diary or journal, though, if they bothered to write it down.”

She blew a curl out of her face where it had fallen in her huffing, but it stayed stubborn around her forehead. Harry reached forward, hesitated only briefly, and tucked it behind her ear.

Tom Riddle sighed inside his head, in the most put-upon manner, and Harry gave back the mental equivalent of jabbing someone rudely in the ribs.

Cut it out.

Hermione smiled tremulously at him.

“So how are we going to another world, Lord Potter?”

Harry noticed his hand was still at her ear, almost cupping her cheek. He’d stepped closer than he intended and her expression as she looked up at him was utterly enthralling.

“Not that, from you.” Harry swallowed. “That’s an informal address from someone outside of the family.”

“Oh.” Hermione flushed softly at being wrong, even on something she’d never studied. “Is it patriarch, then?”

“The correct address would be ‘my lord.’” Privately Harry thought he really was not ready to hear that from her, but of course– she was just as much a Gryffindor as he was.

Literally, now.

“How are we to get there, my lord?”

Harry spent several long seconds blinking before he stroked his thumb across her cheek one last time and stepped away.

The Slytherin grimoire was on Salazar’s desk– Salazar, who was smug over there in his frame and radiating amusement– and he flipped it open to one of the earliest pages.

Harry cleared his throat.

“Another ritual, I’m afraid. When Magna bore her son shortly after the death of her husband, her maid Gysilla and her husband Godwulf [Godric’s great-grandfather] took the child as far as they could– to another world entirely.” [Antiochus the second is the son’s name]

“His older sister, the family’s heir at the time and a talented witch in her own right, beseeched one of the gods to ferry them– their patron, the Dragon God of Time.”

“Modern wizards have a dragon god.” Hermione stepped over to look over his shoulder. “The black dragon of sorcery, though they don’t name him in any text I’ve seen.”

“He goes by many names but my ancestors knew him as Akatosh– on their world he wasn’t known as lord of magic, but what else is the manipulation of fundamental forces but sorcery?”

“Worship of gods tend to change over time.” Hermione mused thoughtfully, looking over his elbow at the page. “Different domains and names were attributed to new beings as cultures rose and fell. Two years ago I would have told you that there were no gods and such faith was for the fanciful or particularly deluded.”

Salazar made an affronted noise.“Young lady.”

She whirled on him.

“I’ve seen far too much now to dismiss the possibility out of hand. Am I devout? Not particularly, no, but so many have personally felt the god of sorcery– the animagus transformation is impossible without it. Magical scholars across the world agree on the intelligence and benevolence of magic as a living force– there is a sentience there which we cannot ignore.”

“Magic is a goddess by many names and it’s impossible to deny that she blesses us.” Harry murmured. “None of the hiding we do today would be possible without rituals beseeching the entity of Magic directly– something most obvious in the wards keeping our enclaves secret and protecting the existence of magical creatures.”

“Is it Akatosh we must petition for our journey, then?” Hermione demanded. “I want to see the ritual you’ve come up with.”

“Oh, darling.” Harry laughed, flipping the page to show the detailed diagram. “I didn’t come up with a thing. Antiochus or more specifically Godwulf wrote down exactly what we need to do to return and the way home is preserved clearly. He also, for that matter, taught it very clearly to his grandson.”

He turned to Salazar’s portrait and the man nodded.

“It’s true, grandfather showed me the way, and I taught my children. If ever we needed to flee, if the world truly became too dangerous for us– the how of it must be clear and precise.”

“I thought, at first, that it was a coward’s choice– running from any threat is not in my nature.” Harry took a deep breath and held her hands once more when she made to interrupt him. “But then I’d go into the hospital wing and see you lying there, as cold as death, and the resolve would burn in me. We’re so young and unprepared. We have no one we can trust to protect us and that makes the magic inside me lash out in ways I can barely control.”

“You’re the last of your line.” Hermione whispered, bringing her hand in his up to his cheek until his own knuckles brushed the bone there. “Your magic has been searching for a guardian, for family, for a mentor or an adult you can trust for your whole life. I have to think it’d latch on to the first person who was safe and not let go.”

“It’s certainly why Dumbledore tried to make himself into a trustworthy grandfather figure to me but I’ve always been able to feel it when someone was lying to me. More than that, how could I ever trust someone who’d leave me with the Dursleys? Even Hagrid sent me back to them after Diagon Alley and made it clear that what Dumbledore said goes. I asked him if I could stay in the wizarding world that summer– but he told me that Dumbledore said I had to go back, so I had to go back, as simple as that.”

“There’s no room for critical thinking here.” Hermione’s nose scrunched in disgust. “Only blind loyalty which, you’re right– he surely sows that in students and carefully grows it as they come of age and move through our world.”

“I asked him that too, you know–Hagrid, that day on diagon alley. Why the headmaster of a school was the one to decide custody of wizarding children. He rattled off all of Dumbledore’s titles and I still thought it was strange. I’d later learn that supreme mugwump of the wizengamot is an empty title– an honorary one with no votes and no power beyond what is granted in wizengamot sessions. He’s basically a glorified babysitter, only allowed to count votes and call for representatives to speak. He’s not a chairperson as we know it from parliament– merely a moderator nominated to keep the peace, little better than a scribe.”

“I could kill him.” Hermione whispered. “I really could. Imagine having a baby and a random member of parliament personally takes the child and leaves him with your drunk idiot cousin or your senile grandmother– as though ‘closest living relative’ is any sort of metric to determine custody of a child!”

“I don’t think ‘Dumbledore Kidnaps Potter Heir’ would be a Daily Prophet headline any time soon.” Harry said, but his gut still burned with fury because that’s what it was– a kidnapping.

“Speaking of.” Hermione puffed out her cheeks adorably. “Are you going to get in trouble for, well– making off with me?”

Harry smiled despite his own answering flush.

“I adopted you– no, not like that, stop frowning at me. We’re not related but I drew you into the family magic as a protected member. I’m your lord but not your guardian, per se. My– now our— family magic will protect you until the day you die, even if you were to marry outside the family. You are a Potter now as surely as if you’d been born one.”

Hermione bit her lip, which was charming all on its own even when she caught herself– it was a habit she was trying to break. He thumbed over her lower lip and forced his breath not to catch as she let it go under his touch.

“That’s usually done for betrothals, right? Or a ward who usually marries into the family?”

“I…” Harry looked up at the ceiling briefly. “It wouldn’t be… nothing I did today stopped you from marrying a Potter. If anything it would please the family magic, tying you more closely to us. The transition would be smoother and softer, like an heir putting on the heir ring, or when I stepped up as Lord. I was already bathed in the family magic, born into it, but becoming Lord entrenched me in it that much deeper, a new connection. It would be the same if you…”

“If we married.” Hermione rose a brow despite her pink cheeks. “You’re the last Potter, you don’t have to make up a hypothetical relative.”

Oh, spare me, Riddle sneered, and Harry mentally kicked shut the door of their connection until the hinges rattled.

“It’s not off the table.” Harry repeated. “Not magically, anyway. Let’s talk about it in five to ten years.”

“Five to ten– Harry Potter!”

“Hermione Potter.” Harry said back, feeling absolutely breathless with it, and her pink cheeks deepened to a fetching rose red. 

“We’ll talk about it again in three or four years. I’m already thirteen, after all.”

“Great, lovely, let’s table it until then.” Harry took the coward’s way out and didn’t even regret it. Everything he felt for her was… too much to get into, when they were on the cusp of converging worlds.

Sometimes discretion was the better part of valor.

“Alright, I’ll go draw out the diagram. Sire, if you’ll look it over when I’m done, I’d be much appreciative.” The portrait nodded its affirmative. Harry pressed a sweet kiss to Hermione’s forehead. “We’re on a time crunch, Mi, but you have about ninety minutes to get anything you want. Direct the elves like a little army– we want to come back eventually, or at least have the option, so don’t steal anything, but we have plenty of funds. It’s the middle of the night so have them leave gold behind to more than cover the cost of the goods if you’re set on something.”

“Paris be having a thriving nightmarket.” Tari said cheerfully.

“Right, well. Yosei, you’re on books. Go into the muggle world, get an exchange for pounds at Gringotts and use whatever disguise magic you have to; I want every manual you can find for how to build things, how to grow things, and how to do things. There’s no telling what level of technology this world is at, especially since wizarding Britain seems stuck in the bloody dark ages.”

“Calantha, I want you to be ruthless in your pursuit of ingredients. Another country has different plants and animals, much less another planet. I need greenhouses, materials, seeds, and living specimens. Buy speciality trunks if you have to. Go head and grab processed potion ingredients, too– if it’s too different, we might struggle for substitutes for common potions. Harry, how much gold do we have?”

“It truly is not a factor.” Harry looked up from where he was mocking out the rune circle with a piece of chalk. “Cal, get quite literally one of everything, and several dozen of the most useful things. Imagine we’re going to a barren wasteland and have to start completely from scratch.”

“Are we?” Hermione looked up in alarm. “What? I just want to know.”

“If there’s no time difference between worlds, it’s been over a thousand years.” Harry told her. “Lord Slytherin was told stories of a Tamriel that was fairly industrialized, at least into the iron age, but there’s truly no telling now that so much time has passed. I’d rather plan for the worst case scenario and be pleasantly surprised.”

“Right, you heard the man, Cal.” Calantha took their new nickname with grace and Harry belatedly realized he’d shortened it such. He made to apologize but the elf just grinned at him. 

“I like Cal.” They admitted.

“Right, Nimue. I want every magical tool we could possibly use, and a lot of core metals. From hammers to rune quills and wand wood to mithril– whatever you can get your hands on. If you need to negotiate with the dverger, do it– and pay them for the late hour.”

“The bank be open 24/7.” Nimue said absently. “Dverger be doing business at all hours– but they do be making wizards wait.”

“Pay them anyway.” Hermione said. “If you can, get crafting materials as well. Think out of the box. If we have to make our own goods, we’ll need wood for furniture and cloth for curtains and upholstery, and clothes. Oh, and leather for boots and maybe dragonhide…” Hermione pulled her thumb into her mouth and trailed off, but Nimue tilted her head to look at her.

“I can be making best guesses.” The little elf said, pushing a braid over her shoulder. “I be picking up everything we be needing for a castle– a fortress. To be warm and to be armed.”

Hermione looked over at Harry, who had taken his work to the portrait to look over and was hissing quietly. Both had lapsed into Parseltongue.

“Elegast.” Hermione knelt down to speak with him quietly. “I want enough food to last at least five years. Do you have a good stasis charm? We will not let Lord Potter be hungry even once. I don’t care if it takes all the gold we have.”

“Food be one of the cheaper buys, Lady Potter.” Elegast said just as quietly. “With elf magic, we can be making it good for a long while. I also be getting feed for animals, if we be getting any for the house. Should…El… be waiting to be buying animals?”

“Do you prefer El? Whatever name you like is fine for us.” Hermione was quick to assure. “And… I’d rather have them and not need them. Is it possible to put live animals in stasis? If not I’d want viable chicken eggs at least under charms, so we can incubate them.”

“Wizards can be putting animals in stasis in special trunks.” El promised. “El not be sure of the way, but can ask and be figuring it out. Maybe… it be best if El gets enough of each one that there not be breeding problems down the line.”

“Good thought.” Hermione did some quick math in her head. “Muggles think that you need 50 of a species for a stable breeding population, and ideally 500 to prevent genetic issues in the future. 500 chickens might be reasonable, but for something like cows it’s crazy.”

“We not be needing to make a new population, though.” El scratched his ear. “Lord Potter says we be coming back– so we just be needing them to breed safe for a few years.”

“Oh, that makes sense.” Hermione considered. “We might not even need calves of the larger mammals. Let’s see… how long can an animal be kept in stasis?”

“It be depending on the wardwork.” El shrugged. “If the charms be good, hundreds of years. Some old family houses be locked down like that. If the work be bad, maybe only six months.”

“If you can get the dverger to do the stasis, or better yet buy the animals directly from them, I’ll take fifty of each livestock animal they have.” Harry looked up to say. Hermione startled, not aware he’d been paying attention. “Pay them handsomely for the rush order, of course– twice what the animals are worth and whatever they want for a stasis field of ten years.”

“Fifty!” Hermione said, after she finished working her mouth without sound for several seconds. “Okay, fine, that– yes, do that. I want at least… oh, god, enough for a loaf of bread, twice a day, for 365 days, for ten years….”

“Five tons of flour, El.” Harry grinned savagely. “Might as well use all of this gold.”

“Go back to your runework. And don’t think I won’t be looking it over too, Harry Potter!”

“I’ll let you work out the logistics by yourself, then, Hermione Potter.”

Her heart sped up in her chests and they were both blushing. She didn’t think she’d get over hearing that any time soon, and leaving behind her parents’ name was freeing to the extreme.

If they stayed away for even four years, she’d never have to go back there again. She’d be an adult in the magical world when they returned, which was worth all the gold in the world.

“Use that math for the rest of it, then. Do you need help with the calculations?” She said quietly to El. He shook his head.

“I be getting ten years worth of everything. It be costly, but not so much as you be thinking. The animals be costing the most, but they be making food, too– it be adding up in our favor.”

Hermione turned finally to Tari.

“What do you think we need?” She asked, because she’d covered what bases she could think of– livestock and materials, seeds and ingredients, books and guides.

“You be needing nice things.” Tariel said immediately. “Chocolates and quills and parchment and brushes for yous thick hair. Things you be buying for birthdays and holidays and just for fun. Magic things and useable things. Things you be using once and they be gone.”

“Consumables.” Hermione murmured. “Okay, I can see it.”

“You be too young for babies but I be noticing full room sets and things in the trunks.” Tari shrugged, ignoring how Hermione’s face burst into flames. “You be having beds and tables already. Need things to put on them– nice bowls, serving tray, silverwares. You be needing clothes, and not just the fabric to make them. Pretty dresses and underthings.”

“Go… get what you like, then. I trust your judgement” Hermione had already noticed that their school trunks were present in the rapidly growing pile of things. She began to worry if it would all fit in the ritual circle. Then again they had the main room of the chamber of secrets to work with and it was quite sizeable. 

Maybe even a space Lord Slytherin had designed for this very ritual.

She looked up as Harry finished his conversation with Salazar Slytherin, and the house elves started returning with their goods.

“I’m ready to start, Mi.” Harry said, handing over his notes. “But Dobby, I’ve got one more task for you. Come over here, it’s kind of a secret.”

–

Almost an hour later had them kitted out to build a whole new civilization, if they had to, and then Dobby popped in with a squished-face orange cat.

“Oh!” Hermione said, when it trotted right up to her and sat down on its fat ass, purring like this had been all his idea. “You remembered!”

“Of course I remembered.” Harry said. “You said you could have made a familiar bond with him– but your parents never would have allowed it without magical intervention, and we’re not old enough to bespell them yet.”

He certainly remembered the hours they’d spent curled close in broom closets and empty classrooms as she brainstormed names and plotted like a Slytherin to go back and adopt the ugly orange thing as soon as she had the means.

He’d been planning to buy it for her just to make sure no one else could the next time he stepped foot in Diagon Alley.

There were real tears in her eyes and he patted her shoulder.

“Put him over there with Hedwig. We want them in the most stable area aside from ours.”

“He understands. Don’t you, Crooks? You’re so smart!” Crookshanks indeed wandered meanderingly over to the indicated spot, slow enough that someone might get the impression that it was his idea all along, or perhaps just coincidence that he ended up there.

Hedwig stared him down. Eventually, they both looked away at the same time, neither giving in. The cat didn’t hiss and Hedwig didn’t bark, though, so it would probably be fine.

–

In this time and in this hour, I call upon an ancient power. Lord of time and lord of space, I call you now to this place. As commanded, so bestowed; a promise made, a duty owed. With blood we came, in ages past; with blood return; the spell is cast.

Akatosh, I beseech thee. By the blood of the convenant, and the dragonfires yet burning, I seek to open the path. To Tamriel, to the Empire of my fathers.

–

In the pure magic suffusing the realm of Aetherius, the dragon avatar of a god opens one ruby eye.

–

A voice responds to the ritual, less an outside awareness and more a thrumming from deep inside his magical core. It’s in no language that Harry knows, but he understands it all the same.

The dynasty of Septim is no more. The dragonfires have been extinguished. The amulet of kings is destroyed. One last stand strengthened the barriers enough to repel Oblivion, but two centuries have seen the ruby throne empty of dragon blood, and the veil begins to crumble once more.

Will you reforge the Covenant?

…

“Yes.”

–

The world disappears in a flash of fire, the unmistakeable note of phoenix song bursting out. A weight in his hand and around his throat, and–

–

Memories of the ritual were like a waking dream. The barest sliver of the almighty, focused entirely on him– the void between worlds–

When reality exists again, Harry stumbles to his feet. Hermione is there, so he holds out a hand to her.

The elves are there. Hedwig and Crookshanks are there.

Fawkes is there.

The Sword of Gryffindor is heavy in his hand, the hilt biting into his naked palm.

Harry sheathes it in the dirt, careful to avoid the basilisk venom-imbued blade. 

“You,” He tells the phoenix. “Were not supposed to come with us.”

Fawkes trills at him, utterly unapologetic.

“Well, as stoways go, we could do worse. Imagine if Ron found us and jumped in at the last moment.” Hermione said wryly.

“Ugh, no. Don’t even say that.” Harry looked at their belongings, and the temperature finally started to sink in. He immediately cast a warming charm on Hermione and then himself.

It barely put a dent in the chill.

“Where are we?” He asked, already looking around. It was white as the eye could see– the kind of untouched snow-covered landscape that earned award-winning praise for nature magazines and which most muggles could only dream about.

Then a yeti came out of the treeline and attacked them, so Harry jerked the sword out of the earth and put practice to the only lesson he’d ever picked up regarding swordcraft: put the pointy end in the enemy, and don’t die.

–

Hermione was less than impressed.

–