"Buried under dying homes

Hands tied in golden thorns

I'm defined by guesswork analogies

Documenting daily life

Tell me I'll be alright

Open-eyed, entangled in absentees

Stories of a child's past

Autopsied broken glass."

-- Aura / Solaria, GHOST

..XoX..

Sometimes Harry thinks he is physic. Of course, it is not meant in the literal sense. He is no Seer and though he dabbles now in the Arts, he is not Dark enough to dare read minds.

Harry is physic in the way that Muggles are magic. In dabbles and in drops, a little sliver of something more fitting between the cracks. Harry can see it, believes in it, even if his Raven peers would mock him if they knew. He was sorted into Ravenclaw for a reason but, honestly, he remains unsure what that reason is. If it exists at all. He might be the result of a quota to fill -- each House must have XX amount of entries per year, per seven years. It is the best excuse Harry can conjure up.

So Harry is physic in the way that Muggles are magic; naturally. A result of the world doing what the world does. When a baker tastes the batter and knows exactly what to add, there is Herbology magic. When a little girl can catch unruly chickens ages before any of the grownups could manage, there is Magical Creature magic.

Look for it. There is magic in everything. Can't you see it?

A ballerina twirls in the air for a second too long. She is flying. Can't you see it? A song you listen to for hours on repeat with no end in sight, and you don't want one. It has encaptured you. Entranced. Can't you see it? A locket rescued from the rubbles of a house fire with a photo that should have long ago degraded. It is protected against all odds, against everything that says it shouldn't be. Can't you see it?

There is magic in everything. Just a little bit.

Harry's "physic" abilities are like that. Natural and maybe not real but there, if you think to look for it. You can see it if you believe it.

Before Katherine's Portraits, there was only a graphic image of Cate, a 32 year old woman, autopsied. After that there was a dream. A girl, deathly thin because she is dead, is a stain of Cate, imprinted onto his mind, painting canvas after canvas for a King.

And after that there was a story, grossly popular. Katherine's Portraits was more handed to him than written. It was a gift. Hardly his at all.

Harry thinks to himself -- not at all a Raven -- that he is physic, and that is what he means. Sometimes images -- and most of the time, they are just and only that; a powerpoint of ideas flashing by him, slammed quickly onto parchment the moment he rises so he may not forget them -- visit him in his sleep and give life to novellas and poems.

There is magic in everything. Harry thinks that includes this.

Tonight -- the evening that Harry sent out a letter with an attached tracking charm, waiting and willing, like a snake poised in the brush -- Harry becomes an oracle once again. He dreams of a sickness that turns your bones to wood and is transferred by touching the bark of the eldest tree. It is an infection. It is rot. You die and you do not die painlessly.

Harry wakes not in a cold sweat but with a smile, stretched so wide it hurts. He has been visited by a mystical force and it is telling him that this is the idea for a novel and he best start writing. So he sits up and casts a lumos and brings out Tom's journal, not minding, just this once, that Tom is able to see everything he writes.

Of course, writing is a process. It does not end with that dream or image -- and sometimes, it hardly begins with it. He takes the idea of Rot and he transforms it, molds it in his hands like clay.

That is the plan, at least.

When he sets his quill on the parchment, he cannot move it. His mind goes blank. He is used to this, to failure, and he pushes himself further. He has to do that with everything he does now. If not he will get nothing done.

Lore, he thinks. He can decide the focus of the story later -- the character arcs and plot and whatever -- but now, it is best to start with lore.

Lore.

Okay.

He can do lore.

Except he can't. It does not come to him. There's a tree and it infects people, yes, sure, but from there, then what?

Then what..?

That's a question. He can work with questions. Okay. So. What makes this tree different from other trees? Why does it curse people? That's good. He can work with that.

He writes the questions down and wonders what it looks like without context to Tom. Funny? Weird? Is he being weird right now? Does it matter? Doesn't it?

Is Tom using him? Of course he is. He's admitted that. So doesn't Harry have a right to use him, too, to fill his journal without explanation? Is it rude? It is a form of rubbing salt in the wound, insult to injury, annoying a boy trapped and close to death for half a decade?

He is being annoying. He should stop writing now, stop right here, right now -- it is not like anything he'd create would be worth anything anyway. What is the point? Why be weird when you can go back to sleep?

Harry frowns. This... it is not something he cares about, Tom's opinion. If you are weird to a Dark Lord (or half a Dark Lord), you're probably doing something right. It is not something he cares about, so it must be something else, some other reason he is fixating on it now, of all the times.

And then he gets it. It is because he is fixating on it now, of all times -- the moment he wants to work, his brain fights against him. He wants to write. Why can't he just write? Why must he make it so hard on himself?

He sees the tear stains on the page before he realizes he is crying.

Harry? writes Tom. What troubles you?

Not an 'are you okay,' but an assumption he is not. Smart. Tom's clever like that. He would have been a great Raven if he was not a Snake. At this rate, Harry's robes do not fit him in more ways than one.

A lot is wrong. It is a hard question to answer normally. Right now, it is at least a bit easier. Writing's hard, he writes. It shouldn't be. At a time, it wasn't.

But he supposes this year a lot is due to change.

Can I be of assistance?

The presumption is hilarious. Like I'd want writing advice from a Dark Lord.

It is a much harder occupation to acquire than you'd think. If I am not good at something, I must pretend to be. Though that does not happen often,

Harry is angry. At Tom's arrogance, yes, but. But as his own inferiority as well. It is not fair. Nothing about the situation is fair. Go to hell, Harry writes, and he starts to close the book, content to forget he'd ever wanted to write in the first place. Happy, even, to forget he'd cried.

Tom writes, before he can do so, My point is, I am a good writer. And that's not fair, either, is it? That it is only the worst people that things come easy for? So if you need help writing, I am here.

Harry is genuinely bewildered by the offer. Why? he asks. What do you stand to gain?

Why, I have been alone for quite some time. Am I not allowed to enjoy your company, to further conversations we have?

You are, says Harry. I just don't see why you would.

A world in which all actions people take are logical is not a world I want to live in.

Oh, come off it. You're a--

Half of a Dark Lord, yes, I'm aware, so you keep saying.

Yeah! So I do! It's a harder position to achieve than one would assume, ain't it? So every action you take is, and has to be, logical. That's how you got where you are now.

And where am I now? I am trapped in a prison of my own creation. I am lost and the idea that there is a way home still, even now, seems far off to me. You want to talk Dark Lord? You want to assume things about Voldemort? Sure. You do that. But I'm not him. If you're against him, I am with you.

... That's fair, Harry thinks. But not enough. How do I know you're not against me?

Because though their late night talks are fun, and Tom's suggestion for emancipation was and is brilliant, and the idea that it is part of Voldemort that will end up killing Voldemort is hilarious and wonderful -- it explains nothing about Tom's patience with him.

For Tom's plan to work, he just needs to be nice enough to either A, keep Harry around long enough to zap the magic from his body (which Harry does not believe the case, given that Tom has agreed to take the magic from a person of Harry's choice), or B, be nice enough to Harry that he agrees to give him to someone else.

Nice enough. But not so nice as to offer to help Harry write.

You have no reason to be kind to me, writes Harry . People like you are not kind without gain.

So, Tom.

What do you have to gain?

And Harry thinks that's stumped him. He has no response and Harry does not really need one, so he plans to go back to just go back to sleep.

But Tom, Tom is full of surprises.

Voldemort said, writes Tom, before he abandoned me... that you were special.

He said that?

Yes. And no. He didn't have to.

Yeah, well, writes Harry. I bet he feels pretty stupid right now, huh?

Maybe, says Tom. I'm still trying to figure that out.

Harry gets it. Tom's kindness is not out of the goodness of his heart. He wants to know him not because he is interested in Harry, as a person, but because he is interested in Harry, as a concept.

How could he ever expect otherwise?

Harry closes the journal and tucks it back into his trunk. He puts out his light and lifts the blankets to his shoulders. It is time to go to bed. He is tired.

..xox..

Luna's weekly letter arrives through the post during breakfast. Surprisingly, it is normal. There Is no reaction whatsoever to the fact that Harry -- for the first time ever -- sent a response.

It is disheartening. Yet understandable. Harry's running theory is shock. Harry wants to be angry at her. I opened my heart to you and you do not even reject it, you -- you ignore it. In what world is that fair? Harry wants so badly to be angry... but he can't. In what world is he a hypocrite?

Not this one. Not this time.

So Harry reads her letter and does not rip it up and buries his rage with logic. He does that because she has earned that much. Because Harry has not even apologized.

She speaks about how the drawing of the names for the Tournament will go down on her end. The Headmaster at Beauxbatons Academy did not, for whatever reason, want to bring any more students than necessary for the event, and so proposed a different format; each school gets its own Goblet. Beauxbatons and Drumstrang both collect their champions at their respective locations and then send them over to Hogwarts, the hosting school, where then Hogwarts' champions will be selected.

She is sad not to see the events in person, she says. She will be viewing them likely by buying someone's memory of it. Just like Harry, she says a lot with so little. She says here that she has taken her name out of the raffle -- and for that, Harry's anger at his letter being ignored fades, because it was not ignored at all. Not really.

The more he looks for it, her subtle acknowledgment, the more of it there is. She offers to embroider his uniform. She knows that he asked if she still did that, and she answered. She speaks of a Dark Arts spell she learned that week -- supposedly to help their future champions bring home the gold. She speaks about her days almost like she always has.

Almost.

Luna Lovegood is far more forgiving than Harry Potter ever could be. A part of him still resents her, but it is not her fault and he knows this. Of course he does. He always has. But today, with this letter, with this kindness he is undeserving of... that part of himself, feeling strongly forgien, is quiet. He tries to hate her and finds that he can't.

His marriage to her has never mattered less.

Then she says that she has tried writing, but is no good at it. Not like him. His works in recent years have been insightful. She is not sure should could do the same thing.

And with this, his heart drops.

Because with this, he is reminded once again of the past he has tried desperately to bury. He is reminded of Katherine's Portraits. What other 'recent works' made public could she be referring to? Is her remark on what must obviously distress him intentional? If this was meant to sting, it is working.

He...

He could not even blame her, if her intentions were not pure, if she meant to hurt him like he had been hurting her for years. You treat people how you want to be treated. Doesn't he know that? What is he, an idiot?

Yeah.

He is.

So he tells himself not to be angry at her for using Katherine's Portraits against him but rather, mad at those who made it available for use at all. Himself. The Prophet. Himself again.

He basks in loathing and then continues reading her letter. It is the least he owes her.

Love's weird, I think. When we fight against our hearts, our bodies fight against us. I deny or force feelings and am haunted in my dreams, waking in cold sweats and tears. I learned then something very simple. The most important aspect of health is self acceptance.

She is right. But what does Harry know about health? About fucking feelings? About love? The most important aspect of Harry's health is his ability to ignore it. Ignore the creeping behind you in the hallways of a dark, shadowy figure making itself an omen. Ignore your tired head. Ignore your aching body, aching heart.

Ignore it and it is like it's not there at all and boom -- suddenly it doesn't matter whether or not you're at peace with yourself.

But Harry does get, like, and relate to her line about his mind haunting him. She is physic in the way Harry is; in ways that aren't magical but aren't any less spectacular, any less relevant to the future. You deny feelings, you force them, and your mind reads the future and tells you, very adamantly, that you fucking shouldn't. Is not magic graceful? Is not your mind merciful?

It is a good note to end on. It is a good letter. Harry writes a response, replying to parts of her letter and talking about his life independently, too. It is not as good as a letter, but he is trying. He really is trying.

He hopes that is worth something.

..xox..

The letter sent to the head of the Butterflies is not sent back, nor given a response. It is odd. Suspicious, out of place, but, maybe, she recognizes him. The author of Katherine's Portraits? Why, he is sure he is hard to forget.

Regardless of her intent, if she has one, and she might not, Harry has a name. Mouton Vicieux. CEO of Season's Greetings, a "factory" on the plotted land the letter ended up at. They are an innocuous company that does nothing more than sell products catering to festivities.

On the surface, it is that easy. It is that innocent.

If you look closely, and in the right place, you will find exactly what you're looking for. Proof. Proof that Season's Greetings, as fun, as fucking festive as they sound is the cover of a cult.

Look for it. Can't you see it?

Donations, starting from 1985 and onward, to the Butterflies organization. That much is expected. It is the donations alongside that that is not.

Gellert Grindelwald. Gellert Grindelwald. What in the hell are the Butterflies doing funding a war criminal? Well. Now that he puts it like that, it is not all that unlikely. They are not the only people helping sick people get sicker. They are not even the only people getting others sick in the first place.

But it is strange. It is not unlikely, not close to impossible, but it is strange. There are layers to the oddness; Mouton Viciuex is an obviously French name. Season's Greeting is located in Britain -- along with the Butterflies -- and Gellert's operations are run in Austria.

And Harry knows that name. It is familiar, even if, now, he cannot place it. Harry is not exceptional in academics, nor popular enough to be in the know of minor celebrities, so whoever it is? They must be big.

But Harry does not know enough or cannot infer enough to piece together this puzzle -- and though it might be a riddle fit for a Riddle, Harry does not tell Tom any more than he needs to know. Tom is friendly at times. Is kind, intelligent, a useful asset -- but that is it.

Tom is not his friend and, quite frankly, Harry needs to stop kidding himself otherwise.

So Harry has a name. A strange one, a one he recognizes but can't quite place. Above all that, it is Harry's target. Harry, before wrapping up Tom's journal and sending it with the label Your favorite author, tells Tom that he'll be sent off that evening.

Be prepared to get your life back, Tom. I do hope you follow through on your word.

Of killing Voldemort, yes, but--

But? What about this confuses you?

... You...

I what?

You don't want me to stick around? Harry does not comprehend what exactly Tom means by this and he does not have to. Everything about Tom is shady, even if it is buried by moments of genuine and helpfulness. This is no exception.

Why would he want Tom to stick around? They are not friends. Tom has made his sole interest very clear.

No, writes Harry curtly. Now go steal someone else's magic. You cannot have mine.

And then Tom is sent away to Mouton Vicieux and Harry is alone again.

Of course, they will not be away for long. For better and for worse.

..XoX..

"Depression is thematic

(Stupid,

Self-absorbed,

Undeniably dreary)

Someone

(Or anyone,

Or everyone)

Will bother to understand

To comprehend

To relate

(To debate

The severity,

The sovereignty

Of what you're going through)

So, yeah

Depression is thematic,

Spawned of children

One of each dramatic."

-- Harry Potter, "The Sun."