Chapter 2
Location: Hogwarts - Headmasters Office: Dumbledore and Snape; Luna’s vision
Dumbledore snarled as he swiped his hand at the various location devices that were spread out on his desk, smashing the strange and random seeming objects onto the floor. Every one of them were supposed to keep the location of one single annoyance of a boy, Harry James Potter, yet every single damn one of them was absolutely useless now! Not a single one of them could tell him where the damned boy was.
Dumbledore hadn’t though he needed to have anyone watching that blasted weapon of his twenty four seven. He hadn’t even though to check in on the boy once throughout summer, and had made sure that no letters could get to or from the boy. Plausible deniability and all. While Dumbledore knew that the Dursleys were going to beat him worse than every other summer so that the boy would come back to Hogwarts as the perfect malleable weapon for his Sixth Year, it was better if he could deny that he had any knowledge of what happened. After all, he was just one very old man who wasn’t just the boy’s magical guardian, but also the Headmaster of Hogwarts, the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot, and the Supreme Mugwump of the International Confederation of Wizards. With so many duties, surely it was better that one boy’s health and safety slipped through the cracks than the health and safety of the entire wixen world, both in Britain and Internationally. And the Wixen World couldn’t really fault him for that, could they? Not when they were the ones begging him to deal with the monster that was his puppet, the Dark Lord Voldemort.
“Seriously? I don’t understand it. Not a single trace of the boy! Not one!” Dumbledore snarled as he lost control of himself. Black feathers popped up to mix with his obnoxiously long silver beard and hair. His lapse of control forced his anger out as he turned his beady red eyes to glare at Severus Snape.
Snape had been sitting silently in the corner of the room watching the Headmaster’s growing anger with a slight smirk on his face. He had tried to warn Dumbledore before that this would happen. The boy was too unpredictable. Too stubborn. Too much like that ruddy bastard of a father. Snape had much better things to do with his time than waste it looking for the lost cause. He had potions to brew and students to intimidate. “Perhaps you should have kept a closer eye on him this summer, shouldn’t you have, Headmaster?” Snape sneered, relishing in the anger that flashed across Dumbledore’s normally composed grandfatherly face. “It isn’t like the boy is known for following the rules, or orders for that matter. If he was, he would still be friends with Mister Weasley and Miss Granger, wouldn’t he? If he was, we would have known what he had been up to during the last year of school. But no, you are the one who gave him that blasted Invisibility Cloak from his father to parade around school all in the name of the Greater Good!” And Snape had tried to warn the Headmaster that letting the blasted boy have that cloak unsupervised, as the cloak wouldn’t allow any sort of magical or muggle tracking devices on it, would end up ruining his plans eventually. But no, of course Albus Dumbledore knew better than anyone else and refused to listen.
Dumbledore shot Snape a glare before he stood up quickly, his ugly lime green robes billowing behind him. “I do not need your commentary, Severus. What I need is solutions. We cannot let Harry Potter become too powerful or be aware of what he is. He is the key to getting us to Nevarah! The key to getting back at the dragels who abandoned you, Severus. At Lily for not picking you to be her Alpha. And the Key to getting my revenge!” He snarled, ice and shadows forming on his hands. It had been a very long time since Dumbledore had felt this angry. Angry enough that his other magic that he kept carefully hidden so he couldn’t be tracked by the Court he was thrown out of, was sparking out. He was so close to losing complete control of himself, and it was all that blasted Potter boys’ fault!
Dumbledore had done everything in his power to carefully craft the damned boy. He had pulled all of those he needed to the Earth Realm so that he could get the perfect Nameless Submissive Dragel he needed to be his key to break into the Nevermore Realm of Nevarah. There had been so many failures through the years. So many, even before Tom Riddle and Severus Snape himself. Not that Dumbledore would ever tell his pawn of a Potions Master that he was just a pawn in his game. And he had been so close to achieving his goals. All he needed was for Harry to defeat Tom, his puppet Voldemort, and then he would be the perfect vessel for him to use to go to Nevarah and punish those who had betrayed him. He would become the first Master of Death and punish the bitch who had turned her back against him when she learned what he was teaching himself from the Immortals library. Then he would take over the other Immortals. Everything had been so utterly perfect! And now it was all crumbling down around him like a castle made of sand.
Severus rolled his eyes, obviously done with Dumbledore’s dramatics. “You overestimate his abilities and underestimate his willpower, Albus.” He drawled, not at all intimidated by the Headmaster’s anger or show of power. “The boy has already proven time and time again that he will do whatever it takes to protect the ones he cares about. Why not use that against him. Even without Mister Weasley and Miss Granger doing your bidding to keep him in line, he still isn’t alone, is he? He has his little band of misfits with him. And Luna Lovegood. She’s always been unpredictable in her own right.”
Dumbledore’s eyes narrowed as he stepped around his desk and came closer to Snape, coming to his full true height to tower over his pawn. “Do not underestimate the power that boy holds, Severus. He is the only one that can lead us to Nevarah. To true power. And we cannot allow him to slip away from us. No matter what it takes.” He hissed, his magic crackling around him furiously. “I will not stand for Nevarah to remain out of my grasp. Not after everything I have sacrificed!”
Snape rolled his eyes again, sighing heavily. “Then perhaps it is time we changed tactics, Headmaster.” Severus stated, pulling out a single bottle of Veritaserum from his robes. A small smirk formed on his face as he swirled the clear colorless, odorless potion in its bottle before Dumbledore’s eyes. “Call the Weasels in. Fred and George, or even that Lovegood girl. Surely they all know where the boy is hiding and will be able to lead us to him. If your little gizmo gadgets and the darkest blood magic trackers and magical signature trackers aren’t working on the boy we need to do something different. It isn’t like everything we have already tried isn’t illegal. All it would take is two drops of Veritaserum and Potter’s little misfits will spill exactly where the arrogant brat is hiding. Then we can get him back under our control.”
Dumbledore’s eyes widened just slightly as he looked at Severus thinking over the idea. It was risky, sure, but it had its merits. Surely the brats friends were in contact with him after how close they had gotten to him last year when the child refused to forgive Dumbledore’s puppets he had placed as the child’s best friends. He had managed to sneak in a letter coated in compulsions to get the boy back with the letters his friends sent but that had also somehow failed. If he made sure to obliviate the children before he released them no one but Severus would be the wiser. And the Potions Master was so far the best puppet he had created so he wasn’t someone Dumbledore needed to worry about. He just couldn’t risk anyone else knowing about what he was trying to do.
Severus was speaking the truth when he said they didn’t know almost anything that his weapon had gotten up to during his Fifth Year. The portraits that he had spying on Harry had been strangely tight-lipped on anything the boy was doing. Even when he invoked his Headmaster’s permissions that should have had them spilling everything instantly without memory of doing so. If only the two blasted pawns of his, Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger, hadn’t abandoned Harry during their Fourth Year things wouldn’t have gone so poorly. Harry would still firmly be under his control. Potioned and compelled to do his bidding if he started to step out of line. But no… Ronald’s jealousy had gotten the better of him, and Hermione’s crush on the jealous brat had led her to leave his weapons side during one of the most crucial parts of his plan. Idiots, the lot of them. He never should have trusted children to handle his weapon without backup plans.
“Yes… That does seem to be the only option we have left at the moment. Do it,” Dumbledore said firmly, his anger still simmering underneath his skin as he forced the twinkle to his eyes and hid it all behind that grandfatherly smile mask he used to convince everyone in the Wixen World that he was a good guy. It was all for the Greater Good, after all. His Greater Good. Dumbledore couldn’t let Harry slip away from him now, not after so many precious years wasted building up the boy to be his weapon against those blasted dragels. “Leave the serum. Call Lovegood first. I can make up an excuse that I have been hearing about the bullying going on in the Raven’s nest. It would be best to wait for the Weasley Twins to step out of line again. We wouldn’t want anyone to become aware of what we are doing.” Not that it would matter. So long as they drank the truth serum they would tell Dumbledore the truth he wanted to know. And Dumbledore wasn’t above forcing them to take it if he needed to. A couple dark curses that wouldn’t show up on a general health scan would have them drink it even if they didn’t want to.
Severus nodded, placing the bottle of Veritaserum on the Headmaster’s desk before quickly leaving the rooms with his robes billowing behind him to carry out Dumbledore’s orders like the good puppet he was.
Dumbledore sat back down in his chair, his mind racing. He couldn’t let Harry get away from him. He had to be the one to control him, to use the boy for his own purposes. He had to make sure that Nevarah was within his reach. As he waited for Severus to return with Luna Lovegood, he thought of the questions he would need to ask. They all had to be carefully worded to make sure she would spill all she knew about his weapons location and what he had been up to last year.
Location: Hogwarts, Founders Tower: Luna, Fred, George, and Slytherin Trio
Luna frown deepened as she stared off into space watching the vision play out before her eyes. In two weeks, Dumbledore and Snape would finally resort to using the truth serum to get their way and find out where Harry was through her. It had moved up since the last time she had checked their current path and that bothered Luna. She couldn’t think of what had caused the sudden change in the timeline once again. “What is it, Luna?” Fred asked, being the first one to notice that the white-blonde female who had been absentmindedly playing with Draco’s hair had frozen.
Luna blinked a couple times to shake off the vision, turning to look at the Pareya. Both Fred and George’s instincts had been going haywire since all of them had realized Harry was nowhere to be found on the train. They had been practically smothering Draco whenever they could get away with it, typically whenever they were in the Founder’s Tower, since he was the only other submissive in their group of misfits, as Snape called them. Not that the Potion’s Master realized that the three Slytherin’s were in Harry’s group of friends. Luna still hadn’t seen how it would all play out between the two submissives, just that all of them were going to be in the same circle. If they could make it to Nevarah in one piece and together that was.
There were several visions Luna had been having that showed all of them separated, filled with dark magic as Dumbledore took over Nevarah and shaped it in his image which resulted in most of the dragels dead. Another fight between Harry and Draco led to the group splitting in two, though Luna had never seen what the fight had been about so she had no way of knowing how to avoid it. And then her personal favorite timeline was the one she had seen where all of them were together and happy in the end, even as Harry was forced to become the Omnis King. Sometimes Luna really hated her visions gifted to her by Lady Fate. Being Fate-blessed wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. So many different timelines. So many different steps that could change the course of the future and what timeline they would continue walking down. There were way too many things for her to juggle to get her circle-not-circle to the right one.
“We are going to have to move up our leave date.” Luna hummed, staring at the portrait of the Founder’s hanging on the wall above the fireplace. The Five Founders. Blythe Hogarth, the forgotten Founder of Hogwarts, was staring at her with a sad knowing look. Blythe, in their time, had been a Seer just like Luna was and had seen all that was to come with their circle-not-circle.
“Why? Theo asked in alarm. When they first realized that Harry was missing on the train, Luna had told them to be as inconspicuous about it as possible until Dumbledore made an announcement about it. She told them to be quiet and listen to the whispers in the hall, and to be very careful about who they trusted. That warning had been mostly directed at Theo, who up until the first week back at school had trusted Severus Snape explicitly for reasons he still refused to share with the rest of the group. Theo had actually gotten sick when he overheard the snarled conversation between Dumbledore and Snape talking about ensnaring the younger boy’s mind to force him to be their weapon. He hadn’t heard much of their place for Harry but it had sickened him that someone he trusted so much hated someone he cared about so much that he had no problems breaking laws to control Harry. To lead him to his death.
Then as the days passed by, Luna had continued to tell them she would get all of them out safely and to Harry, who she had informed them had become a Ferros Submissive Dragel over the summer, and all they needed to do for now was stay under the radar. Fred and George had taken staying under the radar to heart since they had almost completely stopped pulling pranks on the other students at Hogwarts. They still pulled one now and again but whenever anyone asked, they said they were focusing on finishing their Seventh Year as it was more important than jokes and pranks. Minnie had been very proud to see them putting away their pranking ways to focus on their studies, being reminded of the Marauders in their Seventh Year.
“Things have changed again. The Blackbird is planning on working with Nargles and Wrackspurts to get us to spill our secrets.” She said simply, her voice whimsical. “We’ll be okay.” That Luna said with utmost certainty, even if she didn’t fully believe it herself. There were just so many paths that could be taken. One where Harry is caught and releases a Soul Scream, which causes so many issues Luna was trying to steer them far away from it. Another where he is caught and Dumbledore sinks his talons so deeply into Harry that there is no way to recover from it.
The frown on Luna’s face deepened until Draco shifted on her lap, reaching up a hand to caress her face in a calming gesture while cooing reassuringly at her. “We’ll be okay. We’ll get to Harry and leave this Immortal-forsaken Realm, and we will be together.”
“I just hope that Harry doesn’t hate me for the path I’ve chosen for us all.” Luna said, her voice mournful. It would be the most difficult for all of them, but Harry most of all. Harry had never liked being famous, especially not for something that had taken his parents lives. He never liked being the center of attention. He just wanted to be Harry Potter. Not the Boy-Who-Lived. Not the Golden Boy. Not the Chosen One. Not the Wixen World’s Savior. Just Harry. But if the path she had been leading them all towards came to fruition, Harry would become the center of attention in Nevarah. He would have to learn quickly about Nevarahian Politics, hopefully under Draco and Theo’s tutelage. The Nameless Magic that had awoken in him already erased many other paths the future could have taken. People like Harry were very rare and very special. Already he would have to deal with the Merrow Courts, given his parentage, but to make his own Court for the Nameless Dragels would be very difficult. But the Tree had already chosen him when it showed up in the forest that Harry was abandoned in by his uncle and was now protecting him, keeping anyone from tracking him. It was just a matter of if Harry would use it to get to Nevarah.
Out of all the paths that were currently available to them, this one would lead to the most happy ending. Difficult and challenging, and with many many headaches and pain. But in the end they would all be happy and Luna knew that was what Harry wanted most of all. She knew that he wanted a family and they would be such a happy family. Such a happy circle, even with all the social pressures placed on them.
Nevarah was certainly going to be shaken up when they got there, but Luna never saw change as a bad thing. Even within the worst change, good things happened. She just hoped she could steer them all right without breaking her vow to both her Fae Queen and Lady Fate.
A flicker of silver mist formed in the corner of the room, unknown to everyone but Luna, and a small smile formed on her face as she moved her head in Draco’s grasp to kiss his hand gently. Another Fate-Blessed was learning about their small, not full circle-not-circle, and the waves they were going to make. Luna knew that whoever it was would help them when they needed it, based on whatever Lady Fate felt necessary to show them, and relaxed a little. She wouldn’t be alone in steering the future to their benefit.
“Harry hating you?” Draco scoffed, pulling Luna’s attention away from the other Fate-Blessed back to the Air Submissive Dragel. His face was scrunched up as if the thought disgusted him down to his very core making Luna laugh airily. “He could never hate his Moonflower.” The others were quick to agree with Draco’s assessment. Theo and the twins rumbling to reassure her that Harry could never hate him.
Luna sunk back into the sofa in the Founder’s Tower, resuming running her hand through Draco’s hair. It was a pleasure that she was even able to touch the dragel submissive’s hair since he was so conscious of how it looked. For now Luna would calm herself, reassure herself that everything would be okay in the presence of her hopefully soon-to-be-bonded, and when they all left the Founder’s Tower to rejoin the rest of the castle’s occupants, she would begin to reorganize her plans. A letter needed to be sent to the Fae Queen immediately informing her about Harry being chosen by the World Tree, and how she would be moving up their leave from Hogwarts due to complications. Her beloved Queen wouldn’t be happy about the change in timeline but she would understand. She will be delighted to know the World Tree finally picked an Omnis King.
Location: Kadel Clan’s Manor: Maia Kadel
Maia breathed out the smoke deeply as she was dragged out of the vision she had been scrying for. Over the last six months she had felt a shift in the timeline. So many things that were meant to come to play were suddenly, irreversibly changed. Lives that were meant to come about were no longer. Deaths of those marked by Lady Death suddenly seemed forgotten about. The Immortals seemed like they were working overtime to fix something, but Maia hadn’t been privy to that information. And most importantly, the major prophecy that Maia thought was starting to come about had suddenly halted in its steps. The Night of a Thousand Years Prophecy was still there, Maia was fairly certain about that, but it looked as if Lady Fate had decided against starting it now. Or perhaps it had changed but Lady Fate wasn’t allowing her to see it. And Maia was also fairly certain there was an entire circle that had suddenly come back from the dead as well. She could distinctly remember the death of almost all of Ryker’s Bane during a Torvak attack off realm, but new memories flooded her mind of them still being alive and kicking, or at least most of them as they had lost some in the Torvak attack.
Maia’s mind spun in circles as she thought about what she had just been shown. A newly inherited Ferros Submissive Dragel with dark emerald green eyes and merrow traits if the black-blue hair was any indication. The rich, deep magic that he possessed and the many, many changes that him coming to Nevarah was going to bring about.
Maia couldn’t help the happy purr that left her lips at the thought of a Royal of her own Nameless Magic. Shadow and Storm were set to gain their Royal status at the Hunt that was starting in the next couple of months but there had never been any Nameless that was powerful enough to become a royal. Not until him. It would be precious to help cultivate the new Royal-in-coming and his circle-not-circle. But first, there were people who needed to be informed, starting with Ryker’s Bane. In particular, the newly inherited submissive’s Oret, Maurice Elsewood. For some reason in this new timeline that was being carefully cultivated by the young Fate-Blessed Fae she had seen, Maurice was never alerted of his mentorship duties activating when the young submissive came into his inheritance. It would be a difficult conversation to have, Maia was certain of that. He would more than likely want to rush to the Earth Realm, a realm known for hostility against dragels, but that would have disastrous consequences. No, Maurice would have to stay in Nevarah and wait for his mentee to get here.
The secondary notification would be equally as difficult. Maia had an in on the Merrow Courts but securing a meeting with the newly appointed King Alcandor was going to be hard even for her. However, it was a necessary evil since the new submissive was circle related to Alcandor’s family circle. Queen Esperanza, now Queen Regent, had sent shock waves down on the Merrow Court when she had bonded in secret to a trio or landwalkers, or two landwalkers and a lost child of the Merrow who had spent his entire life on land on Earth’s Realm. Especially since one of the pareya dragels she had bonded with held a Fire affinity.
From what little Maia knew about their circumstances, the two Pareya and their soul-bonded Alpha, had tried to escape Earth with their new baby, who was the little submissive in her vision, but something terrible had happened and they had become bound to Nevarah while their son was left on Earth. By the time the Earth and Fire Courts had sent out Gheyos to collect the child, he was missing. Completely unlocatable even by their best trackers. The trio had been devastated over the loss of their first-born son which was when the Alpha had rank shifted into a Joker. They bonded into Queen Esperanza’s circle soon after that. Perhaps, even as a baby the newly inherited submissive’s magic was too powerful and he had accidentally broken the portal that had taken his parents away.
It was a difficult story to hear as someone on the outside looking in but Maia couldn’t think of what those three had gone through not knowing what had happened to their son. At least in this, Maia could bring them some good news. She would have to make sure that the Merrow kept from sending anyone to Earth to gather the boy though. He had been chosen by the World Tree and it would be disastrous to meddle in that sort of magic. No, the young Fae girl had things well in hand on Earth. Maia would just assist her in getting things in Nevarah ready for their arrival, and she would pray to the Immortals that the best path was chosen. Not just for the small no-yet circle, but also for the sake of everyone in Nevarah.