A Slow Descent Into

1. Lingering

He never has figured out why Gabrielle was switched with Fleur during the hijacked portkey ride.

The question pounds around his head and when he finally recovers from his abrupt return to the human world, he seeks Fleur out.

Time is strange in the Fae. This he knows with assured certainty. Days, months, years, they all shuffle around in no certain order: one after the other; yesterday after tomorrow; second year before the first, the third shaky and just a bit behind.

He knows Gabrielle and he were there for years; they'd gone on at least six different Hunts, and there is only one Hunt per year.

But when he arrives home, he's still only fourteen years old, and it is the summer of 1995. Only four weeks have passed.

He skips his fifth year of Hogwarts, unable to assimilate, unable to grasp human magic again quite so easily.

And after a year of trying to recover, he finally seeks her out.

She's living with Bill Weasley, of all people.

Harry's nonplussed at first, that she hasn't attempted to contact him before this. Her sister is still missing, after all.

When he first sees Fleur, he's reminded violently of the Fae, of his last glimpse of Gabrielle—trembling and covered in blood, the dark horse stamping and spitting fire, Him staring after Harry, anger and shock etched across His face.

His magic struggles out in trembling purple flames.

The dark forest crawls its way across his vision.

Copper fills his nose.

Fleur is gentle, while Bill hovers behind her: uncertain, white-knuckled fists, wandpoint facing the ground.

"Let's go inside," she says, her hand soft and warm on his shoulder.

Harry can only nod.

2. Violence

Violence is natural, just a by-product of existence. He has always been quite firm on that point.

"Watch any creature. It is inevitable, observable, and actionable. Humans like to delude themselves that they are above such actions, but watch them and it becomes quite apparent as well."

Harry isn't happy to relive any of these memories.

But time is strange here, and it doesn't give him much of a choice.

He really hopes this is the correct door; it won't be fun if he has to track Gabrielle all across the Fae.

The door itself is unremarkable ( they always are ) in a plain sort of way, just a slightly larger hummock of peat than the surrounding ones. Passing through is as strange as one would expect: a bizarre lifting, squelching, and sinking feeling—and all at once he is pulled through.

It's a Hunting gate.

Strange wooden enclosures ring around the edges of the clearing, lashed pens or paddocks made from twisting green wood, stores for the prey after a Hunt.

The ground is stained dark, blackened from old blood. The foetor of death fills the air.

Fetters hang from the low tree branches, bronze, iron, and rope: each for a different type of prey.

Harry scowls at the sight. It had taken him a considerable amount of time to overcome the insidious seeping of the Hunts, the way the Fae worked itself into his blood and wormed into his head.

It's the reason he started the calvary, it's the reason for the entire trajectory of his life.

It's the reason that even now he remains mired in violence, the reason that he can't find it in himself to feel any remorse for Fawley's death.

"Violence is natural and inevitable."

The twisted green trees move and sway, drifting around the boulder strewn forest floor in their strange lumbering crawl.

He'd forgotten how the forest moves.

"My gosh, you really do think so loudly!"

He startles, jerking out from his reverie and whirls to face Gabrielle as she steps into the clearing. She looks natural here—dressed in the typical Fae gauze cloth, hands still smeared with blood from the train, white blond hair glowing in the bubbly Fae light—and it unnerves him.

Seeing her here again, completely comfortable in the Fae, is its own form of violence.

3. Another Act of Violence

"You shouldn't have come here, Harry."

"No longer Potter, eh?"

"Shut up. I'm serious."

"Okay."

He has to be acting this obtuse on purpose…

"Are you really so brainless as to think it's a good idea to come back!? He has been furious! He'll be on a warpath as soon as He realises you're here, if He hasn't already!"

Harry shrugs at that, showing that he really is that dense.

"How are you?" he asks, as if that even matters right now.

She stares back at him. "How am I? What— what does that have to do with anything. Are you even listening!? You cannot. Be. Here."

"Look, Gabrielle, I'm here to save you."

"Why the hell do I need saving? I'm not eight anymore, Potter," she growls.

And like the insufferable prat he is, he smirks. "I guess I'm back to Potter now."

The forest shifts and moans while wind picks up overhead, howling and rattling the branches, leaves spiralling to the ground.

She can't be dealing with this.

And she hates it. She hates that he's here. She hates him .

It's always easy to find it within herself, her hatred; it runs deep, and it's ever too simple to dive in and pull out strange Fae magic.

It's a giddy feeling, this magic.

Dizzying.

It always leaves her reeling—blissful and rapturous.

She staggers slightly from the ecstatic touch, but yanks on it regardless, pulling the wind that's roaring above down into a wailing cyclone and pushes it towards Harry.

"GET OUT," she shouts over the tremendous howl of wind and slowly whips it up into a squalling cloud.

It's euphoric, her connection with magic, and she exults as Harry tries and fails to brace himself against her tempest, as it slowly pushes him back towards the door and out of the Fae.

It'll work!

She'll get this stubborn, stubborn man out and to safety. She'll have to do something to block the door, maybe just destroy it completely. It's a barely used doorway, which is why she picked it in the first place, the perfect spot to slip in and out of the Fae.

"Gabrielle," he shouts, voice barely audible over the storm, "quit this! I've got to get you hom—"

But he's cut off.

The wind stops.

Branches and dirt fall suddenly to the ground.

Oh no. She pales. He's here.

"Harry Potter," He says crisply, His voice the sound of dry leaves. "So, you've decided to return."

4. Him, Again

It's as if his bones have turned to stone. They both freeze as His voice echoes around the small clearing.

Except his heart pounds loud against his ribs, echoing in the hollow opening up inside of him.

Gabrielle's face is white, her pale skin going sickly as He descends from the sky, floating down like a dark spirit. He isn't so gauzy, not here close to the doorway. His shape has form, and the scowl etched across His face is all sharp lines and harsh planes, black and tenebrous.

Harry glares right back at him, ignoring the tremors in his gut.

It's as if no time has passed at all, as if he is fourteen again, filled with the quiver of magic and death that He had imparted upon them so graciously.

And maybe it is adolescent insecurity or puerile habits but the defensive insolence Harry had relied on whilst in the Fae wells back up and he (with the most impudence he can manage) says, "Right, I am back. No need to be so welcoming. I'm just here for Gabrielle."

Shooting him an angry look, she hisses, "Don't bring me into this!"

He sighs. "You've always been strong-willed, if utterly boneheaded. You've been away for too long. You shouldn't have come back. You're no longer welcome here."

"Well, I'll leave right away. I'm taking her with me, and then I'll be going."

"You think I don't know what you've been up to amongst the humans, Harry? No. No, you won't be going. You're no longer welcome here. But I also can't let you leave. Not whilst an adversary of ours has so willingly walked right into my arms."

Harry pulls out his wand. He has the audacity to laugh.

"Human magic is worthless here, Harry, have you forgotten everything we taught you?" His voice drips with derision. "You always were a difficult student, but I'd hoped our tutors would have had some impact."

The forest crawled away from them during their stand-off, the green woods stretching into a tight walled circle around the pens, clearing the space around Him and Harry as if readying for confrontation.

It's not like the Fae has ever really left him; it's always been there really, under his skin still. It was supposed to have disappeared, supposed to have sloughed away like seal skin as he slipped back into reality away from this strange dream world. But instead it stuck around, a splinter wedged deep in his finger, in his mind.

No matter how much he wants to pretend that the Fae was truly out of his blood, he's back here anyways, shuddering in a slow descent into the madness of the Fae.

He feels bared in this place. Pressed thin.

His every stare picks through Harry's chest, eating away like a scavenger with carrion, plucking his bones clean, until he feels bloodied and raw, ribs and heart exposed, each breath full of gore until his lungs ache with.

Harry doesn't feel ready for this confrontation. Would he ever, though? He's built his entire life on managing the Fae's influence over the world, but now his arms quiver with suppressed nerves. His neck aches; his spine rigid and brittle.

Fae magic always has been elusive, just out of his grasp. He'd never excelled in lessons as Gabrielle had. He'd never fit in here amongst the Fae, and after his rescue, he'd never fit in the human world either.

He knows what his Aurors mutter about him, he hears their whispers when they think he's out of earshot.

The Fae changed him.

That fact is indisputable. But exactly how? Well, he's never really spent too long thinking about that.

Emotion is important to the Fae, they never bury their feelings, they let themselves feel and feel.

That part is easy for him. Harry's never been one to hide his emotion either. For better or worse. Anger comes effortlessly for him. It always has. And now it strikes fast and hard and he whirls into a practised battle crouch, firing as he goes.

He just laughs, eyes wide and wild. He's always been sharp—angled, vicious, high brows and cheekbones—and his laughter adds to it, keen and honed, like a blade. The spells rip apart midair bursting into shattered stars.

His voice is the shiver down Harry's spine, it's the gooseflesh that ripples across his arms, the warning of lightning, ozone in the air. "Little Harry, always so rash. You forget your lessons, human."

The ground heaves and Harry stumbles, rolling as he falls.

Fae magic is the antithesis to human magic. And that's always held him back, kept him from fully grasping it. Harry isn't studious, never has been, but magic was always easy, it always made sense. Holding onto something so wild and raucous as the Fae, well, it's wrong! Just... wrong.

Three short spells ("ascendio , obscurium , oppugno") send Harry hovering over the roiling ground. The dirt forms into a dusty cloud and then hurtles towards Him in a vicious mist.

Gabrielle hangs uncertainly at the edge of the clearing.

His laugh becomes physical, the spikes of it bursting through the air like diving birds, raking at Harry with talons and beaks.

"Your emotions are controlling you! Take a hold! Be stronger! Be better!"

Scowling, Harry lets the burn of his anger pull through his chest until his hands tremble and shake. The flashing purple lights grow steadily darker and thicker, the heat growing and building.

"STOP THIS," she shrieks, the white flame of her voice whipping out, a loud crack, breaking the air between them into fissures. 

And they both pause their fight, turning to face her in surprise.

Arms folded tightly in front of her, she glares at them both. "What is wrong with you two!? This is imbecilic!"

Even through the blaze of her anger, he's distracted: there's a scar on her arm—he hadn't noticed before—a halfmoon of silver skin, wide and puckered.

Her hand partly covers it, fingers flexing angrily as she scowls at him.

5. I Lost All of the Feeling in My

"What now?"

The boulder is rough and scratches at the back of his calves.

He stares still at Gabrielle's scar (it encircles her arm just above her elbow), unable to pull his gaze away, for some reason.

"I got it from a deer." Her voice is quiet—hushed, almost a whisper—for his ears only.

His gaze flashes up to her eyes. She's looking at him, unblinking. She's noticed his staring.

He understands though, deer, they're vicious things.

"Now, little Potter can go, run back to the humans."

"Just like that?"

He sounds petulant, "Just like that."

Harry looks between Him and Gabrielle, confused. "That can't be it!"

"Want to try your luck in combat again?"

"No," he answers, quickly. "But I told you, I'm not leav—"

"Harry!" she interrupts, "I don't need rescuing! I'm fine here." She stresses her words with a pointed look.

Unsure of what she's trying to tell him he just shrugs, unhappily.

"Well, then, I guess... that's that?" He stands and glances at her uncertainly.

He says, "Yes, you will."

Harry rolls his eyes but the door squelches open again and then he's back in the clinging misty rain of the moor.

It's cold and smells of heather and peat.

He frowns. What the hell was that?