Magic
The blow never came, and neither did death. All around him, Tom, and the snakes, a silver shield of light, twice as brilliant as Tom's had been, burst out of Harry's body like a set of wings.
The incoming bombs were deflected to their sides, exploding but never injuring the little space that the shield surrounded. Harry looked up in awe as shudders of something otherworldly ran up and down his body, the shield flexing and growing bright as the sun.
For the first time ever, Harry felt good. The aches around his neck and ribs from never healed beatings disappeared, as did the scars lining his palms and knees. What could only be magic filled his every nerve with a pulsating sort of power.
Tom, suddenly feeling his health drain back and his wounds close, realized his heartbeat again. He slowly opened his eyes and could do nothing but squint and stare as Harry stood in front of him, back turned away but radiating a light sphere that filled him with equal parts of warmth and shock.
Pieces of wall and dirt and everything in between flew up through the air around them and Harry stood in the center of it-- like the beautifully calm eye of a magical hurricane. As the last German plane, the origin of this chaos, disappeared past the horizon, the debris collapsed to the ground and with it, so did Harry.
Tom, now on his knees, couldn't breathe. For years he had searched for someone like himself and Harry had been there all along.
***
Harry, for what it was worth, awoke feeling wonderful, laying on the same bed on which he had arrived. Magic thrummed underneath his skin and he felt right. Harry stretched, his limbs feeling supple and-- for lack of better words-- like they actually fit him. His body wasn't an awkward sort of fit that he had assumed was the norm since he could remember. Did everyone feel like this?
It was like the morning after the most terrific rest, a rest that also erased every scar and remnant of beating off of his skin. Oddly enough, the lightning-shaped scar on his forehead remained.
Looking around, Harry noted the smooth linen of the bed, the stone walls, the single chair. For a moment, Harry fearfully considered the possibility that time had turned back to the moment he had arrived at the orphanage. But, just as quickly as the fears came, they were dispelled. It was the same room, the same furniture, but this time, the chair was occupied by a certain boy reading a thick encyclopedia.
It was occupied by a certain Tom, to be exact, long legs crossed one over the other and eyes narrowed as he studied a particularly large diagram of the human body. Harry had never felt more happiness seeing a person in his life.
"Tom," Harry said, wincing as his voice came out dry and breathy.
Immediately, said boy darted his eyes to him, those red-brown orbs widening with an unknown emotion. Before he could say anything more, the door opened and Mrs. Cole entered in a rush of skirts and curious children. While Harry clutched his head in bouts of deja vu, Mrs. Cole breathed a sigh of relief at his awake state before her piercing blue eyes found his face.
"You! Finally you're awake, and Christ, after three days! It's a Christmas miracle!" No one dared to point out that it was April.
"Three days?" Harry answered, bewildered. If Tom was in the room and Mrs. Cole was somehow piqued, what had he possibly done? Mrs. Cole didn't give him much time to ponder it.
"You foolish, foolish child!" She growled, gripping the sides of his face a little too hard. "Running off to save Tom of all people! In the middle of an air raid! Did those lessons teach you nothing? You're lucky both of you weren't hurt, lest you be in a far greater world of trouble," She shook her head and ushered the curious orphans back through the door. "Come see me if any illnesses arise," She said before leaving herself--Mrs. Cole had never been one for small talk.
"I see you're awake," Tom said the instant the door closed, snapping his book shut and standing. Harry kept quiet-- the air raid? The air raid!
He threw back the bed covers and stepped down onto the stone floor barefoot. And then, as if the cold of the floor had jumpstarted his memory, all of the rest of the events of the air raid came rushing back to him: the snakes, the bombs, magic, Tom!
As soon as he remembered, his legs seemed to move on their own accord and suddenly Harry was collapsing into Tom at full speed. Harry wrapped his arms around the taller boy and held on tightly, burying his head into Tom's neck and nearly crying with relief. The other boy smelled like their room, something akin to cloves and rain; the closest thing to home.
The other boy didn't move, almost freezing at the sudden close proximity. Eventually, Tom's hands came up and wrapped around Harry's body with equal voracity.
"I thought we were dead," Harry mumbled into Tom's shoulder, inhaling the crisp scent of his loose but clean shirt. Tom, who Harry had never seen willingly touch another person, began petting the back of his head, threading his fingers through the ends of Harry's black locks.
"No, thanks to you,"
"Thanks to both of us," Harry corrected, giving a small smile as he sniffed and detached himself from Tom's arms. Tom considered this for a moment, before nodding and taking Harry's wrist.
"Come, we need to discuss a few things," Harry allowed himself to be pulled out of the room and out into the hall...or what remained of it. Just as Harry remembered, the walls were completely gone, crumbling to the ground in more places than not.
The sky was grayer than Harry remembered, what with the pillars of smoke that rose up from fires yet to be extinguished. In total, London was trashed. Despite most buildings being intact in some part, the damage was excessive and ruinous. Now, people milled around the streets in various states of despair as they examined their destroyed livelihoods.
The orphanage itself was still operational, if only some parts of it. Tom quickly and quietly informed him of the ruined portions: the front and left hallway, the foyer, the garden, the kitchen. Harry also saw visible proof of his words as Tom led him through the rubble and up the stairs to their shared bedroom.
Out of the blue, the magic thrumming under his skin rushed to his feet and he was propelled two feet into the air, his neck jerking with the suddenness. Harry have a small yelp as he rose, floating in the air for a good five seconds before crashing back down. Dizzy and slightly nauseous, Harry used a shocked and slightly concerned Tom to pull himself, also shocked and frankly terrified, back upright. At Tom's question-filled stare, Harry motioned to the door behind which other children played. They couldn't risk being overheard.
Orphans ran amuck, far more numerous than Harry remembered. More had probably been admitted after the air raid.
This time, instead of ignoring them entirely, they stared with shock as they watched Tom finally acknowledge Harry, Harry who they had watched trail the loner boy for upwards of a year. They stared as Tom pulled Harry up the stairs and through the door of the last room on the corridor, eyes zoning in on Tom's slender fingers wrapped tightly around Harry's wrist.
As the door closed shut behind them, Tom released his grip on Harry's wrist, sitting down on his bed. Harry did the same on the bed across from him. Tom waved his hand and a magical field appeared, a barrier to sound that Harry acknowledged without question. By this point, he knew Tom was far more advanced in the magic than he, an amateur.
"You came back for me," Tom began rather abruptly, an echo of his sentiment from the air raid.
"Of course I came back for you," Harry dropped his voice, "Why did you stay behind without telling anyone!"
Tom glanced to the side looking fairly uncomfortable. And it was then that Harry finally realized that Tom had probably, much like him, never had anyone that cared. Cared about his wellbeing, about whether or not he lived or died-- the situation hit all too close to home.
"I was testing myself, testing to see how powerful my magic was. I did not realize that you…" Tom turned to the side and then back at him with uncertainty. "That you…" He dropped his gaze again. "Cared," He finished lamely. "My strength was clearly not enough. I…apologize," He said thickly, the words enunciated with the difficulty of someone who did not apologize frequently.
Harry stared before finding himself again; smiling reassuringly. The other boy's emotional battles were uniquely endearing. "Thank you," Harry said honestly. "We were fine, and I also...unlocked? My magic?" Tom's eyes snapped back to him at the word. "So no harm no foul," Harry concluded, nodding his head for emphasis.
Tom examined his expression for a moment; a miniature politician, and Harry sat there attempting to convey sincerity in his eyes. Tom finally changed the subject.
"Yes, your magic," He began. Raising a hand, he pointed to the encyclopedia he had just been reading-- some scientific one that Harry had not yet read nor seen-- and gestured up with his fingers.
The book flew. Or rather, levitated, Harry later corrected. He watched in awe as Tom effortlessly beckoned and the book obeyed, floating to him gently.
"Can you do that?" Tom didn't ask meanly, but more as an inquiry; a test of waters. Harry stared at him pointedly.
"I'll take that as a no," Tom smiled. Smiled. It wasn't the cold ones he gave the charity representatives either, but a specially genuine one just for him. It was a strange feeling that welled up in Harry's chest when he saw the slight curve of Tom's lips--a feeling of warmth that thrummed in tune with the magic now flowing unblocked through his nervous system. No one had ever smiled at him before, aside from the occasional polite smirks from his teachers, or the pitying simpers of the ladies that sometimes came to the orphanage and handed out candies.
"No," Harry affirmed, still slightly basking in the afterglow of being the first recipient of Tom's rare smiles.
"But you can talk to snakes and float and make healing, repelling shields during air raids,"
"The snakes part yes, but the floating thing was an accident, and I don't know how I shielded us that time," Harry amended.
"You really don't know how you did that? It was the greatest feat of magic I've ever seen,"
Harry hummed thoughtfully before answering. "Well, I'd never done magic before that point-- talking to snakes doesn't count, does it? It's not really magic, just speaking a language," When Tom shook his head, he continued. "I'm not lying when I say that I don’t know how it happened. Maybe it was a desperate adrenaline kind of thing? Now in the aftermath, I feel this magic running though me, like sparks are ready to fly out of my fingers any minute. That time I fell, the magic rushed forward randomly and I crashed,"
Tom opened his mouth to ask another question but Harry cut him off. "My turn. Why did you ignore me for a year?"
Tom raised a brow. "Out of all the questions you probably have, you ask that one?"
Harry frowned and rested back against the headboard, "It was a year, Tom! And all I wanted was someone to talk to!"
"There were...let's see...12 now, but before, exactly 8 other children you could have socialized with,"
"You know very well that they all avoided me because they avoid you...speaking of which, why do they do that?"
"Avoid me? I made an example of one of them, the details of which I won't digress. Let's stick to one question at a time," Tom said.
"All right, fine. Why did you ignore me?"
"It has to be that question?" Harry nodded adamantly. "You won't like the answer." Harry shrugged and waited patiently. Eventually, Tom sighed. "I can't form an attachment to everyone I meet, Harry. Orphans are a dime in a dozen--they come and go. I've never interacted with any to this extent, I'll add, if it consoles you any,"
Harry was consoled, to his annoyance. "But now?" He asked.
"What about now?" Tom asked, strangely defensively.
"Now we can...have conversations? Do things together?"
Tom was silent for a moment. "Well, you already know about the magic, the snakes; most things. So I suppose,"
"Then you'll tell me where you disappear off to when I'm not looking?"
"It was extremely difficult to slip away from you," Tom laughed, remembering, much to Harry's chagrin. "I was in the garden,"
"Lies!" Harry exclaimed, jumping up suddenly and tackling an unsuspecting Tom face-up on the bed. Another startled laugh was forced out though Tom's lips, and Harry crowed in victory. "I looked everywhere in this bloody orphanage! And I know you're not in the garden because I'm in the garden! Searching for snakes!"
"Not this garden!" Tom insisted, pushing Harry off of him. "There's a hidden garden behind the shed. I speak with snakes and have been practicing magic there since you've moved in,"
Harry frowned. "And I looked for you for so long," He said sadly. Harry crossed his legs and looked at Tom, "So, how do we have magic then?"
Tom's brow furrowed and he shook his head. "I don't know. I hadn't met anyone else who had the ability before you,"
"There's no school of magic? Nothing?"
"Not that I know of," Tom replied, and Harry's hopes dried and shriveled. He hopped to his feet to go back to his own bed and vanished.
Tom was left sitting on the bed, slightly perturbed.
Harry, on the other hand, found himself skinning his elbows rather meanly as he slid across the floor, now downstairs and in an empty kitchen. Sucking in a short, annoyed breath through his teeth, Harry ran down the hall and took the stairs back up to their room two at a time. He stumbled back in through the door and fell face down onto his bed.
"Kitchen," He mumbled in response to Tom's pointed gaze. Harry felt a tingling in his arms as Tom raised a glowing palm, and slowly but surely, the angry red marks on his elbows faded.
Harry examined the newly knit flesh and, impressed, looked back up at Tom.
"Can you teach me?"
Tom contemplated his request before slowly nodding.
***
In the days following , Harry fell into a new routine, but this time with Tom.
In the mornings, they finished their chores separately-- Harry usually on sweeping duty and Tom, partly due to his intellectual prowess but mostly because of his antisocial and difficult nature, was tasked with filing new and old books through the orphanage library. Afterwards, if there weren't any special events in order, they alternated between reading and practicing magic.
The kids at the orphanage soon realized that Harry and Tom's relationship had drastically changed. Eventually, even the newer orphans knew the latest gossip: Harry and Tom now came in a pair.
It was a Sunday when Sister Mary arrived.