FIC: Chalice (Harry Potter/Merry Gentry)
Some of the things I've been doing: First off, two HP drabbles ( Child and Changeling) over at hp100. Second, there's more of those wacky summaries up at from the Title Meme the other day. Now, onto what I wrote this morning over coffee:
Chalice
A Harry Potter/Merry Gentry crossover
Characters: Hermione and Harry from HP-land, and Danu (the Goddess) from Merry-land.
Disclaimer: The Harry Potterites belong to JK Rowling. Merry Gentry belongs to Laurell K. Hamilton. I'm only borrowing and will return them at the end of the fic.
Author's Note: child_labor wanted some Harry/Potter/Meredith Gentry, which at first broke my brain, but then I was inspired! Oh yeah: Ficlette Fiasco III master list found here. This story is set after the end of the HP books, when Harry and Hermione are about 30, and over the beginning of book three, Seduced by Moonlight, in the Merry Gentry universe.
Word count:: 2,052
Summary/Introduction: In SbM, Merry brought Maeve Reed and Frost back into their powers, then she passed out. That night, she dreamed about the Goddess Danu and the Chalice, which had vanished from the Seelie Court centuries before. The Chalice was able to feed the hungry, heal the wounded, and was a source of great power. When Merry woke up, the Chalice was in her bed. No one knows why the Chalice chose that time to appear. What if it, and the Goddess, needed a helping hand?
~*~
"What are you doing?"
Hermione Granger blinked at the voice, her attention pulled away from the ancient writing in front of her. "Huh?" she muttered, looking up. "Oh, Harry. How did you get in here?"
Harry Potter raised his eyebrows as he perched on the only free inch of table, the rest of the surface covered by papers and scrolls and books. "I work here."
Hermione restrained herself from sighing. Even though he was almost thirty, Harry could be so obtuse at times. "I mean, how did you get into this wing? Aurors don't normally have access to the archives." His expression didn't change, but she narrowed her eyes at him. "Oh, tell me you didn't sneak in with your invisibility cloak!"
Harry ducked his head and looked bashful. "We hardly ever see you, Hermione, all locked up here in the Department of Mysteries."
Hermione stood up and pushed Harry off the table, making him stagger. "Save the puppy-dog eyes for Molly," she said as she stretched her arms above her head. "Has that ever worked on me?"
"There's always a first time," Harry said, dropping the pretense. "But honestly, you've been locked up down here more than normal. On the edge of solving any mystery?"
She couldn't keep the tiny smile off her face. Harry spotted it at once, and grinned widely.
"You have! I knew it! Tell me?" He snapped his fingers. "Wait, don't tell me. Let's go for tea, up in London. Give yourself a break."
"Harry--"
He crossed his arms over his chest. "Don't make me go get a letter from the Minister."
That made Hermione laugh. "As if Arthur doesn't have enough to do!"
~*~
Harry didn't press for details until they were both seated in the tiny tea shop, across London. They often met here, usually with Ron when Hogwarts was on break. It was far away from the Ministry that they seldom saw any wizards about. Even though Voldemort had been dead for more than twelve years, the attention from the wizarding world that followed the three of them still didn't seem to be letting up.
Harry sat back, an expectant look on his face. "So?"
Hermione picked up her teacup, breathing in the steam. Now that she was out of the archives, she realized exactly how hungry she was. "So?"
"So, what's kept you locked up for so long?" Harry asked. "What fun mystery?"
Hermione waited long enough to swallow a bite of her sandwich, before relenting. "Did you know anything about the Sidhe?"
"As in the Seelie and Unseelie Sidhe?" Harry asked quietly, growing very serious. "The fae?"
"The very same." Hermione scooted her chair closer to Harry. In the loud bustle of the shop, they had a sort of anonymity that made talking easy. "The Department unearthed a scroll, about fifty years ago. No work had been done on it, until I found it in the vaults last month."
"But why not?" Harry asked, then he shook his head. "Of course. Voldemort."
"They needed weapons to fight him then, Harry, they didn't have time for academic searches," Hermione said gently, putting her hand on top of Harry's. He still had broomstick calluses from his weekend Quidditch matches, reassuringly familiar under her fingers. "But that's over now."
Harry managed a smile. "It is. Go on, would you?"
Hermione took another sip of tea. "I was interested in the information in the scroll. It was written from long before the Sidhe were banished from Europe, but I don't think it was written by them, I think it was written by one of us, a wizard."
"What was the scroll about?" Harry asked in an undertone.
Hermione couldn't hold back the smile. "Have you ever heard of the Chalice?"
~*~
Three hours later, as Harry walked Hermione home, they were still arguing. "I still say that you have no idea what kind of magic you are dealing with!" Harry exclaimed.
"I know exactly what I am dealing with!" Hermione retorted, staring straight ahead. "Even before this, I spent years researching natural magic! That's what the fae are!"
They waited at the intersection for the light to change, a gaggle of punked-out teenagers lounging on a nearby bench, watching them with bored eyes. "Fine, then I don't think you realize that there are some things you shouldn't be playing with!" Harry said as the light changed. He strode across the intersection, leaving Hermione behind. She had to run to catch up with him.
"I know what I'm doing!" Hermione said, more than a little angry. How many times had Harry gone into situations, not knowing what was happening? She knew the lay of the land, all about the Sidhe and their magic.
Harry didn't say a word until they were across the street and at Hermione's door. "You may know what you're doing, but that's not the question you should be asking yourself," he said in a low, insistent voice. "How would you feel if the Sidhe started to play with Wizarding magic? You shouldn't be toying with their magic. The Ministry has done some stupid things in the past but even they would know better..." Harry's voice trailed off. "You're not working on Ministry approval, are you?" It wasn't a question.
Hermione glared at her friend. "This is a personal project."
With a sigh, Harry pushed his hair off his face. "I love you, you know that, right?" he said after a minute.
"But?"
"No buts. That's it." He squeezed her arm above her elbow, just like he'd done all those times she was in the hospital after the war. "I love you, and I trust you. You're still smarter than me."
"Then what is this all about?" Hermione almost wailed. He could be so confusing sometimes.
"Just... you're smart enough to know things, just be smart enough to be careful about using that knowledge."
Hermione wanted to be angry, but looking at Harry, so somber on her front step, she felt her irritation melting away. "I always do."
"Except that thing in York."
Hermione glared at Harry. "I thought we were never going to discuss that."
Harry just smiled. "Ron made that promise, not me." He pulled her into a hug. "I'll see you soon. Don't work too hard," he said against her hair.
"Same with you," she said, muffled. They never told each other to be careful, that was a given.
Harry let go and with one last smile, walked off into the night. "Let me know how it goes!" he said over his shoulder.
"Give my love to Tonks!" Hermione called after him.
Up in her flat, Hermione turned on the light and sat at the kitchen table, covered in work papers. Crookshanks curled around her ankles, and absently she reached down to scratch his head. Her open notebook teased her with arcane symbols as Harry's words swirled in her head.
Why was she doing this? What did she want? According to the scroll she had been working on, the Chalice had been lost to the Seelie Sidhe for many, many years, like so many of the objects of power that had simply vanished over the centuries.
But nothing magical ever vanishes, it just goes somewhere else, Hermione mused. So all I need to do is figure out where it went.
~*~
The question of what happened to the Sidhe Chalice became an obsession. Hermione read everything she could on the Sidhe, in the Ministry libraries, in muggle libraries, even resorting to the muggle tabloids. The only Sidhe to be born on North American soil, Meredith NicEssus, had recently surfaced in Los Angeles, and the tabloids were buzzing with stories.
Hermione saw a picture of Princess Meredith in one of the European tabloids, a delicate-looking woman, appearing years younger than she was. Not knowing why, Hermione cut the picture out of the magazine and taped it up over the scrolls at work. Sometimes, as she worked on the scroll translation, she would look at the picture, at Meredith's tri-coloured eyes, sensing the answers to her question were hidden there. But no matter how hard she worked, the answer always eluded her.
One night, Hermione fell asleep at her desk, and she dreamed.
A woman stood on the hill beside a dead tree. The land was black and barren. Nothing lived here.
The woman wore a dark cloak, her face hidden, as Hermione approached. "Hello?" Hermione said tentatively. The woman did not answer. "I'm looking for the Chalice."
"Why?" the woman asked, her voice traveling over the land like a breeze.
Hermione was struck dumb. The woman came closer, and Hermione wanted to duck her head, a child at school not knowing her lessons.
"You have the answers," the woman continued. "More than that, you have something I thought gone forever."
"What's that?" Hermione whispered.
Although she could not see the woman's face, Hermione knew she smiled. "The chance to interfere. Go to your books. You will find the answers there, if only you look at things through different eyes."
Hermione woke suddenly. Blinking furiously, she stared down at her books and papers. "Interfere?" she mumbled, her dream sticking to her like mist. She looked at Meredith's picture. Something about the green-on-green-on-gold eyes...
She let out a groan as the realization hit her. "The bloody thing's in code!"
~*~
No one asked why she wanted the day off work. Harry was in the field on assignment, Ron was in the middle of exams at Hogwarts, and there was no one to ask what she was doing.
A month of frantic preparation, of spells spoken and charms woven into the air, all behind her as Hermione knelt among the abandoned standing stones on the desolate moor. There was no one to see the tiny flame, burning blue and green in the silver cauldron. Hermione held a sprig of rosemary ready, all nervousness leaving her. She closed her eyes, recited the spells she had created, and dropped the rosemary into the flame.
She felt the earth moving underneath her, a slow circling under the blankets of the ocean, the steady assurance that things were. She forgot to want as she felt everything. This was the way it was supposed to be, things lying in and on the earth.
A presence pushed into her mind, a slightly impatient interference, directing her. Hermione-as-earth let her attention slide over the ground. She felt the Chalice lying there, resting, waiting. The earth cradled it in its grasp, keeping it safe. There had been no one worthy of it, Hermione knew now. Not a one of the old Sidhe had been worthy to hold the power of the Chalice.
But things had changed.
The earth convulsed under Hermione, rocks rattling around her as the moor awoke. The Chalice convulsed, warm and hot, and hands that were not her own slowly drew it out of the ground.
The air around her simmered, and Hermione knew it was time for her to leave. She'd helped this far, but her feet were not destined for the remainder of the path. Slowly, reluctantly, she slid back into her body, feeling the imprint of the Chalice on her hands
Across the ocean, magic was stirring.
~*~
Hermione called in sick the following day. She was too exhausted to move, and too euphoric to think properly. A very concerned Harry showed up at her flat with lunch. He watched her devour the meal before saying, "There was an earthquake on Dartmoor yesterday."
Hermione lay back on the couch, staring at the ceiling. She couldn't hide the tiny smile on her lips. "Really?"
"Ron tells me that the centaurs near Hogwarts are freaking out."
"That's nice."
"The new Divination teacher is in hysterics."
Hermione rolled onto her side on the couch and stared at Harry. "She's following a fine tradition, then."
Harry rolled his eyes. "Hermione, what did you do?"
She smiled wider. "I didn't do anything." At his dubious look, she shrugged. "I helped someone who wasn't able to do something on her own."
"Helped who do what?"
"Don't worry about it, Harry. It's going to be all right now." Hermione hugged the knowledge to herself tight, knowing she would never, ever tell her story to a living soul.
And that was all right.
the end
Chalice
A Harry Potter/Merry Gentry crossover
Characters: Hermione and Harry from HP-land, and Danu (the Goddess) from Merry-land.
Disclaimer: The Harry Potterites belong to JK Rowling. Merry Gentry belongs to Laurell K. Hamilton. I'm only borrowing and will return them at the end of the fic.
Author's Note: child_labor wanted some Harry/Potter/Meredith Gentry, which at first broke my brain, but then I was inspired! Oh yeah: Ficlette Fiasco III master list found here. This story is set after the end of the HP books, when Harry and Hermione are about 30, and over the beginning of book three, Seduced by Moonlight, in the Merry Gentry universe.
Word count:: 2,052
Summary/Introduction: In SbM, Merry brought Maeve Reed and Frost back into their powers, then she passed out. That night, she dreamed about the Goddess Danu and the Chalice, which had vanished from the Seelie Court centuries before. The Chalice was able to feed the hungry, heal the wounded, and was a source of great power. When Merry woke up, the Chalice was in her bed. No one knows why the Chalice chose that time to appear. What if it, and the Goddess, needed a helping hand?
~*~
"What are you doing?"
Hermione Granger blinked at the voice, her attention pulled away from the ancient writing in front of her. "Huh?" she muttered, looking up. "Oh, Harry. How did you get in here?"
Harry Potter raised his eyebrows as he perched on the only free inch of table, the rest of the surface covered by papers and scrolls and books. "I work here."
Hermione restrained herself from sighing. Even though he was almost thirty, Harry could be so obtuse at times. "I mean, how did you get into this wing? Aurors don't normally have access to the archives." His expression didn't change, but she narrowed her eyes at him. "Oh, tell me you didn't sneak in with your invisibility cloak!"
Harry ducked his head and looked bashful. "We hardly ever see you, Hermione, all locked up here in the Department of Mysteries."
Hermione stood up and pushed Harry off the table, making him stagger. "Save the puppy-dog eyes for Molly," she said as she stretched her arms above her head. "Has that ever worked on me?"
"There's always a first time," Harry said, dropping the pretense. "But honestly, you've been locked up down here more than normal. On the edge of solving any mystery?"
She couldn't keep the tiny smile off her face. Harry spotted it at once, and grinned widely.
"You have! I knew it! Tell me?" He snapped his fingers. "Wait, don't tell me. Let's go for tea, up in London. Give yourself a break."
"Harry--"
He crossed his arms over his chest. "Don't make me go get a letter from the Minister."
That made Hermione laugh. "As if Arthur doesn't have enough to do!"
~*~
Harry didn't press for details until they were both seated in the tiny tea shop, across London. They often met here, usually with Ron when Hogwarts was on break. It was far away from the Ministry that they seldom saw any wizards about. Even though Voldemort had been dead for more than twelve years, the attention from the wizarding world that followed the three of them still didn't seem to be letting up.
Harry sat back, an expectant look on his face. "So?"
Hermione picked up her teacup, breathing in the steam. Now that she was out of the archives, she realized exactly how hungry she was. "So?"
"So, what's kept you locked up for so long?" Harry asked. "What fun mystery?"
Hermione waited long enough to swallow a bite of her sandwich, before relenting. "Did you know anything about the Sidhe?"
"As in the Seelie and Unseelie Sidhe?" Harry asked quietly, growing very serious. "The fae?"
"The very same." Hermione scooted her chair closer to Harry. In the loud bustle of the shop, they had a sort of anonymity that made talking easy. "The Department unearthed a scroll, about fifty years ago. No work had been done on it, until I found it in the vaults last month."
"But why not?" Harry asked, then he shook his head. "Of course. Voldemort."
"They needed weapons to fight him then, Harry, they didn't have time for academic searches," Hermione said gently, putting her hand on top of Harry's. He still had broomstick calluses from his weekend Quidditch matches, reassuringly familiar under her fingers. "But that's over now."
Harry managed a smile. "It is. Go on, would you?"
Hermione took another sip of tea. "I was interested in the information in the scroll. It was written from long before the Sidhe were banished from Europe, but I don't think it was written by them, I think it was written by one of us, a wizard."
"What was the scroll about?" Harry asked in an undertone.
Hermione couldn't hold back the smile. "Have you ever heard of the Chalice?"
~*~
Three hours later, as Harry walked Hermione home, they were still arguing. "I still say that you have no idea what kind of magic you are dealing with!" Harry exclaimed.
"I know exactly what I am dealing with!" Hermione retorted, staring straight ahead. "Even before this, I spent years researching natural magic! That's what the fae are!"
They waited at the intersection for the light to change, a gaggle of punked-out teenagers lounging on a nearby bench, watching them with bored eyes. "Fine, then I don't think you realize that there are some things you shouldn't be playing with!" Harry said as the light changed. He strode across the intersection, leaving Hermione behind. She had to run to catch up with him.
"I know what I'm doing!" Hermione said, more than a little angry. How many times had Harry gone into situations, not knowing what was happening? She knew the lay of the land, all about the Sidhe and their magic.
Harry didn't say a word until they were across the street and at Hermione's door. "You may know what you're doing, but that's not the question you should be asking yourself," he said in a low, insistent voice. "How would you feel if the Sidhe started to play with Wizarding magic? You shouldn't be toying with their magic. The Ministry has done some stupid things in the past but even they would know better..." Harry's voice trailed off. "You're not working on Ministry approval, are you?" It wasn't a question.
Hermione glared at her friend. "This is a personal project."
With a sigh, Harry pushed his hair off his face. "I love you, you know that, right?" he said after a minute.
"But?"
"No buts. That's it." He squeezed her arm above her elbow, just like he'd done all those times she was in the hospital after the war. "I love you, and I trust you. You're still smarter than me."
"Then what is this all about?" Hermione almost wailed. He could be so confusing sometimes.
"Just... you're smart enough to know things, just be smart enough to be careful about using that knowledge."
Hermione wanted to be angry, but looking at Harry, so somber on her front step, she felt her irritation melting away. "I always do."
"Except that thing in York."
Hermione glared at Harry. "I thought we were never going to discuss that."
Harry just smiled. "Ron made that promise, not me." He pulled her into a hug. "I'll see you soon. Don't work too hard," he said against her hair.
"Same with you," she said, muffled. They never told each other to be careful, that was a given.
Harry let go and with one last smile, walked off into the night. "Let me know how it goes!" he said over his shoulder.
"Give my love to Tonks!" Hermione called after him.
Up in her flat, Hermione turned on the light and sat at the kitchen table, covered in work papers. Crookshanks curled around her ankles, and absently she reached down to scratch his head. Her open notebook teased her with arcane symbols as Harry's words swirled in her head.
Why was she doing this? What did she want? According to the scroll she had been working on, the Chalice had been lost to the Seelie Sidhe for many, many years, like so many of the objects of power that had simply vanished over the centuries.
But nothing magical ever vanishes, it just goes somewhere else, Hermione mused. So all I need to do is figure out where it went.
~*~
The question of what happened to the Sidhe Chalice became an obsession. Hermione read everything she could on the Sidhe, in the Ministry libraries, in muggle libraries, even resorting to the muggle tabloids. The only Sidhe to be born on North American soil, Meredith NicEssus, had recently surfaced in Los Angeles, and the tabloids were buzzing with stories.
Hermione saw a picture of Princess Meredith in one of the European tabloids, a delicate-looking woman, appearing years younger than she was. Not knowing why, Hermione cut the picture out of the magazine and taped it up over the scrolls at work. Sometimes, as she worked on the scroll translation, she would look at the picture, at Meredith's tri-coloured eyes, sensing the answers to her question were hidden there. But no matter how hard she worked, the answer always eluded her.
One night, Hermione fell asleep at her desk, and she dreamed.
A woman stood on the hill beside a dead tree. The land was black and barren. Nothing lived here.
The woman wore a dark cloak, her face hidden, as Hermione approached. "Hello?" Hermione said tentatively. The woman did not answer. "I'm looking for the Chalice."
"Why?" the woman asked, her voice traveling over the land like a breeze.
Hermione was struck dumb. The woman came closer, and Hermione wanted to duck her head, a child at school not knowing her lessons.
"You have the answers," the woman continued. "More than that, you have something I thought gone forever."
"What's that?" Hermione whispered.
Although she could not see the woman's face, Hermione knew she smiled. "The chance to interfere. Go to your books. You will find the answers there, if only you look at things through different eyes."
Hermione woke suddenly. Blinking furiously, she stared down at her books and papers. "Interfere?" she mumbled, her dream sticking to her like mist. She looked at Meredith's picture. Something about the green-on-green-on-gold eyes...
She let out a groan as the realization hit her. "The bloody thing's in code!"
~*~
No one asked why she wanted the day off work. Harry was in the field on assignment, Ron was in the middle of exams at Hogwarts, and there was no one to ask what she was doing.
A month of frantic preparation, of spells spoken and charms woven into the air, all behind her as Hermione knelt among the abandoned standing stones on the desolate moor. There was no one to see the tiny flame, burning blue and green in the silver cauldron. Hermione held a sprig of rosemary ready, all nervousness leaving her. She closed her eyes, recited the spells she had created, and dropped the rosemary into the flame.
She felt the earth moving underneath her, a slow circling under the blankets of the ocean, the steady assurance that things were. She forgot to want as she felt everything. This was the way it was supposed to be, things lying in and on the earth.
A presence pushed into her mind, a slightly impatient interference, directing her. Hermione-as-earth let her attention slide over the ground. She felt the Chalice lying there, resting, waiting. The earth cradled it in its grasp, keeping it safe. There had been no one worthy of it, Hermione knew now. Not a one of the old Sidhe had been worthy to hold the power of the Chalice.
But things had changed.
The earth convulsed under Hermione, rocks rattling around her as the moor awoke. The Chalice convulsed, warm and hot, and hands that were not her own slowly drew it out of the ground.
The air around her simmered, and Hermione knew it was time for her to leave. She'd helped this far, but her feet were not destined for the remainder of the path. Slowly, reluctantly, she slid back into her body, feeling the imprint of the Chalice on her hands
Across the ocean, magic was stirring.
~*~
Hermione called in sick the following day. She was too exhausted to move, and too euphoric to think properly. A very concerned Harry showed up at her flat with lunch. He watched her devour the meal before saying, "There was an earthquake on Dartmoor yesterday."
Hermione lay back on the couch, staring at the ceiling. She couldn't hide the tiny smile on her lips. "Really?"
"Ron tells me that the centaurs near Hogwarts are freaking out."
"That's nice."
"The new Divination teacher is in hysterics."
Hermione rolled onto her side on the couch and stared at Harry. "She's following a fine tradition, then."
Harry rolled his eyes. "Hermione, what did you do?"
She smiled wider. "I didn't do anything." At his dubious look, she shrugged. "I helped someone who wasn't able to do something on her own."
"Helped who do what?"
"Don't worry about it, Harry. It's going to be all right now." Hermione hugged the knowledge to herself tight, knowing she would never, ever tell her story to a living soul.
And that was all right.
the end