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Harry stood among the six corpses scattered across his hospital room, looking at the three people who'd been guarding him. The adrenaline was finally wearing off, leaving behind a strange sort of clarity He felt like he was seeing his own world through new eyes—everything looked smaller somehow, less immediate than everything he had encountered at the Lands Between. He looked at the pink haired woman, and he recognised her face, he did not know who she was, but he knew she was the same woman who appeared on the doorstep of his room when he was brought back in his own world.
The three strangers were dressed oddly, he noticed. Not odd in the way that wizarding robes were odd to Muggles, but odd in that they seemed to be trying very hard to look like Muggles and failing spectacularly. The woman with the bright pink hair was wearing what appeared to be leather trousers and a jacket that screamed 'trying too hard to be cool,' while the tall black man was dressed in robes that were clearly magical but cut in a style that suggested he'd rather be wearing a Muggle suit. The scarred man with the spinning magical eye, however, made no such pretenses—his long coat and battered appearance spoke of someone who'd given up caring what anyone thought of his fashion choices long ago.
Ron had mentioned Aurors before, Harry remembered suddenly. Dark wizard catchers, the wizarding world's equivalent of police officers who dealt with the really dangerous criminals. That would explain the way they held themselves—alert, professional, ready for trouble.
"You're Aurors," Harry said. It wasn't really a question.
The scarred man stepped forward, his magical eye spinning to focus on Harry while his normal eye remained fixed on the bodies. "Alastor Moody," he growled, his voice carrying the rough edge of someone who'd seen too much violence. "Mad-Eye, if you prefer. Been hunting dark wizards since before you were born, Potter."
The tall black man moved forward next, extending a hand that Harry shook automatically. "Kingsley Shacklebolt," he said. "Senior Auror. We've been... keeping an eye on things."
The pink-haired woman bounced forward last, her hair shifting from pink to a more subdued brown as she moved. "Nymphadora Tonks," she said, then immediately grimaced. "But call me Tonks. Just Tonks. Anyone who uses my full name gets hexed."
Harry found himself almost smiling at that. It was such a normal thing to say after everything that had happened. "Harry Potter," he replied, though he supposed they already knew that. "Though I expect you already—"
"We know who you are, Potter," Moody interrupted, his magical eye now spinning to examine the corpses more closely. "Question is, do you know what you've done here?"
Harry looked around at the six bodies scattered across the hospital room floor, each one lying in a pool of blood that seemed to absorb the harsh hospital lighting. He felt a strange disconnect looking at them—they'd been trying to kill him and his protectors, it was as simple as that.
"I'm sorry about the trouble," Harry said, gesturing toward the bodies. It seemed inadequate, but what else could he say? 'Sorry I killed six people in your hospital'? 'Sorry I brought interdimensional assassins to your doorstep'? None of it seemed quite right.
Tonks was staring at him with an expression he couldn't quite read. "Trouble?" she repeated. "Mate, you just killed six... whatever these things are... with what looked like a sword made of light. I think we're a bit past 'trouble.' Anddd you saved our necks." She added at the end with a smile.
"Who were they?" Moody demanded, crouching beside one of the bodies and examining the curved dagger still clutched in its hand. "These aren't any dark wizards I've seen before."
Harry looked down at the nearest corpse, taking in the dark, form-fitting clothing and the pale, sharp features that were somehow both human and not quite right. "Black Knife Assassins," he said simply. "They're... well, they're assassins. Elite ones. Very good at staying invisible and killing people quietly."
"Black Knife Assassins," Kingsley repeated slowly, looking at Moody as if asking if he knew something he did not, but all he got was a shake of Moody's head. "I've never heard of any group by that name."
"You wouldn't have," Harry replied. "They're not from... here."
Moody's normal eye fixed on Harry. "Not from here? What's that supposed to mean, Potter?"
Before Harry could answer, Moody had moved to examine another of the daggers. He held it up to the light, and Harry could see the reddish tint along the blade's edge.
"'Black Knife' assassins," Moody observed dryly, "but their knives are more red than black."
"That's because they're coated with magic," Harry said, thought he wasn't really sure why the tips of their knives were red instead of black or silver. "I mean, they were designed to kill... specific targets. The blades are infused with magic that makes wounds very difficult to heal."
Tonks was examining her own arms and legs, flexing experimentally. "But we're fine now. You healed us with that tree thing."
Harry nodded. "Grace magic works differently than your spells. It can counter their weapons."
"Grace magic?" Kingsley asked, his eyebrows rising. "I've never heard of any branch of magic called Grace."
"You wouldn't have," Harry said again, beginning to realize just how many times he was going to have to say that. "It's not... it's from somewhere else."
The three Aurors exchanged glances, and Harry could practically see them filing away every word he said for later analysis. Moody's magical eye continued its restless spinning, occasionally focusing on Harry himself in a way that made him wonder exactly what the device could see.
"Right," Tonks said slowly. "So we've got assassins from 'somewhere else' using magic weapons that our healing spells couldn't do anything about, and you fought them off using magic we've never heard of." She paused, her hair shifting to an almost nervous shade of purple. "Did I miss anything?"
"The bit where Potter here moved like he'd been trained by the best dueling masters in Europe," Moody added grimly. "That wasn't luck, boy. That was skill. Serious skill."
Harry felt heat creep up his neck. He'd gotten used to moving the way Captain Artan had taught him, the way survival in the Lands Between had demanded, but he supposed it would look strange to people who thought he was just a thirteen years old kid.
"I had good teachers," he said simply.
"Teachers," Kingsley repeated. "Where, exactly, did you find teachers for combat magic we've never seen before?"
Harry realized there was no way to answer it without opening a conversation he wasn't sure he was ready for. How did you explain to people that you'd spent months in another world, learning magic from a mysterious woman who spoke in riddles about gods and rings and the fundamental nature of reality itself?
"It's complicated," Harry said finally.
Moody snorted. "Everything's complicated when you're thirteen and think you know better than your elders, Potter. What's not complicated is that you've brought something dangerous, and we need to know what we're dealing with."
"I didn't bring them here," Harry protested, though even as he said it, he wondered if that was entirely true. The assassins had been looking for 'the Tarnished'—for him specifically. If he hadn't come back, he was sure they would have attacked him in the Lands Between, and not bother to come here?
"Maybe not deliberately," Tonks said, her tone gentler than Moody's, "but they were definitely here for you. They called you something... Tarnished?"
Harry nodded reluctantly. "It's... a title, I suppose. From where I've been."
Tonks stepped closer to one of the bodies, her hair shifting to a worried shade of orange as she studied the assassin's pale features. "What did they want with you?" she asked, looking back at Harry. "I mean, why attack? What were they after?"
Harry considered the question, thinking back to the lead assassin's words. "They said Lord Rykard wants the Tarnished—wants me. I'm not entirely sure why, but..." He paused, remembering the God-Devouring Serpent's reputation in the Lands Between. "Let's just say he's not someone you want to work for willingly."
"Lord Rykard," Moody repeated. "Another one of your friends from 'somewhere else'?"
"Definitely not a friend," Harry said quickly. "I have never really met him, but I have heard that Rykard was a very greedy man, and that was before he was devoured."
"Wait, what do you mean he was devoured? Is he even alive, whoever this Lord Rykard is?" The pink haired witched asked right away, looking confused, and then looking at the other two as if making sure the two had heard the same thing.
"I only heard rumors about him, it's said that he let himself willingly get devoured by a serpent to strengthen himself but I'm not really sure," Harry replied grimly. "The point is, this isn't the first time I've seen those things in this world."
The three Aurors exchanged sharp glances. "What do you mean, not the first time?" Moody demanded, his normal eye narrowing dangerously.
"I mean exactly that," Harry said. "I've encountered them before. Not here, obviously, but... they shouldn't be able to cross over. At least, not so soon."
"Cross over from where?" Tonks asked, but Moody was already moving on to the more immediate concern.
"Are more coming?" the ex-Auror growled. "Do we need to evacuate the hospital? Set up additional wards?"
Tonks wondered why Moody was even bringing up the wards, is not the like the wards this hospital had done anything to prevent those things from entering as if they didn't care about the wards, and Tonks was really starting to believe that they did not care.
Harry shook his head. "I don't think so. They want me specifically. If more show up, they'll be looking for me, not attacking random people." He paused, considering. "They're assassins, not terrorists. They have a target, and that target is me."
"Well, that's reassuring," Tonks muttered.
"It should be," Harry said seriously. "Trust me, you don't want these things going after innocent people. They're very good at what they do."
Kingsley was studying Harry with that measured look again. "You speak like you know them well."
"I know their type," Harry replied carefully. "I've fought similar enemies before."
"In this mysterious place you've been," Moody said. It wasn't a question.
"Yes."
Tonks suddenly straightened, her expression shifting to something more urgent. "Speaking of creatures from wherever you've been," she said, "what about the thing that appeared at your relatives' house? The one that tried to attack you before I got you out of there?"
Harry blinked, genuine confusion crossing his features. "What creature?"
"You were unconscious, but... bloody hell, Harry, this thing was horrible. It came up through the floorboards like someone had spilled a bucket of sick that decided to come alive."
"I don't know what you're talking about," Harry said slowly. "What did it look like?"
Tonks swallowed visibly, her hair shifting to an almost queasy shade of green. "Human torso, but wrong. Too many arms and legs sprouting at impossible angles—moved like a bloody great spider. And the head..." She shuddered. "Mostly featureless except for this gaping, circular mouth full of human teeth. Rows and rows of them, all mismatched. My spells couldn't do anything to it."
Harry felt a cold chill run down his spine. "That doesn't sound like anything I encountered in the Lands Between," he said, his voice tight with concern. "Are you sure it was trying to get to me?"
Tonks, Shacklebolt and Moody noticed the name he used 'Lands Between' but decided to ask about it later.
"Positive," Tonks replied firmly. "The thing went straight for you. I had to activate an emergency Portkey to get us both out of there before it could reach you."
"But you said your spells didn't work on it either?" Harry asked.
"Not a damn bit of good," Tonks confirmed. "Stupefy, Impedimenta, even Bombarda."
Harry ran a hand through his hair, trying to process this information. "That's... concerning. The closest things I can think of would be the Grafted Wolves and the Grafted—"
"The what now?" Moody interrupted sharply.
"Grafted creatures," Harry said absently, still thinking about Tonks's description. "There were these things called Grafted Wolves, and then there was Godrick the Grafted, who was—"
"Hold on," Kingsley said, raising a hand. "Grafted? As in, surgically attached?"
Harry looked up at their horrified expressions. "It's... complicated," he said weakly.
"Everything seems to be complicated with you, Potter," Moody growled. "But we're going to need explanations for all of this. Especially if there are more things like what Tonks described running around."
"That's just it," Harry said, his concern evident in his voice. "I don't think that creature came from where I've been. I've never seen anything like what Tonks described. I am not sure where it came from." Harry admitted.
"Wonderful," Moody said dryly. "So we've got assassins from Potter's magical mystery tour, and now completely unrelated monsters that eat through floors and ignore stunning spells. Anyone else fancy a career change?"
Despite everything, Harry found himself almost smiling at the ex-Auror's gallows humor. Almost.
Harry wondered if this creature was from the Lands Between as well, or maybe, from the Realm of Shadow, Harry remembered vaguely dreaming of such a place, Melina had told him that him appearing there, even for a few moments should have been impossible, he wondered if this creature came from that place, but Harry did not know, he had never asked Melina what this Realm of Shadow was, and even the Lands Between, he barely knew everything that lived there, he figured this strange creature was simply a creature he had not encountered yet, maybe that was it. Melina had told him that the Lands Between was large, and Limgrave was the smallest part of it.
Kingsley had been quiet through most of the conversation, but now he stepped forward, his expression thoughtful. "I have to ask, Mister Potter—how exactly did you kill them? Our spells barely slowed them down, and you made it look effortless."
Harry considered the question. "Your spells could harm them," he said carefully. "But they're much stronger than normal people. Your stunning spells and binding curses just weren't... enough."
"But yours were," Moody observed, his magical eye spinning to examine the precise wounds on the nearest corpse. "That's some serious cutting power, Potter. What kind of spell creates wounds like these?"
"It wasn't really a spell," Harry said, then realized how inadequate that explanation was. "I mean, not in the way you think of spells."
"Show us," Tonks said suddenly, her curiosity overriding any caution. "Can you do it again? The golden sword thing?"
Harry hesitated. In the Lands Between, manifesting a weapon of pure Grace had become as natural as breathing. Here, surrounded by the sterile walls of a hospital room and the expectant faces of three professional Aurors, it felt almost... showy. Like he was performing a party trick rather than demonstrating something that had kept him alive through countless battles.
"It's not dangerous," he assured them, seeing Moody's hand drift toward his wand. "I mean, not unless I want it to be."
He closed his eyes for a moment, feeling for the Grace that flowed through him like a second heartbeat. It was still there, warm and golden and reassuring, responding to his call as easily as it had in the shadow of the Erdtree. When he opened his eyes and extended his right hand, the sword was already forming.
Tonks gasped audibly.
The blade materialized from nothing, golden light coalescing into a weapon that seemed to be made of captured sunlight. It wasn't quite solid—Harry could see through it slightly, and it cast no shadow—but it hummed with power that made the air around it shimmer. The sword was beautiful in a way that ordinary weapons couldn't be, perfect and ethereal and clearly not of this world.
"Bloody hell," Tonks breathed, her hair cycling rapidly through shades of amazed yellow and orange. "That's... that's incredible."
Moody's magical eye was so focused on the weapon, that it seemed like it would just pop out from the place it was secured in. "What kind of magic is that, Potter? Is this the Grace thing you mentioned."
Harry couldn't help but chuckle at the question, remembering the countless times Melina had corrected him on exactly this point. "Grace magic," he said, then caught himself. "Well, just Grace, really. Melina always said calling it 'Grace magic' was redundant. Like saying 'magic magic.'"
"Melina?" Kingsley asked, latching onto the name.
"My teacher," Harry said simply, not wanting to get into the complexities of his relationship with the one-eyed woman. "She's the one who taught me how to use Grace."
"And Grace is...?" Tonks prompted, still staring at the sword with fascination.
"It's..." Harry paused, trying to find words for something that had no equivalent in their world. "It's the power of the Erdtree, I suppose. The power that flows through the Lands Between. It can heal, it can harm, it can reveal truth or create illusions. It's not like your magic—it doesn't need wands or words or specific movements. It just... is."
He let the sword dissolve as he spoke, the golden light breaking apart into thousands of tiny motes that danced around his hand for a moment before fading away completely. The casual way he did it—like dismissing a pet rather than banishing a weapon of impossible power—seemed to unnerve the three Aurors more than the sword's creation had.
"Just like that?" Tonks asked weakly.
"Just like that," Harry confirmed. "Grace responds to will and need, not ritual. If I need a weapon, I can create one. If I need to heal someone, I can do that too. If I need to see through illusions or lies..." He shrugged. "Well, you saw what happened with the assassins' invisibility."
"Law of Regression," Moody said suddenly. "That's what you said to make them visible."
Harry nodded. "One of the basic Grace incantations. It strips away falsehoods and reveals truth. Very useful against enemies who rely on deception."
"Incantations," Kingsley repeated. "So there are specific techniques to this Grace of yours?"
"Some," Harry admitted. "But it's not like your spell system. There's no single right way to do anything. Melina taught me the traditional methods, but I've developed my own variations too. Grace is... flexible."
The three Aurors exchanged glances, and Harry could practically see them trying to process what they'd just witnessed. Magic that didn't follow any rules they understood, wielded by a thirteen-year-old boy who spoke about creating weapons of light and healing trees like they were perfectly normal things.
Before Harry say more, the door to the hospital room opened.
Albus Dumbledore stepped into the room with the measured pace of someone who had expected to find exactly what he was looking at. His blue eyes, bright and alert despite the early hour, took in the scene with the kind of calm assessment that suggested this wasn't even close to the strangest thing he'd encountered recently. Six corpses scattered across a hospital room floor, three blood-stained Aurors, and Harry Potter standing in the middle of it all looking like he'd rather be anywhere else.
"Good morning," Dumbledore said mildly, closing the door behind him with a soft click. "I trust everyone is well?"
"Define 'well,'" Tonks muttered, her hair shifting to a nervous shade of brown.
Dumbledore's gaze lingered on each of the bodies in turn, noting their strange clothing and the curved daggers still clutched in their hands. "These would be our unexpected visitors, I presume?"
"Black Knife Assassins," Moody reported briskly, falling automatically into the role of briefing a superior. "Six of them, all invisible when they attacked. They were after Potter specifically—called him 'the Tarnished' and said someone named Lord Rykard wanted him."
"Lord Rykard," Dumbledore repeated thoughtfully. "I see. And they were... dealt with?"
"Potter dealt with them," Kingsley said, his tone carrying a note of professional respect. "Single-handedly. With magic unlike anything we've seen before."
Dumbledore's piercing gaze shifted to Harry, who felt suddenly like a student called to the headmaster's office for something he couldn't quite explain. "Indeed? How fascinating."
"Professor," Harry said, relief evident in his voice despite his nervousness. "I know this looks bad—"
"On the contrary, Harry," Dumbledore interrupted gently. "From what I can see, this looks like you protected yourself and three of our finest Aurors from a serious threat. That hardly qualifies as 'bad' in my estimation."
Harry felt some of the tension leave his shoulders. Trust Dumbledore to focus on the outcome rather than the methods.
"However," the headmaster continued, "I believe explanations are in order. Perhaps you could tell us where you've been for the past two weeks?"
"Two weeks?" Harry repeated, his eyes widening with genuine shock. "It's really been two weeks?"
The question seemed to catch Dumbledore off guard. "You were unaware of the time that had passed?"
"I..." Harry ran a hand through his hair, looking suddenly much younger than his thirteen years. "I knew time was passing, but I thought maybe a few days at most. Two weeks?" He looked around at the assembled adults with something approaching panic. "Ron and Hermione—are they all right? Do they know what happened? Are they worried?"
"Harry," Dumbledore said, his voice taking on the gentle tone he used for students in distress. "Your friends are perfectly safe. They're currently at the Burrow with the Weasley family. As for being worried..." He paused, his eyes twinkling slightly. "I believe 'frantic' would be a more accurate description of Miss Granger's state of mind."
"I need to see them," Harry said immediately. "I need to explain—"
"And you shall," Dumbledore assured him. "But first, I believe we all need to understand exactly what has happened. The attacks tonight, your mysterious absence, these unusual abilities you've apparently developed according to Moody..." He gestured vaguely toward the corpses. "All of it suggests a story worth hearing."
Harry looked around at the four adults watching him expectantly, then down at the corpses that served as stark evidence of just how much he'd changed during his time away.
"Could we... could we sit down?" he asked quietly. "It's going to take a while to explain everything, and I'm not sure where to start."
"Of course," Dumbledore said kindly. With a wave of his wand, four comfortable chairs appeared around a small table, positioned carefully to avoid the blood stains on the floor. "Please, make yourself comfortable."
As they settled into their seats—Harry noticed Moody positioned himself where he could keep an eye on both the door and the bodies—Dumbledore conjured a tea service with another casual flick of his wand and started serving tea to everyone. Tonks tasted it first and it seemed like she liked the taste and started sipping more while trying to avoid burning her tongue. Shacklebolt didn't take a single sip, while Moody added more sugar to his own team.
Harry wrapped his hands around the warm teacup. He had forgotten how long it had been since he had drank tea, in the Lands Between, he had mostly eaten meat from animals he had hunted, and bread.
"Now, that we are more relaxed, Harry can you start telling us your little story." Dumbledore asked with a gentle smile, and Harry cleared his throat.
"It started two weeks ago," he began. "I was out for my morning run—I'd been trying to stay in shape over the summer, you know, after everything that happened with Sirius Black. I was running along one of the paths near Little Whinging when I tripped over a tree root and twisted my knee badly."
He paused, remembering the sharp pain and his frustration at being injured so close to home. "I was sitting there, wondering how I was going to explain a swollen knee to the Dursleys, when this woman appeared. She had short, flowing hair and wore those strange old clothes, and her right eye was permanently closed—like there was a scar running across the eyelid. But her left eye..." Harry shook his head. "It was golden. Not hazel or amber, but actually golden, like molten metal and she introduced herself as Melina."
"So that's her name," Tonks interrupted suddenly, her hair shifting to an interested shade of bright yellow. "Melina."
Moody shot her an annoyed look that could have frozen fire. "Tonks."
Harry blinked, looking between the three Aurors with sudden realization. "You've met her? You know Melina?"
"Know is a strong word," Tonks said, earning another glare from Moody. "She appeared when you were—"
"Tonks," Moody growled, his magical eye spinning to fix on her. "Let the boy tell his story without interruption. You can ask questions when he's finished."
"Sorry," Tonks muttered, her hair shifting to a chastened brown.
Harry was still staring at them with surprise. "But you have seen her? When?"
"You were dying from your wounds," Tonks said quickly, ignoring Moody's deepening scowl. "The healers couldn't do anything for you, and then this one-eyed woman just appeared in your hospital room. She made a golden tree—like what you did to heal us—and then turned into a swarm of butterflies and disappeared without explaining anything."
"She healed me again," Harry said softly, a small smile crossing his face. "That sounds like Melina."
"Tonks," Moody said, his voice carrying the kind of authority that brooked no argument, "wait for the explanation and don't interrupt again."
"Right, sorry," Tonks apologized, though she looked like she was bursting with more questions.
Harry took another sip of his tea, organizing his thoughts. "Melina healed my knee with this golden light—the same kind of magic I showed you earlier. She told me her name, said I'd been 'chosen,' and then she disappeared. I thought maybe I'd imagined the whole thing, but my knee was completely healed."
"That same night, she appeared in my bedroom. Just... materialized out of nowhere. She told me about this place called the Lands Between, and said that I was something called a Tarnished."
Despite Moody's warning look, Tonks opened her mouth and asked. "What is a Tarnished?"
"From what I understand," Harry said, "a Tarnished is a warrior who's been touched by Grace—that golden magic I showed you. According to Melina, all Tarnished are meant to return to the Lands Between, claim something called the Elden Ring, and become the Elden Lord."
Tonks looked like she wanted to ask about a dozen follow-up questions, but a single glance from Moody kept her silent.
"Melina told me that I was needed to help her world," Harry continued. "She said that if I didn't... fix things there, then things from her world would start appearing in this one. Dangerous things."
Dumbledore leaned forward slightly, his blue eyes intent. "What sort of things, Harry?"
Harry met the headmaster's gaze, knowing this was where the story was going to get really difficult to believe. "Well, those assassins tonight weren't the first ones I've encountered in this world."
The room went very still.
"After Melina left that night," Harry continued, "I spend the whole next day thinking about her, and what she meant. But the next evening, I was attacked. Right in my bedroom at the Dursleys'."
"How did you survive?" Tonks asked immediately, then clapped a hand over her mouth when Moody's eye swiveled toward her.
Harry smiled slightly at her obvious struggle to contain her curiosity. "I would have died," he said simply. "The assassin had me completely outmatched. But the night before, when Melina first appeared in my bedroom, she gave me this."
He held up his left hand, showing them the golden ring on his finger. It was simple in design, but there were branches carved into the ring. "She said it would protect me when I needed it most."
"When the assassin tried to kill me, the ring... reacted. It released this burst of golden energy that knocked the assassin backward and somehow sent him back to the Lands Between."
"May I?" Tonks asked, her hand already reaching toward the ring before catching herself and looking at Moody apologetically.
Harry nodded, extending his hand toward her. "It's safe to touch."
Tonks reached out and gently touched the ring with one finger. Her eyes widened immediately. "It's warm," she said with surprise. "Not just body heat warm—it's actually generating heat."
"That's the Grace," Harry explained. "It flows through the ring constantly."
Dumbledore was studying the ring with intense interest. "And this Grace—it's the source of the magic you demonstrated earlier?"
"Yes," Harry said, flexing his fingers and feeling the familiar warmth pulse through the ring. "Though I didn't understand what it was at first. That night, after the assassin disappeared, Melina appeared again. She said the attack proved that her world was already bleeding into ours, and that I needed to come with her to stop it from getting worse."
"And you went," Kingsley said. It wasn't a question.
"I went," Harry confirmed. "She used a spell and we appeared into the Lands Between."
The silence stretched for a long moment before Dumbledore leaned forward in his chair, his fingers steepled thoughtfully. "Harry, when you mention that worse things could cross over from this Lands Between, what exactly are you referring to besides those Black Knife Assassins and the Creature Miss Tonks encountered in your home?"
Harry took a deep breath, knowing that what he was about to say would sound completely mad to anyone who hadn't experienced it firsthand. "Melina warned me that if I didn't complete my mission in the Lands Between, the Outer Gods might begin to influence this world directly."
Tonks nearly choked on her tea, Kingsley's eyebrows shot up toward his hairline, and even Moody's magical eye stopped its constant spinning to focus entirely on Harry. But it was Dumbledore's reaction that surprised Harry the most—the headmaster's face went completely still, his blue eyes suddenly sharp, a sight Harry had never seen before.
"Did you just say gods?" Tonks asked, her voice rising to almost a shout before she caught herself. "What do gods have to do with any of this?"
Harry shifted uncomfortably in his chair. "I'm not entirely sure myself," he admitted. "I don't have all the information I'd like. But according to Melina and other people I met in the Lands Between, there are these... entities called Outer Gods. They're ancient beings with power over fundamental aspects of reality, and they can influence people so can share their influence into the world."
He paused, watching their faces carefully. "Melina thinks someone in this world might already be under the influence of one of them."
Dumbledore's eyes widened slightly—barely perceptible, but Harry caught it. The headmaster's reaction was subtle, but there was definitely recognition there, as if Harry's words had connected to something Dumbledore already knew or suspected.
"Could you elaborate on this influence?" Dumbledore asked, his voice carefully neutral in a way that suggested he was working very hard to keep it that way.
Harry noticed the reaction but decided not to comment on it for now. There would be time for that conversation later. "Melina told me there are many Outer Gods, each with their own agenda and sphere of influence. But she said the most dangerous one—the one most likely to cause harm to a world like ours—is called the Lord of Frenzied Flame."
The moment Harry spoke the name, everyone in the room felt it—a cold shudder that seemed to pass through the air itself, as if reality had briefly recoiled from the words. Tonks's hair immediately shifted to a alarmed shade of white, and Moody's hand moved instinctively toward his wand.
"Bloody hell," Tonks whispered. "Just saying the name feels wrong."
"That's because it is wrong," Harry said grimly. "The Lord of Frenzied Flame represents chaos, destruction, the unmaking of order."
Kingsley was staring at Harry with something approaching awe. "What can this Outer God do, exactly?"
Harry considered how to explain something that defied conventional understanding. "In the Lands Between, there was once a queen called Marika the Eternal who ruled for centuries. From what I learned, she was a vessel of some kind—a mortal who had been chosen by one of the Outer Gods to channel their power into that world."
He ran a hand through his hair, frustrated by the gaps in his knowledge. "I don't have all the information I need about how it works, but Melina explained that the Lord of Frenzied Flame operates by whispering to people who desire power. It starts small—little suggestions, promises of strength or knowledge or influence. The person thinks the thoughts are their own at first."
"And then?" Dumbledore asked quietly.
"Then the whispers get stronger," Harry continued. "The Lord of Frenzied Flame makes increasingly generous offers of power, each one requiring the person to do something that serves its agenda. The person believes they're making their own choices, but really they're being guided toward becoming a vessel for the Outer God's influence in their world."
The room had gone very quiet. Even Moody seemed subdued by the implications.
"How would one know," Dumbledore asked with studied casualness, "if someone was being influenced by this Lord of Frenzied Flame?"
Harry appreciated the question—it was exactly what he would have wanted to know if he were in their position. "According to Melina, the early stages are almost impossible to detect. The person seems normal, maybe a bit more ambitious or power-hungry than usual, but nothing obviously wrong."
He paused, remembering Melina's warnings about the signs to watch for. "But as the influence grows stronger—what Melina called reaching 'a new level' of control—physical signs start to appear. The most obvious one is the eyes."
"The eyes?" Tonks asked, leaning forward despite herself.
"They start to glow," Harry said simply. "Red and golden light, like embers or flames. At first it might just be for moments when the person is angry or emotional, but as the control deepens, it becomes constant."
Dumbledore's face had gone very still again, and Harry could practically see the gears turning in the headmaster's mind. There was definitely something there—some connection to information Dumbledore already possessed.
"Is there," Dumbledore asked carefully, "any way to reverse such influence once it has begun?"
Harry shook his head. "Melina never said there was. She seemed to think that once someone had accepted the Lord of Frenzied Flame's whispers, the process was irreversible. The only solution was to prevent the vessel from completing whatever goal the Outer God was working toward."
"And what would that goal be?" Kingsley asked.
"Well, the people of the Lands Between believe that the ultimate goal of the Lord of Frenzied Flame is to bring chaos to the world. Burn down everything, in their eyes, life is a mistake, and the lord of chaos will burn it all down until there's nothing returning all to a primordial state."
The silence that followed Harry's words was deafening. Tonks's hair had gone completely white, Kingsley's knuckles were pale where he gripped his wand, and even Moody's magical eye had stopped its constant spinning to focus entirely on Harry.
"Burn... everything?" Tonks whispered, her voice barely audible. "You mean like... a few buildings? A city?"
Harry shook his head grimly. "I mean everything. Every person, every tree, every blade of grass. The Lord of Frenzied Flame doesn't want to rule the world or reshape it—it wants to unmake it entirely. To reduce everything back to the primordial flame that existed before creation."
Kingsley set down his teacup with a hand that wasn't quite steady. "That's... that's not just madness. That's annihilation."
"Complete annihilation," Harry confirmed. "According to what Melina told me, the Lord of Frenzied Flame views existence itself as a cosmic mistake. Life, consciousness, order—all of it is seen as an aberration that needs to be corrected. And the correction is to burn it all away until nothing remains but the original chaos."
Dumbledore's face had gone very pale, his usual composed demeanor cracking slightly. "Harry, when you say 'everything,' do you mean...?"
"I mean that if the Lord of Frenzied Flame succeeds, there won't be a world left to save," Harry said quietly. "No Hogwarts, no Ministry, no Burrow. No wizards or Muggles or magical creatures. Nothing. Just endless, empty flame where reality used to be."
Moody's scarred face had taken on a grayish tinge. "And you think someone in our world might be under this thing's influence?"
"I think it's possible," Harry replied, noting how Dumbledore's eyes had grown distant and troubled. "As you said, I was gone for two weeks, and one Black Knife Assassin was able to attack me, but this time there was a creature, and six of them, so it's possible that someone might be under the influence of an outer god."
Tonks made a small, strangled sound. "So someone could be working toward ending everything, and we might not even realize what they're really doing?"
"That's exactly what makes the Lord of Frenzied Flame so dangerous," Harry said. "Its vessels don't usually understand the true scope of what they're working toward until it's too late. They think they're pursuing power, or revenge, or even what they believe is a better world. At least that's what Melina told me."
Harry seemed to realize only now how often Melina warned him about the Frenzied Flame, saying it would end it all, and she had brought it up many times; he remembered when he had first told her that he had seen Three Giant Fingers when he had dreamed of the Realm of Shadows, she had seen troubled, saying they were 'The Three Fingers' because of this reason, Melina had brought it up to Harry quite often about how dangerous the Frenzied Flame was, and Harry wondered if there was a connection between the Three Fingers and The Frenzied Flame.
Kingsley was staring at Harry with growing horror. "How long would this process take? From first contact to... to the end of everything?"
"I'm afraid I don't know, for me, it felt like I have been in the Lands Between for months, but I have never encountered someone who showed any signs of the Madness, but I have only been in Limgrave, so it's possible I simply haven't encountered them yet."
"The Madness?" Dumbledore asked sharply.
"That's what Melina called it when someone is fully consumed by the Lord of Frenzied Flame's influence," Harry explained. "She said you could recognize them by their behavior—completely unpredictable, violent beyond reason, and their eyes..." He shuddered. "She said their eyes burn with yellow flame, and they attack anything that moves."
The weight of those words settled over the room like a shroud, and Harry felt the familiar burden of destiny pressing down on his shoulders once again. He'd thought that defeating Godrick might give him some respite, some time to be a normal teenager again. Instead, it seemed like his real battle was just beginning.
Harry took another sip of tea, gathering his thoughts for what he knew would be the most difficult part of his explanation. "After Melina took me to the Lands Between, she began teaching me how to use Grace properly. It wasn't like learning spells at Hogwarts—there were no wand movements. Grace responds to will and need, but it requires understanding and focus."
He held up his hand, letting a few small golden lights dance around his fingers before dismissing them. "I started with simple things—creating small orbs of light, basic healing. Melina was patient but insistent that I learn quickly. She said the Lands Between were dangerous, and I'd need to defend myself."
"How dangerous?" Kingsley asked.
"Imagine if someone took the Forbidden Forest and made it ten times larger, filled it with creatures that make Acromantulas look friendly, and then scattered it with the ruins of a civilization that had mastered magic beyond anything we know," Harry said dryly. "Then add in the fact that most of the remaining inhabitants are either insane, hostile, or both."
Tonks's hair shifted to a worried shade of pale blue. "Sounds delightful."
"It had its moments," Harry admitted. "I met many good people there. A Captain who served under a tyrant but defected when he realized what his lord was truly like." Harry thought of Artan, the man who gave his life to give him one more chance to kill Godrick.
Harry told them more about what happened to him in The Lands Between, what he had done, and the fights he had fought, but he made sure to avoid bringing up the fact that he fell into an abyss and met a Prince who was supposed to be dead, and then he got the Cursemark of Death on his chest. Eventually, he started explaining Godrick The Grafted.
"The Grafted?" Tonks interrupted, her curiosity overcoming her earlier restraint. "What does that mean exactly?"
Harry looked around the table. "Does anyone here know what grafting means?"
Tonks raised her hand slightly. "It's a gardening technique. You take a cutting from one plant and attach it to another, usually to strengthen the main plant or give it characteristics it didn't have before."
"That's exactly right," Harry said, his expression growing dark. "Except Godrick wasn't grafting plants."
The realization hit them almost simultaneously. Tonks went pale, Kingsley's jaw tightened, and even Moody looked disturbed.
"He was grafting human limbs onto himself," Harry said simply. "Arms, legs, sometimes entire torsos. He believed he was the weakest of his royal bloodline, so he decided to steal strength from others by literally attaching their body parts to his own."
Tonks made a choking sound and pressed her hand to her mouth, looking like she might be sick. "That's... that's monstrous."
"It gets worse," Harry said grimly. "The grafting process doesn't kill the consciousness of the original owners. I encountered creatures that had the heads of strangers grafted onto wolf bodies, and they could still speak, still remember who they were. They begged me to kill them."
The silence that followed was deafening. Even Moody, who had seen the worst of what dark wizards could do, looked shaken.
"Godrick had turned Stormveil Castle into a charnel house," Harry continued, his voice steady despite the horrific memories. "Entire chambers filled with his experiments, soldiers whose only purpose was to capture fresh victims for his grafting tables. He'd been doing it for centuries."
"How did you stop him?" Dumbledore asked quietly.
Harry's hand unconsciously moved to his chest, where the half-cursemark remained hidden beneath his hospital gown. "It wasn't easy. The castle was filled with horrors—grafted monstrosities, soldiers loyal to Godrick through fear. We had to fight our way through level after level, rescuing prisoners when we could."
He remembered the knight who had nearly killed him, sending him tumbling into the abyss where he'd encountered Godwyn. "I faced Crucible Knight Ordovis, one of Godrick's champions. He was... incredible. Easily the most skilled warrior I'd ever fought. He nearly killed me, and I only survived by falling into an underground cavern system."
"But you did survive," Kingsley observed.
"I did," Harry confirmed, not mentioning the Deathbed Dream or his encounter with Godwyn's corrupted soul. Some parts of his journey were too personal, too complex to explain in a room full of people who were already struggling to understand the basics. "When I fought my way back to my friends, I found that Godrick had captured them and was planning to use them as leverage against me."
His expression hardened at the memory. "He wanted to graft my limbs onto himself, claimed my power would make him worthy of his royal heritage. We fought in a field outside the castle, with my friends bound to trees as an audience."
"What was he like?" Tonks asked, her morbid curiosity overcoming her revulsion.
"Imagine a man who might have been eight feet tall originally, but with so many extra limbs grafted on that he looked like a spider made of human parts," Harry said. "Dozens of arms and legs, faces embedded in his torso that could still blink and sometimes speak. He was fast despite his size, incredibly strong, and completely insane."
Moody leaned forward. "How do you kill something like that?"
"With great difficulty," Harry replied. "Normal weapons couldn't do much damage—he had too many redundant body parts. I had to target the grafted limbs specifically, weakening him by removing his stolen strength piece by piece."
He paused, remembering the most horrifying moment of the battle. "When he realized he was losing, Godrick cut off his own arm and grafted a dragon's head onto the stump."
"A dragon's head?" Dumbledore repeated, his eyebrows rising.
"A real one, from a dragon he'd killed years earlier," Harry confirmed. "Suddenly the head could breathe fire, had enhanced strength, and the dragon's head could act independently of his own mind. It nearly killed my friend Artan—" Harry's voice caught slightly "—he sacrificed himself to blind Godrick's remaining eye so I could land the killing blow."
The room was completely silent now, everyone absorbed in the horrific tale.
"I managed to sever the dragon head and detonate the Grace energy I'd been placing on him throughout the fight," Harry concluded. "When Godrick died, I absorbed his power—that's how the rune system works in the Lands Between. The stronger the enemy you defeat, the more power you gain."
"And then?" Dumbledore prompted gently.
"Then I started glowing with golden light, and suddenly I was back in my bedroom at Privet Drive," Harry said simply. "Still wounded, still wearing my armor, with my sword beside me. That's where Auror Tonks found me."
He looked around at their faces, seeing the mixture of horror, fascination, and disbelief. "I know it sounds impossible. I know it sounds like the ravings of someone who's been Confunded or cursed. But every word is true."
Moody's magical eye had been spinning throughout Harry's tale, occasionally focusing on different parts of his body as if trying to detect deception. "You're telling the truth," he said finally, and it wasn't a question.
"Every word," Harry confirmed.
"Then God help us all," Moody muttered, "because if half of what you've described could cross over into our world..."
He didn't need to finish the sentence. They were all imagining the same thing—creatures like Godrick the Grafted loose in London, Black Knife Assassins stalking the corridors of the Ministry, the Lord of Frenzied Flame whispering to ambitious wizards who thought they could control power beyond their understanding.
"Harry," Dumbledore said gently, "are you planning to return?"
"I will have to eventually, I have friends on the other side who need me, and I must make sure to do whatever that is neccaseary to cut this connection between our worlds before the Lord of Frenzied Flame finds someone power hungry enough to listen to it."
The weight of his story settled over the room like a heavy blanket, and Harry found himself feeling suddenly, overwhelmingly tired. Not just physically, though the events of the night had certainly taken their toll, but emotionally drained in a way he hadn't experienced since his journey had begun. In the Lands Between, there had always been another battle to fight, another challenge to face, another step forward in his quest. Here, surrounded by the familiar faces and voices of his own world, the magnitude of what he'd been through hit him all at once.
"Harry," Dumbledore said gently, breaking the contemplative silence, "how are you feeling? After everything you've experienced, after the revelations about the threats to our world—how are you managing?"
Harry considered the question, surprised by how difficult it was to answer. "Honestly? Right now, all I want is to see Ron and Hermione," he said, his voice quieter than it had been throughout his entire explanation. "I know it's only been two weeks here, but for me... it feels like I've been gone for months. I hadn't realized until now how much I missed them."
"They've missed you too," Dumbledore assured him. "Miss Granger, in particular, has been... quite distressed by your absence. She's convinced herself that something terrible has happened to you."
"She wasn't wrong," Harry said with a weak smile. "Though I suppose 'terrible' doesn't quite cover fighting your way through a castle full of grafted monstrosities."
Tonks, who had been unusually quiet since Harry's description of Godrick's horrors, seemed to shake herself back to the present. "I could take you to the Burrow," she offered, her hair shifting to a more cheerful shade of yellow. "I mean, after we sort out the whole 'six dead assassins in a hospital room' situation. The Weasleys would be over the moon to see you, and this Hermione... well, she might actually cry from relief."
"I'd like that," Harry said, and meant it. The thought of Mrs. Weasley's fussing, of Ron's friendship, of Hermione's rapid-fire questions about everything he'd experienced—it all sounded wonderfully, blessedly normal after the otherworldly experience of the Lands Between.
"The Burrow sounds like exactly what you need," Kingsley agreed. "Somewhere safe and familiar while we work out how to handle the broader implications of what you've told us."
Harry was about to respond when every instinct he'd developed in the Lands Between suddenly screamed danger. He was on his feet before he'd consciously decided to move, seven golden daggers materializing in the air around him, their points oriented toward his hospital bed.
Moody and Dumbledore reacted almost as quickly, both rising from their chairs with wands drawn and trained on the same spot Harry was watching. Tonks and Kingsley followed a split second later, their own wands appearing in their hands.
Sitting on Harry's hospital bed, as if they had simply materialized there, was a young girl. Long, flowing golden hair, too long for her size, it seemed her hair was longer than her body was, and her face...she was strangely handsome with bright golden eyes, reminding him of Melina's golden eye.
"Who are you?" Harry demanded, his golden daggers hovering menacingly in the air. Yet, he felt that he could trust her, he had no reason to not trust her, she wasn't big, she was small, and he had no reason to mistrust someone like her, she might even be an ally. Why wouldn't he trust her?
Harry shook his head, suddenly feeling a headache that he couldn't quite explain, he noticed that Dumbledore and Moody were no longer aiming their wands at this handsome girl.
The figure smiled, and when it spoke, only now Harry realised that this 'girl' was no girl at all, it was a boy, a young handsome boy that looked too much like a girl. If Harry had to guess, he seemed like he was at the age of thirteen or twelve.
"I am Prince Miquella," the figure said, his voice was so calming and so soft that Harry for a moment thought of making his daggers disappear, why would he aim his daggers at someone with no weapons, he was harmless, he was a...he was a friend...right?
But with a shake of his head, the headache returned again, Harry felt confused as the Prince spoke again. "I have come to speak with the Tarnished from the Other World."
𒉭
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The abandoned manor house in Little Hangleton stood shrouded in perpetual shadow, its windows boarded and its gardens long since claimed by thorns and decay. In what had once been the grand drawing room, a fire crackled in the massive stone hearth, casting dancing shadows across walls stained with damp and neglect.
Before the fire, in a high-backed chair that dwarfed his diminished form, sat Lord Voldemort. His body remained the twisted, infant-like thing, pale, wrinkled skin stretched over bones too prominent, features that were a grotesque mockery of human proportions. But his eyes... his eyes burned.
Where once they had been the flat red of a serpent, now they blazed with an inner fire of gold and crimson, flickering like flames caught in ruby glass.
Wormtail knelt on the cold stone floor before his master, his entire body trembling with a fear that went beyond mere terror of punishment. There was something new in the Dark Lord's presence, something that made Peter's very soul recoil in instinctive horror.
"Master," Wormtail whispered, his voice cracking with desperate servility. "Please, tell me what I can do for you. Anything. Anything at all."
Tears streamed down his face as he pressed his forehead to the floor, the golden hand Voldemort had given him clicking against the stone. "I live only to serve you, my lord. Command me, and I will obey."
Voldemort's lips curved into something that might have been a smile, if smiles could contain such casual malevolence. When he spoke, his voice was different, his own normal voice, yet, underneath that voice was another voice, a strange voice.
"Yesss," he hissed softly, the golden flames in his eyes dancing with apparent pleasure. "You would do anything for your master, wouldn't you, Wormtail? You have always been so... eager to please."
"Yes, my lord!" Peter sobbed, not daring to look up. "Anything!"
"Good," Voldemort said, his tone taking on a contemplative quality. "Because I find myself in need of something specific."
Wormtail's trembling intensified, but he remained prostrate before his master. "What do you require, my lord?"
The Dark Lord leaned forward slightly in his chair, the firelight catching the unnatural glow of his transformed eyes. "I need... eyes, Wormtail."
Peter's head snapped up in confusion, his tear-stained face reflecting his bewilderment. "Eyes, my lord? I... I don't understand. Whose eyes? How can I—"
His words died in his throat as Voldemort's burning gaze fixed upon him with sudden, terrible focus.
Peter felt something cold and alien brush against his mind.
"Your eyes will do perfectly," Voldemort said with the casual tone.
"My lord?" Wormtail whispered, but even as he spoke, he felt it beginning.
The fire started as a tingling warmth behind his eyes, almost pleasant at first. Then it grew hotter, spreading through the delicate tissues like molten metal poured into his skull. Peter's mouth opened in a silent gasp of shock, his hands flying to his face as the sensation became unbearable.
"Master, please—" he began, but the words turned into a shriek of agony as golden flames erupted from his eyes.
The fire that poured from Peter's eye sockets was the same unnatural gold and crimson that burned in Voldemort's gaze, but where the Dark Lord's eyes contained the flames, Wormtail's simply burned. The smell of charring flesh filled the air as Peter writhed on the stone floor, his screams echoing off the manor's crumbling walls.
"Please!" he begged through his torment, his voice raw and desperate. "Please, my lord, mercy! I beg you!"
But Voldemort merely watched with the detached interest of someone observing a mildly entertaining experiment. The flames reflected in his own transformed eyes seemed to dance in rhythm with the fire consuming his servant's sight.
The burning lasted an eternity that was probably only seconds before the golden fire suddenly vanished, leaving Wormtail collapsed on the floor like a broken doll. His face was unmarked—there were no burns, no visible signs of the flames that had poured from his eyes. He lay gasping and barely moving, as if the very essence of his being had been partially drained away.
Voldemort rose from his chair. Nagini was nearby, watching them with a hint of goldness in her eyes but nowhere near as noticeable as Voldemort's eyes.
He approached his fallen servant. Peter lay motionless except for the shallow rise and fall of his chest, his eyes closed, whether from unconsciousness or simply the inability to open them, Voldemort couldn't tell.
The Dark Lord knelt beside Wormtail's prone form, his pale, infant-like hand reaching out toward Peter's face, towards his right eye.
"One will do for now." Voldemort said and the screams of Wormtail echoed in the room.
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