the DragonBard
3rd July 2006, 07:10 AM
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I'm doing a similar idea for this with Ranma 1/2, except I'm using martial
instead of magical arts for Ranma.
************************************************** *****************************
I do not own any of these characters, or any of the games, books, movies,
skills, spells, items, or techniques mentioned in this story, except those
specifically created by myself. All others are owned by their respective
copywrite holders and/or creators. Especially any characters from the Harry
Potter series, which is the property of J.K. Rowlings, or any parts of
Dungeons & Dragons, which is owned by Wizards of the Coast.
================================================== ===========
Prologue:
Young Harry Potter stood on the roof of his school, looking around.
"What am I doing up here?" He asked, though there was no one around to
answer him.
Harry sat down, and began to think.
"Last thing I remember, Dudley's gang was chasing me, and I ran away from
them. I remember... I knew they were going to beat me up again, even worse
than the last time. I was scared, I wanted to be somewhere else... anywhere
else... Someplace they could never get me... like the... school... roof."
Harry's voice trailed off, as his eyes got large.
"I wanted to be somewhere like the school roof, and I sent myself to the
roof!" He whispered in astonishment. "But HOW?"
There was only one thing that young Harry could think of that might have
allow him to do something like that. Something that, according to the loud
denunciations by Vernon and Petunia Dursley, didn't exist. Though, with the
situation he was in, Harry figured it was obvious they were wrong.
"Magic." Harry invoked the word, as if the word itself held power. Which
it did to a young boy trapped in an almost hellish home. "I can do magic!"
"What should I do? What can I do?" Harry asked himself excitedly.
Unfortunately, Harry's attempts to experiment were thwarted when he heard
the noise from the playground fading. Harry glanced over the edge of the
roof, and noticed that the kids were gathering to go back in from recess.
"Oh no! I've got to get back down!" Harry began to panic.
"Okay, calm down." He told himself. "Just try and do what got you up here
in the first place."
Harry closed his eyes, and concentrated.
"I want to be back on the ground. I 'need' to be back on the ground."
Harry repeated the mantra to himself over, and over again, trying to will
himself back down.
"Potter!"
Harry opened his eyes at the cry, and found himself standing in front of
his homeroom teacher.
"What are you doing, just standing here?" Mrs Hendricks was a
grandmotherly looking old woman, who had a less than grandmotherly
personality.
"Er-I... "
"Never mind!" Mrs Hendricks grabbed Harry's arm. "Recess ended five
minutes ago, you should be back in classes."
The rest of the day went by quickly for Harry. Even though he was severely
reprimanded by the teachers, and sent to his closet without dinner by his
Aunt Petunia, it didn't hurt his mood. He, Harry James Potter, could do
*magic!*
The days past in a blur for Harry, as he began to experiment with his new
found power. He briefly considered telling the Durselys about his magic,
but quickly squelched that idea. He had seen Petunia and Vernon's reactions
whenever there was something mentioned in the paper about people who
practiced magic, like the witches and druids. Honestly, if they found out
he could do real magic, Harry had little doubt that the Drusleys would kick
him out on the street.
Harry also considered talking to some of the people mentioned in the news,
but figured that they wouldn't want to talk to a little boy about it. Plus,
a little talk with his school librarian (one of the few members of the
school faculty that seemed to like Harry) convinced him that they didn't
work magic like he did. Most of their magic seemed to be just like going to
a strange church, and praying for something to happen. Wereas, for Harry,
it was all a matter of concentration, need, and will.
The school librarian, Mr Caufmann, loaned Harry an old paperback copy of
the Hobbit. Harry had to be careful about letting the Durselys see it, as
they would have likely thrown the book away. Fortunately, Harry had figured
out how to make objects invisible for a time, though Harry discovered that
he could still see them. It made borrowing 'un-Dursley' books (though Harry
doubted that there was really such thing as a book that 'was' Dursley) from
the library, and Mr Caufmann, much easier.
Looking back, Harry would say that reading the 'Lord of the Rings' books,
and thereby being introduced to fantasy literature, was probably the second
great milestone of his life with the Dursley family.
Harry found himself enjoying the book, and quickly devoured it. When he
brought the finished book back to Mr Caufmann, he enquired what happened
after, and Mr Caufmann happily loaned him the sequel; the first book in the
'Lord of the Rings' trilogy, 'Fellowship of the Ring,' quickly followed by
the next book in the series, the 'Two Towers.' Harry breezed through these
even faster than the first, and was rewarded with 'Return of the King.'
After 'Return of the King,' was the 'Chronicles of Narnia,' the 'Riftwar'
series, 'Dune,' the 'Star Wars' novels, and others. Harry read them all.
Mr Caufmann's impact on his life, however, was not limited to just
introducing Harry to fantasy, however. It all started one afternoon, just
after school had let out.
Harry was talking to Mr Caufmann, when a boy, a few years older than Harry,
entered the library.
"Hey Dad." The boy said, swinging his bookbag onto one of the tables. It
looked like he was about to say something else, when he suddenly noticed
Harry.
"Oops. Sorry. Didn't realise anyone else was here." He laughed.
Mr Caufmann shook his head at the boy, and turned to Harry.
"Harry, as you can probably tell, this is my son, Chad." Harry did indeed
notice a number of similarities between the two.
"What are you doing here, anyway?" Mr Caufmann asked. "I thought you were
going to Jeremy's house for a dungeon crawl."
Chad shrugged. "Jeremy's sick with the flu, so had to cancel at the last
minute. Too bad, it was supposed to be my turn to DM, and I had a killer of
a campaign planned."
Harry was a bit confused by the conversation, which Chad must of noticed,
because he chuckled.
"Some friends of mine, and I, like to play RPGs a lot. RPG means
Role-Playing Games." Chad explained. "It's a lot like playing pretend, but
with rules and stuff, so that you can keep things fair. Most RPGs are set
in fantasy worlds, with wizards, elves, fighters, evil monsters and so on.
You basically get together, each of you playing a character with certain
skills, and try to kill monsters and get treasure to become more powerful in
the game.
"Most of the time, the adventures are set in dungeons, so a gaming session
gets called a dungeon crawl."
Harry nodded, adsorbing the information.
"What's a DM?" He asked.
This time, Mr Caufmann answered. "DM stands for Dungeon Master. He's
basically the guy who tells the others what's happening, and makes sure that
everyone follows the rules."
"Dad introduced me to the game a few years back." Chad said.
Mr Caufman chuckled. "Well, it was pretty popular during my college days."
He turned to Harry. "If you're interested, I've got an old players
handbook you can borrow. It's got alot of the rules and such for playing
the game. Why don't I bring it with me tomorrow, and if you have any
questions, just let me know."
Harry smiled, and nodded in agreement. This RPG stuff certainly sounded
interesting.
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Harry Potter, the Arch-Magus.
by
the DragonBard
************************************************** *****************************
I do not own any of these characters, or any of the games, books, movies,
skills, spells, items, or techniques mentioned in this story, except those
specifically created by myself. All others are owned by their respective
copywrite holders and/or creators. Especially any characters from the Harry
Potter series, which is the property of J.K. Rowlings, or any parts of
Dungeons & Dragons, which is owned by Wizards of the Coast.
================================================== ===========
Chapter 1
If a visitor were to pass through Privet Drive, they might think it looked
quaint, or picturesque. Not beautiful, or lavish, but nice, in a fairly
normal sort of way, and that's the way several of the residents prefered
things. Especially three of the residents of 4 Privet Drive (actually, one
of those three didn't care about being normal, he just agreed with his
parents to get his own way)
The fourth resident, Harry James Potter, didn't care much about normal, one
way or the other. Both because he knew that, he himself wasn't normal, and
suspected that his aunt and uncle, no matter what they claimed, weren't
normal either. At least he 'hoped' they weren't normal, or his future
didn't look all that good.
You see, Harry was a wizard. Or was he a sorcerer? Perhaps a mage? Maybe
even a Jedi (though he somehow doubted it.) It was hard to say, as he had
yet to knowingly encounter another magic-user since he had discovered his
powers, so he didn't know any of the terminology that real magic-users used.
Anyway, to put it simply, Harry could work magic. He wasn't great at it,
he would admit if asked, as he was self-taught, and had to practice in
secret. From the few times his aunt and uncle had found out about his
'accidental' magic use, he really didn't want to see what would happen if
they caught him doing it on purpose, and worse, 'succeeding.'
School had let out for the summer, trapping Harry indoors with his cousin,
Dudley, and his gang, and away from Harry's own friends. Fortunately, they
had been wary of actually confronting Harry for the last couple of years.
Somehow, they weren't sure how or why, everytime they tried to do something
to him, or when he was around, things seemed to happen. Sometimes it would
be that they would begin slipping around like they were on sheer ice. Other
times, they found themselves dizzy, and barely able to stand. There had
even been times where he would just stare at them, and they would find
themselves turning around and leaving their target alone, with no idea why.
Harry didn't mind the summers that much, though it forced him to be around
his 'family' and away from his friends too much for his taste. He simply
spent as much time as he could in his closet-room, going over his
spellbooks, and reading his fantasy and science fiction books.
Harry's spellbooks were, in fact, just a bunch of spiralbound notebooks
with several drawings and notes in them. Harry had started them soon after
discovering his mage gift, and they were filled with his notes about how he
achieved his magical effects, and working out spells he could use, and how
he might make them work.
Most, if not all, of Harry's ideas for spells and magical items, came from
the fantasy & science fiction books he read. He had first started reading
fantasy after being loaned some books by his primary school librarian, and
later got into RPGing (Role-Playing Games) by the librarian's son, Chad.
Harry enjoyed the D&D game, though he really couldn't play much, what with
the Dursleys and all. Though he did talk with Chad about the game a lot.
He even, eventually, was able to make friend with Chad's RPG group.
Most of the group were, like Chad, older than Harry, but quickly developed
a liking for the kid, and tended to think of him as a little brother.
It was a few months later, after getting to know Chad, that Harry hit the
fantasy motherload. He had been taking out the trash, after Dudley whined
his way out of it, when he saw a neighbor doing the same, carrying a few
large boxes. Curious, Harry had looked inside, and found several dozen
books. He recognised some of the titles as ones he had borrowed from Mr
Caufmann, and there were others that appeared to be of the same genre.
There were even what looked to be RPG books!
As quickly as he could, Harry shrank all the boxes, using a hastily thought
up spell, and hid them under his shirt. For once he was thankful that he
was forced to wear his cousin's extremely over sized hand-me-downs, as it
made it much easier to conceal the small boxes. Later that night, Harry
restored one of the boxes, and began to read about the adventures of King
Belgarion and his ancestor, Belgarath the Sorcerer.
As time passed, Harry went through all the books, laughing at the silliness
of the Myth-Adventures crew, crying at the pain of Herald-Mage Vanyel,
respecting the courage of the friends Dragonlord Tomas, and the archmage
Pug, and several more. He also read of the worlds of Dunegons & Dragons,
the Rifts Megaverse, and other worlds of magic.
It was all fascinating to Harry, and very different from the very dull
'normal' life of the Dursleys. Plus, they had wizards casting spells, which
Harry quickly jotted down in his notebooks, trying to figure out how to do
the same thing.
It was an otherwise normal day in July when the third great mile-stone of
Harry's time with the Dursleys occured, and his life changed forever. He
had woken up that morning, and discovered his Aunt Petunia dyeing some of
Dudley's old cast-offs grey, so that they wouldn't have to pay for a uniform
for him (the Dursely's never spent any money on Harry that they didn't
absolutely have to).
"It'll look just like everyone else's when I'm finished." Petunia told
him.
*Yeah, if everyone else is wearing an elephent skin.* Harry thought to
himself, but decided against arguing, as it wouldn't do him any good. Never
did, never would.
Unless, of course, he cast some kind of mind control spell, but Harry felt
ugly clothing wasn't worth altering a person's mind.
One of Chad's friends had mentioned something to Harry a while ago, and it
was something that had stuck with Harry; 'with great power, comes great
responsibility.' That saying was one of the primary tenants that Harry
tried to live his life by.
Harry vaguely considered working out a spell to at least make the clothing
less hideous, but decided it would just get him in more trouble with his
aunt and uncle. 'Not that there's much that 'wouldn't' get me in trouble,
but I at least want to try and avoid problems.' Harry thought to himself.
Harry had long ago figured out that he was given Dudley's old clothes for
two reasons. One, it allowed the Dursleys to spend less money on him, and
second, it was just another way for them to belittle him.
Harry and the Dursleys had all just sat down to eat, when they heard the
mail slot click, and the letters flop on the door.
"Mail's here." Vernon Dursley noted from behind his paper. "Go get it
Dudley."
Dudley quickly whinned to his father, forcing Harry to get the mail.
With his back to his 'family,' Harry rolled his eyes. 'Glad it's Aunt
Petunia I'm related to. I would hate to see what I'd be like if I had any
genetics from 'him.''
Harry quickly grabbed the mail, and sorted through it, turning back to the
kitchen, when he came across a very strange letter. It was addressed to
'him,' Harry Potter, and the address included the closet! The fact that it
had been written in a strange green ink was easily overlooked.
Harry was frozen in shock for a few moments. No one besides himself and
the Dursleys knew about where he slept. Vernon and Petunia had been very
vehenoment about not revealing it to anyone, not even those few friends he
had made at school. The ones that Dudley hadn't been able to scare off with
his bullying.
Harry was just about to open his letter, when Dudley, curious about what
was taking Harry so long, came into the room, and grabbed the letter from
his hand.
"Mum, Dad, someone sent the Freak a wierd letter." Dudley called out.
If Harry hadn't known any better, he would have thought that his aunt and
uncle had teleported themselves into the room, they moved so fast.
Vernon grabbed the letter from Dudley's hand, ignoring the minature
behemoth's sqwauck of surprise, and and the two huddled together away from
the boys, quickly reading over the letter.
Harry was rather indignant. The first time he ever got a letter of his
own, and Vernon had to steal it from him!
Harry hated to do it, but something inside was telling him that he 'had' to
get that letter! Harry began a calming exercise he had read in one of his
books, the Flame and the Void, and cleared his mind of all thoughts and
emotions. He then focused his will on Vernon and Petunia, and spoke in what
he called 'the Voice.'
"You will give me the letter." Harry commanded the two, airily waving his
hand at them.
"We will give you the letter." Vernon said, angrily, and handed the letter
over.
"You have burned the letter." Harry told them.
"We have burned the letter." The pair repeated.
"I never got to read it." Harry told them, which they agreed with. Harry
quickly stuffed the letter under his shirt, and went into his closet.
It was something that Harry called the Jedi Mind Trick, which allowed him
to manipulate people's minds and actions, to a certain extent. From what he
could tell, the effects were rather short. You could give a person orders,
especially if they were weak-willed, and they would obey. Unfortunately,
strong emotions tended to degrade the effectiveness, and orders couldn't be
long term. You could tell a person to do something, but except for altering
recent memories, anything that lasted more than a few moments, needed
constant reinforcement.
When he was first developing his newly discovered skills and powers, Harry
had tried to make Vernon and Petunia treat him nicely. It was a failure.
The pair had reverted to their normal behavior within the hour. The best
Harry had been able to do, was prevent them from going to excess in
punishing him (which he admitted he sometimes deserved) and to protect the
little kids from Dudley's bullying ways.
Harry figured that there were probably ways to permanently alter a person's
behavior, but he didn't want to really try them. Mind altering spells,
especially ones that altered long-term behavior were too much like bullying
someone, in Harry's opinion. However, he understood that there were times
when it needed to be done, such as when he used it to stop Dudley's gang
from beatting up some kids. He was still reluctant to use it, though.
'Hope this letter is as important as I think it is,' Harry thought to
himself. 'Otherwise, I just screwed around with Uncle Vernon and Aunt
Petunia's mind for no reason.*
Harry opened the letter, and his eyes widened in surprise.
"Jackpot!" He whispered.
HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY
Headmaster: ALBUS DUMBLEDORE
(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf Warlock, Supreme Mugwump,
International Confed. of Wizards)
Dear Mr. Potter,
We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School
of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necesary
books and equipment.
Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31.
Yours sincerely,
Minerva McGonagall
Deputy Headmistress
If there had been enough room in the closet, Harry would have started to
jump around screaming at the top of his lungs in joy. He was going to magic
school!
Suddenly, Harry frowned.
"How in the world am I supposed to contact them?" He asked himself. "What
do they mean, 'we await your owl?'"
Harry started grumbling to himself, as he began to search through his
books, and spellbooks, for any spell that might allow him to communicate
with either 'Albus Dumbledore' or 'Minerva McGonagall.' Unfortunately,
long-range communication spells didn't seem to be a high priority in most
magical worlds. There were a few, but most of them seemed to requiring
actually having met the person, or had too short a range.
Harry stopped in his search, as a thought suddenly occured to him.
"Wait a second. They got scared after reading the letter. I don't think
they even noticed it was addressed to my closet, so why would they be
scared?" He asked himself.
That instant, several things that had confused Harry, suddenly clicked.
"They knew." He whispered. "THEY KNEW! All this time I wondered how they
could blame me for all those 'freaky things' when they didn't believe in
magic, but they knew!"
For a minute, Harry considered using some of his untested and experimental
spells on the Dursleys.
"Polymorph Other, yeah, that would be good, turn them into frogs, or maybe
rats. Maybe Fireball... no, that would blow up the house. How about
Levitation? I could trap them on the ceiling."
Harry continued ranting for a while, but finally calmed down, though he was
still furious at the Dursleys. He idily considered working out a Charm
spell, and using it on his aunt and uncle to find out the truth, but decided
against it, much for the same reasons that he never developed one to make
them treat him like Dudley. If they weren't willing to do it of their own
free will, then it wasn't worth it.
"However, a Divination spell to find out what's going on... 'that' is
another kettle of fish entirely." Harry said with a smile.
Unfortunately, Harry was unable to put his plan of working out a Divination
spell into motion, as that evening, when Vernon came home, he called Harry
out of his closet.
Vernon grinned at Harry, though it looked rather painful.
"Boy, er, Harry, I've been thinking, and this closet is getting a bit small
for you. So, your Aunt Petunia and I, have decided to move you into
Dudley's second bedroom."
"WHAT?" Dudley wailed. "But I 'need' that room! You can't give it to
him!"
Harry mentally shrugged, and gathered together his things to move them to
his new room. Thankfully, there was so much junk that Dudley had broken in
there, that Harry would be able to hide his magical stuff much more easily.
However, he still kept most of it under a concealment spell, so that the
Dursleys wouldn't notice.
Vernon had bought a bunch of second-hand furniture for the room. It was
pretty obvious that it was the cheapest the man could buy.
With Harry settled into his new room, the Dursleys seemed to relax a
little.
*Maybe they think that whoever wrote my letter is keeping an eye on them,
and will think that they're treating me right.* Harry thought to himself,
rolling his eyes a their stupidity.
The days passed quickly for Harry, as he tried working out a spell to
contact Headmaster Dumbledore, or Deputy-Headmaster McGonagall.
Unfortunately, Harry didn't believe that a simple name would be enough, and
whether it was simply his lack of belief, or his lack of skill, he was
quickly proven correct.
"BLAST AND BLOODY HELL!" Harry growled out as his tenth attempt at
divining anything about Albus Dumbledore collapsed. "I almost had it that
time! I'm sure of it!"
Before the spell had failed, Harry had been able to see a man, whom he was
certain was Dumbledore. However, it had only lasted a brief second, but
that was enough time for Harry to notice a few things about him.
Dumbledore was pretty much the poster child for the stereotypical fairy
tale wizard, with long silver hair and beard, robes, and such.
Harry sighed in frustration.
"Just what am I doing wrong here? What am I missing?" He asked himself,
as he started cleaning up the remains of his latest failed diviniation
attempt.
Most of the time, when working magic, Harry simply tended to visualise what
he wanted, and then will it to happen. For something more complex, such as
the divination spell, he decided that he needed something a bite more. He
had used an old mirror of Petunia's from an empty compact, and a piece of
paper with the words ALBUS DUMBLEDORE written on them. Harry had briefly
considered using his letter, but finally decided it was too risky.
"Hmm, maybe I'm doing the spell right, but he's just got some kind of
protection of scrying ward up." Harry muttered. "That's possible."
While straightening up,Harry just happened to glance over at his calender,
when he noticed something.
"It's almost my birthday." Unlike most children who enjoyed their
birthdays, Harry's was always a melancholy time for him. All he ever got
from the Dursleys were yells, and junk. His friends might have gotten him
something, but they didn't know when his birthday was, and they never saw
him during it. After all, the Dursley's would 'never' allow someone who
willingly associated with Harry Potter in their house.
Watching the clock, Harry softely counted down the seconds until midnight.
*Three, two, one.*
Midnight.
At the instant the clock struck midnight, there was a great pounding that
echoed throughout the house. Harry could hear Vernon and Petunia getting
up, yelling that they were coming, and complaining about people who were so
rude as to knock on a door in the middle of the night.
As soon as he knew that the two were downstairs, Harry cast a quick Knock
spell on his door, and silently crept to the stairs to find out what was
going on.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~
The Jedi Mind Trick is, of course, from the 'Star Wars' series, by George
Lucas. The Voice, is a trick from the Dune series, made famous by Frank
Herbert. Harry doesn't really 'use' the Voice, but he is aware of it. He's
trying to integrate the two together. The Knock spell is from the 'Dungeons
& Dragons' RPG. It's simply used to unlock doors that have been magically
or mechanically sealed.
Just to let you know, Harry doesn't have much in the way of combat spells,
and most of his other spells are pretty low level. Basically think Cantrips
and 1st-3rd level spells. He's got ideas for the bigger stuff, but he
simply hasn't had the time, or a place to practice them.
Hopefully, Harry's problems with the divination spell will show him to be
powerful, but not a Super!Harry... at least not yet ;)
Though, Harry 'is' supposed to be Voldie's 'equal' so that means he should
be much more powerful than the average wizard.
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I'm doing a similar idea for this with Ranma 1/2, except I'm using martial
instead of magical arts for Ranma.
************************************************** *****************************
I do not own any of these characters, or any of the games, books, movies,
skills, spells, items, or techniques mentioned in this story, except those
specifically created by myself. All others are owned by their respective
copywrite holders and/or creators. Especially any characters from the Harry
Potter series, which is the property of J.K. Rowlings, or any parts of
Dungeons & Dragons, which is owned by Wizards of the Coast.
================================================== ===========
Prologue:
Young Harry Potter stood on the roof of his school, looking around.
"What am I doing up here?" He asked, though there was no one around to
answer him.
Harry sat down, and began to think.
"Last thing I remember, Dudley's gang was chasing me, and I ran away from
them. I remember... I knew they were going to beat me up again, even worse
than the last time. I was scared, I wanted to be somewhere else... anywhere
else... Someplace they could never get me... like the... school... roof."
Harry's voice trailed off, as his eyes got large.
"I wanted to be somewhere like the school roof, and I sent myself to the
roof!" He whispered in astonishment. "But HOW?"
There was only one thing that young Harry could think of that might have
allow him to do something like that. Something that, according to the loud
denunciations by Vernon and Petunia Dursley, didn't exist. Though, with the
situation he was in, Harry figured it was obvious they were wrong.
"Magic." Harry invoked the word, as if the word itself held power. Which
it did to a young boy trapped in an almost hellish home. "I can do magic!"
"What should I do? What can I do?" Harry asked himself excitedly.
Unfortunately, Harry's attempts to experiment were thwarted when he heard
the noise from the playground fading. Harry glanced over the edge of the
roof, and noticed that the kids were gathering to go back in from recess.
"Oh no! I've got to get back down!" Harry began to panic.
"Okay, calm down." He told himself. "Just try and do what got you up here
in the first place."
Harry closed his eyes, and concentrated.
"I want to be back on the ground. I 'need' to be back on the ground."
Harry repeated the mantra to himself over, and over again, trying to will
himself back down.
"Potter!"
Harry opened his eyes at the cry, and found himself standing in front of
his homeroom teacher.
"What are you doing, just standing here?" Mrs Hendricks was a
grandmotherly looking old woman, who had a less than grandmotherly
personality.
"Er-I... "
"Never mind!" Mrs Hendricks grabbed Harry's arm. "Recess ended five
minutes ago, you should be back in classes."
The rest of the day went by quickly for Harry. Even though he was severely
reprimanded by the teachers, and sent to his closet without dinner by his
Aunt Petunia, it didn't hurt his mood. He, Harry James Potter, could do
*magic!*
The days past in a blur for Harry, as he began to experiment with his new
found power. He briefly considered telling the Durselys about his magic,
but quickly squelched that idea. He had seen Petunia and Vernon's reactions
whenever there was something mentioned in the paper about people who
practiced magic, like the witches and druids. Honestly, if they found out
he could do real magic, Harry had little doubt that the Drusleys would kick
him out on the street.
Harry also considered talking to some of the people mentioned in the news,
but figured that they wouldn't want to talk to a little boy about it. Plus,
a little talk with his school librarian (one of the few members of the
school faculty that seemed to like Harry) convinced him that they didn't
work magic like he did. Most of their magic seemed to be just like going to
a strange church, and praying for something to happen. Wereas, for Harry,
it was all a matter of concentration, need, and will.
The school librarian, Mr Caufmann, loaned Harry an old paperback copy of
the Hobbit. Harry had to be careful about letting the Durselys see it, as
they would have likely thrown the book away. Fortunately, Harry had figured
out how to make objects invisible for a time, though Harry discovered that
he could still see them. It made borrowing 'un-Dursley' books (though Harry
doubted that there was really such thing as a book that 'was' Dursley) from
the library, and Mr Caufmann, much easier.
Looking back, Harry would say that reading the 'Lord of the Rings' books,
and thereby being introduced to fantasy literature, was probably the second
great milestone of his life with the Dursley family.
Harry found himself enjoying the book, and quickly devoured it. When he
brought the finished book back to Mr Caufmann, he enquired what happened
after, and Mr Caufmann happily loaned him the sequel; the first book in the
'Lord of the Rings' trilogy, 'Fellowship of the Ring,' quickly followed by
the next book in the series, the 'Two Towers.' Harry breezed through these
even faster than the first, and was rewarded with 'Return of the King.'
After 'Return of the King,' was the 'Chronicles of Narnia,' the 'Riftwar'
series, 'Dune,' the 'Star Wars' novels, and others. Harry read them all.
Mr Caufmann's impact on his life, however, was not limited to just
introducing Harry to fantasy, however. It all started one afternoon, just
after school had let out.
Harry was talking to Mr Caufmann, when a boy, a few years older than Harry,
entered the library.
"Hey Dad." The boy said, swinging his bookbag onto one of the tables. It
looked like he was about to say something else, when he suddenly noticed
Harry.
"Oops. Sorry. Didn't realise anyone else was here." He laughed.
Mr Caufmann shook his head at the boy, and turned to Harry.
"Harry, as you can probably tell, this is my son, Chad." Harry did indeed
notice a number of similarities between the two.
"What are you doing here, anyway?" Mr Caufmann asked. "I thought you were
going to Jeremy's house for a dungeon crawl."
Chad shrugged. "Jeremy's sick with the flu, so had to cancel at the last
minute. Too bad, it was supposed to be my turn to DM, and I had a killer of
a campaign planned."
Harry was a bit confused by the conversation, which Chad must of noticed,
because he chuckled.
"Some friends of mine, and I, like to play RPGs a lot. RPG means
Role-Playing Games." Chad explained. "It's a lot like playing pretend, but
with rules and stuff, so that you can keep things fair. Most RPGs are set
in fantasy worlds, with wizards, elves, fighters, evil monsters and so on.
You basically get together, each of you playing a character with certain
skills, and try to kill monsters and get treasure to become more powerful in
the game.
"Most of the time, the adventures are set in dungeons, so a gaming session
gets called a dungeon crawl."
Harry nodded, adsorbing the information.
"What's a DM?" He asked.
This time, Mr Caufmann answered. "DM stands for Dungeon Master. He's
basically the guy who tells the others what's happening, and makes sure that
everyone follows the rules."
"Dad introduced me to the game a few years back." Chad said.
Mr Caufman chuckled. "Well, it was pretty popular during my college days."
He turned to Harry. "If you're interested, I've got an old players
handbook you can borrow. It's got alot of the rules and such for playing
the game. Why don't I bring it with me tomorrow, and if you have any
questions, just let me know."
Harry smiled, and nodded in agreement. This RPG stuff certainly sounded
interesting.
************************************************** ****************************
Harry Potter, the Arch-Magus.
by
the DragonBard
************************************************** *****************************
I do not own any of these characters, or any of the games, books, movies,
skills, spells, items, or techniques mentioned in this story, except those
specifically created by myself. All others are owned by their respective
copywrite holders and/or creators. Especially any characters from the Harry
Potter series, which is the property of J.K. Rowlings, or any parts of
Dungeons & Dragons, which is owned by Wizards of the Coast.
================================================== ===========
Chapter 1
If a visitor were to pass through Privet Drive, they might think it looked
quaint, or picturesque. Not beautiful, or lavish, but nice, in a fairly
normal sort of way, and that's the way several of the residents prefered
things. Especially three of the residents of 4 Privet Drive (actually, one
of those three didn't care about being normal, he just agreed with his
parents to get his own way)
The fourth resident, Harry James Potter, didn't care much about normal, one
way or the other. Both because he knew that, he himself wasn't normal, and
suspected that his aunt and uncle, no matter what they claimed, weren't
normal either. At least he 'hoped' they weren't normal, or his future
didn't look all that good.
You see, Harry was a wizard. Or was he a sorcerer? Perhaps a mage? Maybe
even a Jedi (though he somehow doubted it.) It was hard to say, as he had
yet to knowingly encounter another magic-user since he had discovered his
powers, so he didn't know any of the terminology that real magic-users used.
Anyway, to put it simply, Harry could work magic. He wasn't great at it,
he would admit if asked, as he was self-taught, and had to practice in
secret. From the few times his aunt and uncle had found out about his
'accidental' magic use, he really didn't want to see what would happen if
they caught him doing it on purpose, and worse, 'succeeding.'
School had let out for the summer, trapping Harry indoors with his cousin,
Dudley, and his gang, and away from Harry's own friends. Fortunately, they
had been wary of actually confronting Harry for the last couple of years.
Somehow, they weren't sure how or why, everytime they tried to do something
to him, or when he was around, things seemed to happen. Sometimes it would
be that they would begin slipping around like they were on sheer ice. Other
times, they found themselves dizzy, and barely able to stand. There had
even been times where he would just stare at them, and they would find
themselves turning around and leaving their target alone, with no idea why.
Harry didn't mind the summers that much, though it forced him to be around
his 'family' and away from his friends too much for his taste. He simply
spent as much time as he could in his closet-room, going over his
spellbooks, and reading his fantasy and science fiction books.
Harry's spellbooks were, in fact, just a bunch of spiralbound notebooks
with several drawings and notes in them. Harry had started them soon after
discovering his mage gift, and they were filled with his notes about how he
achieved his magical effects, and working out spells he could use, and how
he might make them work.
Most, if not all, of Harry's ideas for spells and magical items, came from
the fantasy & science fiction books he read. He had first started reading
fantasy after being loaned some books by his primary school librarian, and
later got into RPGing (Role-Playing Games) by the librarian's son, Chad.
Harry enjoyed the D&D game, though he really couldn't play much, what with
the Dursleys and all. Though he did talk with Chad about the game a lot.
He even, eventually, was able to make friend with Chad's RPG group.
Most of the group were, like Chad, older than Harry, but quickly developed
a liking for the kid, and tended to think of him as a little brother.
It was a few months later, after getting to know Chad, that Harry hit the
fantasy motherload. He had been taking out the trash, after Dudley whined
his way out of it, when he saw a neighbor doing the same, carrying a few
large boxes. Curious, Harry had looked inside, and found several dozen
books. He recognised some of the titles as ones he had borrowed from Mr
Caufmann, and there were others that appeared to be of the same genre.
There were even what looked to be RPG books!
As quickly as he could, Harry shrank all the boxes, using a hastily thought
up spell, and hid them under his shirt. For once he was thankful that he
was forced to wear his cousin's extremely over sized hand-me-downs, as it
made it much easier to conceal the small boxes. Later that night, Harry
restored one of the boxes, and began to read about the adventures of King
Belgarion and his ancestor, Belgarath the Sorcerer.
As time passed, Harry went through all the books, laughing at the silliness
of the Myth-Adventures crew, crying at the pain of Herald-Mage Vanyel,
respecting the courage of the friends Dragonlord Tomas, and the archmage
Pug, and several more. He also read of the worlds of Dunegons & Dragons,
the Rifts Megaverse, and other worlds of magic.
It was all fascinating to Harry, and very different from the very dull
'normal' life of the Dursleys. Plus, they had wizards casting spells, which
Harry quickly jotted down in his notebooks, trying to figure out how to do
the same thing.
It was an otherwise normal day in July when the third great mile-stone of
Harry's time with the Dursleys occured, and his life changed forever. He
had woken up that morning, and discovered his Aunt Petunia dyeing some of
Dudley's old cast-offs grey, so that they wouldn't have to pay for a uniform
for him (the Dursely's never spent any money on Harry that they didn't
absolutely have to).
"It'll look just like everyone else's when I'm finished." Petunia told
him.
*Yeah, if everyone else is wearing an elephent skin.* Harry thought to
himself, but decided against arguing, as it wouldn't do him any good. Never
did, never would.
Unless, of course, he cast some kind of mind control spell, but Harry felt
ugly clothing wasn't worth altering a person's mind.
One of Chad's friends had mentioned something to Harry a while ago, and it
was something that had stuck with Harry; 'with great power, comes great
responsibility.' That saying was one of the primary tenants that Harry
tried to live his life by.
Harry vaguely considered working out a spell to at least make the clothing
less hideous, but decided it would just get him in more trouble with his
aunt and uncle. 'Not that there's much that 'wouldn't' get me in trouble,
but I at least want to try and avoid problems.' Harry thought to himself.
Harry had long ago figured out that he was given Dudley's old clothes for
two reasons. One, it allowed the Dursleys to spend less money on him, and
second, it was just another way for them to belittle him.
Harry and the Dursleys had all just sat down to eat, when they heard the
mail slot click, and the letters flop on the door.
"Mail's here." Vernon Dursley noted from behind his paper. "Go get it
Dudley."
Dudley quickly whinned to his father, forcing Harry to get the mail.
With his back to his 'family,' Harry rolled his eyes. 'Glad it's Aunt
Petunia I'm related to. I would hate to see what I'd be like if I had any
genetics from 'him.''
Harry quickly grabbed the mail, and sorted through it, turning back to the
kitchen, when he came across a very strange letter. It was addressed to
'him,' Harry Potter, and the address included the closet! The fact that it
had been written in a strange green ink was easily overlooked.
Harry was frozen in shock for a few moments. No one besides himself and
the Dursleys knew about where he slept. Vernon and Petunia had been very
vehenoment about not revealing it to anyone, not even those few friends he
had made at school. The ones that Dudley hadn't been able to scare off with
his bullying.
Harry was just about to open his letter, when Dudley, curious about what
was taking Harry so long, came into the room, and grabbed the letter from
his hand.
"Mum, Dad, someone sent the Freak a wierd letter." Dudley called out.
If Harry hadn't known any better, he would have thought that his aunt and
uncle had teleported themselves into the room, they moved so fast.
Vernon grabbed the letter from Dudley's hand, ignoring the minature
behemoth's sqwauck of surprise, and and the two huddled together away from
the boys, quickly reading over the letter.
Harry was rather indignant. The first time he ever got a letter of his
own, and Vernon had to steal it from him!
Harry hated to do it, but something inside was telling him that he 'had' to
get that letter! Harry began a calming exercise he had read in one of his
books, the Flame and the Void, and cleared his mind of all thoughts and
emotions. He then focused his will on Vernon and Petunia, and spoke in what
he called 'the Voice.'
"You will give me the letter." Harry commanded the two, airily waving his
hand at them.
"We will give you the letter." Vernon said, angrily, and handed the letter
over.
"You have burned the letter." Harry told them.
"We have burned the letter." The pair repeated.
"I never got to read it." Harry told them, which they agreed with. Harry
quickly stuffed the letter under his shirt, and went into his closet.
It was something that Harry called the Jedi Mind Trick, which allowed him
to manipulate people's minds and actions, to a certain extent. From what he
could tell, the effects were rather short. You could give a person orders,
especially if they were weak-willed, and they would obey. Unfortunately,
strong emotions tended to degrade the effectiveness, and orders couldn't be
long term. You could tell a person to do something, but except for altering
recent memories, anything that lasted more than a few moments, needed
constant reinforcement.
When he was first developing his newly discovered skills and powers, Harry
had tried to make Vernon and Petunia treat him nicely. It was a failure.
The pair had reverted to their normal behavior within the hour. The best
Harry had been able to do, was prevent them from going to excess in
punishing him (which he admitted he sometimes deserved) and to protect the
little kids from Dudley's bullying ways.
Harry figured that there were probably ways to permanently alter a person's
behavior, but he didn't want to really try them. Mind altering spells,
especially ones that altered long-term behavior were too much like bullying
someone, in Harry's opinion. However, he understood that there were times
when it needed to be done, such as when he used it to stop Dudley's gang
from beatting up some kids. He was still reluctant to use it, though.
'Hope this letter is as important as I think it is,' Harry thought to
himself. 'Otherwise, I just screwed around with Uncle Vernon and Aunt
Petunia's mind for no reason.*
Harry opened the letter, and his eyes widened in surprise.
"Jackpot!" He whispered.
HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY
Headmaster: ALBUS DUMBLEDORE
(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf Warlock, Supreme Mugwump,
International Confed. of Wizards)
Dear Mr. Potter,
We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School
of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necesary
books and equipment.
Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31.
Yours sincerely,
Minerva McGonagall
Deputy Headmistress
If there had been enough room in the closet, Harry would have started to
jump around screaming at the top of his lungs in joy. He was going to magic
school!
Suddenly, Harry frowned.
"How in the world am I supposed to contact them?" He asked himself. "What
do they mean, 'we await your owl?'"
Harry started grumbling to himself, as he began to search through his
books, and spellbooks, for any spell that might allow him to communicate
with either 'Albus Dumbledore' or 'Minerva McGonagall.' Unfortunately,
long-range communication spells didn't seem to be a high priority in most
magical worlds. There were a few, but most of them seemed to requiring
actually having met the person, or had too short a range.
Harry stopped in his search, as a thought suddenly occured to him.
"Wait a second. They got scared after reading the letter. I don't think
they even noticed it was addressed to my closet, so why would they be
scared?" He asked himself.
That instant, several things that had confused Harry, suddenly clicked.
"They knew." He whispered. "THEY KNEW! All this time I wondered how they
could blame me for all those 'freaky things' when they didn't believe in
magic, but they knew!"
For a minute, Harry considered using some of his untested and experimental
spells on the Dursleys.
"Polymorph Other, yeah, that would be good, turn them into frogs, or maybe
rats. Maybe Fireball... no, that would blow up the house. How about
Levitation? I could trap them on the ceiling."
Harry continued ranting for a while, but finally calmed down, though he was
still furious at the Dursleys. He idily considered working out a Charm
spell, and using it on his aunt and uncle to find out the truth, but decided
against it, much for the same reasons that he never developed one to make
them treat him like Dudley. If they weren't willing to do it of their own
free will, then it wasn't worth it.
"However, a Divination spell to find out what's going on... 'that' is
another kettle of fish entirely." Harry said with a smile.
Unfortunately, Harry was unable to put his plan of working out a Divination
spell into motion, as that evening, when Vernon came home, he called Harry
out of his closet.
Vernon grinned at Harry, though it looked rather painful.
"Boy, er, Harry, I've been thinking, and this closet is getting a bit small
for you. So, your Aunt Petunia and I, have decided to move you into
Dudley's second bedroom."
"WHAT?" Dudley wailed. "But I 'need' that room! You can't give it to
him!"
Harry mentally shrugged, and gathered together his things to move them to
his new room. Thankfully, there was so much junk that Dudley had broken in
there, that Harry would be able to hide his magical stuff much more easily.
However, he still kept most of it under a concealment spell, so that the
Dursleys wouldn't notice.
Vernon had bought a bunch of second-hand furniture for the room. It was
pretty obvious that it was the cheapest the man could buy.
With Harry settled into his new room, the Dursleys seemed to relax a
little.
*Maybe they think that whoever wrote my letter is keeping an eye on them,
and will think that they're treating me right.* Harry thought to himself,
rolling his eyes a their stupidity.
The days passed quickly for Harry, as he tried working out a spell to
contact Headmaster Dumbledore, or Deputy-Headmaster McGonagall.
Unfortunately, Harry didn't believe that a simple name would be enough, and
whether it was simply his lack of belief, or his lack of skill, he was
quickly proven correct.
"BLAST AND BLOODY HELL!" Harry growled out as his tenth attempt at
divining anything about Albus Dumbledore collapsed. "I almost had it that
time! I'm sure of it!"
Before the spell had failed, Harry had been able to see a man, whom he was
certain was Dumbledore. However, it had only lasted a brief second, but
that was enough time for Harry to notice a few things about him.
Dumbledore was pretty much the poster child for the stereotypical fairy
tale wizard, with long silver hair and beard, robes, and such.
Harry sighed in frustration.
"Just what am I doing wrong here? What am I missing?" He asked himself,
as he started cleaning up the remains of his latest failed diviniation
attempt.
Most of the time, when working magic, Harry simply tended to visualise what
he wanted, and then will it to happen. For something more complex, such as
the divination spell, he decided that he needed something a bite more. He
had used an old mirror of Petunia's from an empty compact, and a piece of
paper with the words ALBUS DUMBLEDORE written on them. Harry had briefly
considered using his letter, but finally decided it was too risky.
"Hmm, maybe I'm doing the spell right, but he's just got some kind of
protection of scrying ward up." Harry muttered. "That's possible."
While straightening up,Harry just happened to glance over at his calender,
when he noticed something.
"It's almost my birthday." Unlike most children who enjoyed their
birthdays, Harry's was always a melancholy time for him. All he ever got
from the Dursleys were yells, and junk. His friends might have gotten him
something, but they didn't know when his birthday was, and they never saw
him during it. After all, the Dursley's would 'never' allow someone who
willingly associated with Harry Potter in their house.
Watching the clock, Harry softely counted down the seconds until midnight.
*Three, two, one.*
Midnight.
At the instant the clock struck midnight, there was a great pounding that
echoed throughout the house. Harry could hear Vernon and Petunia getting
up, yelling that they were coming, and complaining about people who were so
rude as to knock on a door in the middle of the night.
As soon as he knew that the two were downstairs, Harry cast a quick Knock
spell on his door, and silently crept to the stairs to find out what was
going on.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~
The Jedi Mind Trick is, of course, from the 'Star Wars' series, by George
Lucas. The Voice, is a trick from the Dune series, made famous by Frank
Herbert. Harry doesn't really 'use' the Voice, but he is aware of it. He's
trying to integrate the two together. The Knock spell is from the 'Dungeons
& Dragons' RPG. It's simply used to unlock doors that have been magically
or mechanically sealed.
Just to let you know, Harry doesn't have much in the way of combat spells,
and most of his other spells are pretty low level. Basically think Cantrips
and 1st-3rd level spells. He's got ideas for the bigger stuff, but he
simply hasn't had the time, or a place to practice them.
Hopefully, Harry's problems with the divination spell will show him to be
powerful, but not a Super!Harry... at least not yet ;)
Though, Harry 'is' supposed to be Voldie's 'equal' so that means he should
be much more powerful than the average wizard.
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