Author:
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ianthe_waitingRating: T
Disclaimer: The Harry Potter books and their characters are the property of JK Rowling. This is a work of fan-fiction. No infringement is intended, and no money is being made from this story. I am just borrowing the puppets, but this is my stage.
Genre: Drabble
Warnings: None
Summary: #94 – Journey. The Fool’s journey is disencumbered.
Word Count: 1,179 words.
Author's Notes: Drabble: a slice of fic in less than 1500 words. Part of the FEH universe.
Prompt 94 – Journey
The goal was a settlement east of Ust-Avam, a journey in which Hermione Granger was loath to make in the bitter cold of the Arctic. She had never been so far away from anything resembling civilization, yet she walked through the Siberian tundra in what should have been a nice August day, wrapped in a fur cloak, with knee high fur wrapped boots upon her feet. Warming and shield Charms kept the bite of the cold off her exposed chin, her eyes covered with goggles, her head under a thermal hat lined with more fur.
The Nganasan people had been quite kind in Ust-Avam after her inquiring as to the whereabouts of a shaman, the one called the Crone. Hermione knew that by the way the people looked at her, the shape of her face, the tone of her voice, that they believed they would find her frozen to death into the snow—another outsider fool. The Nganasan people were once a people of incredible magic, Hermione could feel it when she stood near them in the yurts. The magic had died out, the Nganasan people only of a popular of over eight hundred left from what had been thousands.
They were about to move south, many had already gone, but the people Hermione had found were waiting for a warm day to pull up the poles and move again as their people had always moved for thousands of years—south, in anticipation of deep winter.
The goal was the Crone. Gather intelligence, an anthropological study of the remaining, true shaman left in the Arctic. It was one of many tests Hermione had to pass to finishing her F.O.I.L. training. She had spoken to a Yupik shaman only a week earlier, referring Hermione to seek the Crone in the ‘old lands of the ancient magic.’ The Yupik shaman had sensed Hermione’s power, and Hermione sensed the Yupik shaman’s fear of her and the spirits who walked in her shadow.
The Crone could call the spirits out of her shadow, the Yupik shaman said, and Hermione would be able to walk the world unburdened.
And so Hermione journeyed, and when she saw blue smoke in the sky, she knew she had found the Crone.
“I have been waiting all week for you, copper eyes.”
Hermione closed the flap of the small, strange smelling yurt, the only light coming from a pit fire in the middle of the structure, and from the bowl of a long stemmed piped perched in a near blackened, claw like left hand.
“Come to the fire.”
Hermione removed her goggles, knowing that the voice, which reminded her of rasping dead leaves, had not seen her eyes. She complied however, tucking her goggles, gloves, and hat into the inside pocket of her Transfigured cloak. Sitting across from the shadowed figure, Hermione waited patiently, her eyes peering through the fire to find a tiny figure of a woman.
“You drag spirits into my tent, copper eyes,” the woman said again, exhaling fragrant blue smoke as she spoke. Learning forward to knock the ash from the pipe, Hermione could see the Crone in the firelight.
The woman was ancient, but the only wrinkles upon her darkened face were about her thin mouth and her blazing blood coloured eyes. Her hair was long and white, hanging about her thin shoulders much like Hermione’s, in tiny braids. But in those braids were bones, beads, and eider feathers. The Crone looked very much like a shaman would.
“The old walrus in the ‘new place,’ sent you here?”
Hermione took a breath, inhaling the smoke of the fire and the pipe.
“Yes. He said that I had spirits in my shadow that you could call out…”
“And eat, yes. The spirits have journeyed with you, and they mean you no good.”
Hermione frowned. “I don’t understand.”
The Crone laughed, her hand moving to refill the herb in the pipe, and Hermione realized that her hands were not merely blackened, but tattooed extensively.
“You are a witch of the pale ones, the pale ones lost the language to speak with the spirits long ago. It is no wonder that you had not noticed, copper eyes.
You are powerful, you have seen many things never to be seen by the eyes of the living, but you are still ‘The Fool.’”
Hermione recoiled, the Elder Wand slowly slipping from her arm holster and into her hand.
“A holy Fool who is on her journey toward freedom of the madness that has surrounded her.”
The Crone had noticed Hermione’s wand, and slowly Hermione shoved the Elder Wand back into place.
The red-eyed Crone locked orbs with the copper-eyed woman, and through the fire between them, they regarded one another.
“One spirit was good, and has left you of its own accord. The one the drags upon you is the spirit of the one you killed—a friend who became an enemy.”
Hermione nodded slowly.
“Shall I pluck it from your shadow and eat it?”
“I wouldn’t eat that spirit,” Hermione whispered.
“Because it is a mad?” the Crone cackled.
Hermione nodded.
“No matter. Only bad spirits are eaten—and shit out like the rubbish they are…”
Hermione smirked. The Crone was mad herself.
“This spirit, he was a friend once…” Hermione began.
“Means nothing now that the spirit means to drag you back, copper eyes. No love in that shade, no good will. It will not let you go forward to where you need to go.”
Hermione closed her eyes.
“Will it hurt?”
The Crone cackled. “You or it?”
Hermione said nothing, opening her eyes again. When her eyes met the Crone’s, the woman’s face hardened.
“It will hurt, but you’ve hurt worse. You bear the scars more beautifully than any man or woman I have ever seen—and I have lived twelve and two hundred turns about the Great Eye.”
Hermione was not impressed. Little impressed her after seeing the face of the universe at the end of time.
“Do it then, what is you fee?”
The Crone grinned, revealing teeth that had been filed to points. Hermione was not shaken by the demonic appearance. “What I want, you would never give.”
Hermione narrowed her amber eyes, the Crone knew of the Hallows in her pocket.
“I will take nothing, copper eyes. Eating a spirit will suffice. It has been ages since I had such a powerful spirit.”
Hermione sat very still as the Crone rose from her place in fur pelts arranged by the fire. The woman stood, at most, four feet in height. She wore furs about her body, leaving her skinny legs and arms exposed. And as she moved, Hermione cocked an eyebrow at the nimble manner in which the ancient Crone’s bare feet fell upon the furs.
“You have journeyed far, copper eyes, and with this spirit I pluck and eat…”
Hermione felt the claw like fingers dig into the back of her hair, the nails scraping her scalp.
“…the Fool takes one step closer to enlightenment.”
And there was considerable pain.
- Mood:
groggy
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Comments
Good for Hermione that her spirit is now free to move onward, sad for Harry in that now his soul is truly doomed. I guess I was kind of hoping that in some way, maybe in the afterworld there would be a way to give Harry peace :( Any chance of a drabble like that, where after death Harry goes through difficult trials and finally finds the light again?
But I'm glad you liked it!
Redemption for Harry...*sighs* Maybe, I really don't know, fitting it into FEH somewhere, I mean. Someone in the story has to have an unhappy ending. Just not Hermione or Draco.
Don't get me wrong, I like Harry, I really do...but happiness? In another drabble.
Maybe something where Harry has to fight his demons in the netherworlds. He comes out stronger, but maybe his spirit needs to end up going alone until the end of Earth's time helping others without people ever knowing that he did. That's sort of sad and angsty :( Because Harry was a people person, not someone who did things alone. He needs people. So being alone for 9+ billion years before he could rest would be painful. Then at the end he can rest peacefully. At the end, he finally is able to be with the people he loves in spirit because he didn't deserve it when he was insane. He has to payback before he can though.
Edited at 2008-05-08 08:30 am (UTC)
Currently, I am really pushing my reserves to write drabbles. I force myself to write something everyday...like channeling a spirit or a piece of something floating in the atmosphere. Most times its crap, other times not.
As for Harry. I really don't know, like I said, I'm just about tapped out for a while. I need a nap, or a vacation. *faints*
I am sooo behind on Bleach, and I did not even think of it when I typed this one out. Hm. Maybe that's where the subconscious thought came from...Hm.
"Only bad spirits are eaten—and shit out like the rubbish they are…”
I wish i could do that!!... Life would be much easier!! lol
Bad things do stay with us either we want or not! It's not easy to let go!
to much catholic influence , i'm afraid!lol
I know about Spanish Baroque art, some medieval art, Arabic influence, etc. But that's about it. How limited, eh? I need to do some more research.
Shaman, originally, is a concept unique to Mongolian and Siberian native peoples...which came to the Americas during the migration from the last ice age. Africa has a type of shaman, which goes under the name shaman in English for lack of a better word.
Witches, healers, sages, seers, there are all sorts of names for the different cultures. But it all ties into a universal belief of sorts...either animistic or more complex beliefs in an unseen world. I tend to avoid the more occultic beliefs and stick to the facts, but it is interesting all the same.
*chuckle* Catholicism has its own mysticisms, I suppose. I was not raised Catholic, but I had to immerse myself in Catholicism to understand much of Western Art up until the Seventeenth Century. I have learned the Sacraments, the Saints, the ritual...but I'm still learning. It is a complex belief!