There are a great many strange things in this world…

…But no matter how odd…

…How incredible something may be…

…If a human does not touch it…

…If a human does not see it…

…If a human is not involved with it…

…It is simply something that happened.

Simply a matter that will fade with time.

Humans.
Mankind.
Homo Sapiens.

Humans are the most profoundly mysterious living things in the world!

Inexorable Inevitability

Chapter 1: Hitsuzen

I have found power in the mysteries of thought,

exaltation in the changing of the Muses;

I have been versed in the reasonings of men;

but Fate is stronger than anything I have known.

- Euripides

This dream was an odd one. Normally, the dreams he could not control were infected with verdant lights, blistering and cold, or high-pitched laughter ringing through empty hallways lined with doors leading nowhere. This, though...

The young man peered to the left, squinting his eyes. For some reason, his glasses had not carried over to the realm of dreams this time, but he found his eyesight unimpaired. Still, the motion was a familiar one and, though it did nothing to help pierce the darkness surrounding him, he did it anyway.

To the left, there was darkness. To the right, there was darkness. Above, below, in front, behind; he hovered in darkness so black that his pale flesh stood out in stark contrast.

The rational part of his brain told him that he should be panicking, but the notion was brushed aside. He was dreaming; nothing could hurt him here, though he was not so disbelieving of divination that he could rule out the possibility of being part of a vision. Normally though, his visions were short and to the point, if frustratingly vague; by his calculations, he had been hovering, staring blindly into the darkness for some time now.

Or perhaps it had been no time at all. He had no point of reference to compare with.

If only something would change this unaltering dream...

The asphalt was painful beneath his bare feet, but the pain was dulled by the shock of his transition. The bright light of an afternoon sun stung his unwary eyes, and he hid them behind his arm with a hiss. His thin bed shirt barely served as an adequate shield, but he made due, his eyes slowly adjusting to the new world he had been thrust into.

There was a dull roar in the background; traffic? Was he near a city then? The sound was muffled though, as if heard from a long distance, and he put it out of mind in favor of more interesting sights.

The building he stood before was certainly unique; he had never seen anything like it, though with his isolated childhood, new discoveries such as this were par for the course. He brushed back a strand of dark hair that had fallen into his eyes, examining the structure with a careful eye.

Both windows and moons were prominently displayed, the large, open windows giving the place an almost airy feel. He could almost imagine sitting by one of the windows, the sun reflecting off the skyscrapers beside the building (and that was an odd contrast, the antique-looking building cramped between the two modern-day structures). The moons themselves seemed more for decoration, but it leant the store a mystical air.

He shivered; even without the moons, the building, and the air around it, was saturated with magic. Foreign magic, Old magic, that made him wary and unwilling to enter, or even go near, it. His body jerked, as if in response to his thoughts, and he watched in mild fascination as he took a step forward not out of his own accord. Normally, he would struggle if control of his body was wrested from him, but he was dreaming; either the coming consequences would be harmless or something that needed to occur.

His musings were cut off as he stopped before the building's doors, which swept open silently. Inside stood two young girls, welcoming, and yet mischievous, smiles on their faces.

"We have a guest!~"
"We have a guest!~"

The two girls rushed forward, grabbing his arms. His mind froze; he could feel them, his arms were jostled by their skipping. Their voices, chirping and symphonic, still rang in his ears.

This was not an ordinary dream.

"We haven't had a guest in so long!~" The girl on his right exclaimed, her long pigtails nearly trailing on the ground. She pouted cutely and he almost chuckled at her put-out expression.

"Master was getting lonely!~" The other one exclaimed, her short hair bobbing as she nodded, her serious look dissolving as they both giggled.

"Um," he said, hesitatingly, a little taken aback as they froze, turning to face him with bright smiles. "Could you please tell me where I am?"

"A store," A masculine voice rang out, echoing slightly. He jumped, not expecting an answer from someone other than the girls. The girls giggled, pulling back a portion of the wall (a screen door? Had his dream led him somewhere Asian?), revealing the speaker in all his glory.

A sable-haired man lay limply on a luxurious couch, his head resting on a mountain of pillows behind him. Smoke curled and danced around the room, the source being the butterfly-emblazoned pipe in the man's hand. Though he normally could not stand the scent of tobacco, whatever the man was smoking left a pleasant smell in the air, something relaxing and hypnotic. A dangerous scent, he thought as he shook his head.

The man looked amused now, his thin glasses flashing in the dim light. His hair (which was almost as messy as his own, a feat he had thought until now to be unrepeatable) flowed like silk as he shifted on his seat, and his different colored eyes mesmerized him for a second. One was a deep blue, an oceanic blue that he could see would be brilliant when lit with emotion, something his seemingly-bored gaze was lacking; its twin was a sharp gold, something that didn't quite fit the others face. It was too shielded, too piercing, too watchful, and it clashed with the blue eye to create a contrast that, set in the pale man's face, was quite beautiful.

His thoughts were wandering again; any motivation he might ever have felt to smoke vanished. It distracted him too much, and he needed his wits about him for this not-dream.

"If I might ask," he began politely, causing the other man's lips to quirk. "What kind of store is this?"

"This store is..." The man trailed off, drawing his leg up to clutch to his chest, his intricate robes flowing around his thin frame. "Where wishes are granted."

"Wishes are granted!~" The short-haired girl chimed.

"If it's possible for our customer...~"
"If it's possible for our customer...~"

"We'll grant any wish!~" The long-haired girl finished. The two ran over to the man's side, their master embracing them in a loving hug. He was startled by the amount of love he saw in the man's eyes that were, just a second ago, so apathetic.

"Wishes?" He asked after a moment, hesitant to break up the familial moment.

"Yes," the mysterious man said, hefting the two girls up onto his couch. The two started playing with his hair, cooing slightly. "Just as Maru and Moro said," he finished, pointing first at the long-haired girl and then at the short-haired one.

"And you grant people's wishes?" He asked, suspicious of the man's proclamation.

"For a price, of course," the man replied, petting Maru lightly, sending the girl into a fit of giggles.

"Such as?"

"A soul," he replied casually, as if bartering with souls was an every-day occurrence.

"What!" he exclaimed, paling rapidly. To dabble in such dark magic was unthinka-

"Oh, calm down," the man said, waving a hand lackadaisically. "A 'soul' can mean many things. I don't mean that I would kill someone as a fee for their wish. Why would I want to take on the crushing weight of murder onto my soul? Nothing could ever make up for taking on such a weight."

His fist clenched, and he bit his lip instinctively. Just one more reminder of what he would become if he managed to succeed.

"Now we're getting to the root of the issue," the man said, smirking. "Tell me, what is your name?"

"...Harry Potter, why?" Harry replied, confused at the man's odd request.

The other's heterochromatic eyes glinted with some unknown emotion. "And your birthdate?"

"Why do you want to know?" Harry asked defensively.

The man fell silent, watching the smoke curl out of his pipe. Harry though the man hadn't heard him and was about to ask once more, but the supposed wish-granter suddenly spoke once more. "With the knowledge of a person's name, one can lay hold of a piece of the person's soul. With the knowledge of a birthdate, one is able to lay hold of the plot of the life path from birth to now and from now onward. So you see, giving out your name so casually like that was really foolish of you!" The man smiled, though it was distant and his eyes were clouded, as if lost in memories.

Harry's lip curled in an unpleasant sneer, though he quickly beat the uncontrollable expression down. Dammit, why did everyone he meet try to control him in some way? "If you know my name, then it is only right that you tell me yours."

"Oh?" The man asked with a raised eyebrow. Harry bristled. Sitting so lazily, pipe in one hand and his head propped in another, his smirk never leaving his face; the man looked like he was mocking him somehow. "In that case then, you can call me Ichihara Kimihiro. Or Watanuki Kimihiro - Kimihiro Watanuki for you, I suppose. It makes no difference; they're all assumed names anyway."

"Tch." Harry turned away; Ichihara was seriously pissing him off. The man was getting under his skin worse than Snape or Malfoy ever did!

"Now, you have a wish for me?" Ichihara asked, bringing his pipe to his lips. The elegantly simplistic motion was almost unnatural, as was the halo of smoke that encircled his head.

"Why do you say that?" Harry asked in irritation

"You wouldn't be here if you didn't," Ichihara replied.

"My body acted on its own accord," Harry said with a huff. "I did not want to come here."

"And yet you have, which means this meeting of ours... was hitsuzen," Ichihara said cryptically.

"Hitsuzen?" Harry asked, his curiosity perked by the odd word. After a conversation totally in English (or at least translated into English; the shop's characteristics, along with the trio's foreign sounding names, meant that he was probably in a foreign country, which meant that some form of magic was translating their conversation into something recognizable), the untranslated word was very dissonant. "What's that?"

"I could define it for you..." Ichihara said, grabbing a book from a table beside the couch and waving it in the air ('Kodansha Japanese Desk Dictionary, Second Edition' it said; he was in Japan then?). "But it would be so much more fun for you to do it yourself. Consider it homework!"

"As if I needed more work," Harry grumbled.

"Speaking of schoolwork though," Ichihara said, rising from his couch and gliding over towards Harry on bare feet, his robe/kimono/far too intricate piece of clothing trailing behind him. He leaned down slightly, whispering in Harry's ear with a wicked smirk, "Don't you need to wake up now?"

"What?" Harry asked-

-sitting up in bed, his glasses askew. Fixing his glasses, Harry glanced around wildly before settling back in his bed, groaning. What an odd dream! A cross-dressing mysterious shop-owner, two slightly-creepy little girls with a fondness for speaking as one, and a shop that granted wishes; Harry laughed at how ridiculous his dream sounded.

"Oi, Harry!" Ron shouted, wrenching back the curtains to Harry's four postured bed. "I was just going to wake you up, only to find that you've been holding out on us!"

"What?" Harry asked in confusion, glancing from Ron to his other roommates. Neville seemed embarrassed, his cheeks flushed a rosy red, while Dean and Seamus were snickering to each other, glancing at him every once in awhile.

"You should be more careful though, Harry," Ron continued, not noticing his friend's confusion. "With Hermione so stressed about OWLs this year, she'd freak if she saw you smoking of all things. I'll cover for you, but we don't want Hermione blowing her lid, right?"

"Smoking..." Harry trailed off, reaching for his wand on his bedside table, freezing at the sight of what lay beside his wand. With shaking fingers, he carefully touched the thin object, gasping as he felt its weight. It was real, he could feel it...

A butterfly-emblazoned pipe, straight from the world of dreams.

Well, here's a new project! This plunny came out of nowhere; I was on deviantart and, lo and behold, I found some odd picture of a Harry Potter and xxxHoLic crossover, and the plunny was born. I have no clue where this is going, but then again, doesn't that seem to be CLAMP's style, even if we all know it isn't?

Now, just some logistical things to get out of the way (for those who are confused at what the hell is going on, aka those not up to date, which means spoilers ahead):

-This story takes place ahead of where the manga is, which is when Watanuki's customer is a blind woman with a musical instrument (new story arc, yay). Therefore, this is officially in xxxHoLic Rou.

-For those who don't know, xxxHoLic Rou began in chapter 186, which started four years after xxxHoLic ended. Yep, that means there was a timeskip.

-In xxxHoLic Rou, Watanuki has been the shopkeeper for four years now. So far, Maru, Moro, Mokona, Doumeki, and Kohane have been re-introduced (with an allusion to the old fortune teller as well, by Kohane). No mentions yet of Himawari, Mugetsu, or any other spirits yet.

-As alluded to, Harry is currently in his fifth year at Hogwarts. I am well aware that the time lines don't match, but with all the screwing around the Tsubasa crew has done (here's looking at you, Syaoran, every single one of you), I refuse to accept that the time line is absolutely perfect. So therefore, it works. Somehow.

Okay, that's it for timeline stuff now; or, at least, I think that is enough for a base. Any questions will be answered to the best of my abilities and if I can answer them without spoiling anything. But go ahead and leave some questions in a review; or, you know, just leave a review in general. I'll give you xxxHoLic/Tsubasa plushies if you do.

Oh, and because I know someone is going to ask, yes there will be some romance. No, it will not be Watanuki/Harry. Yes, there will probably be Doumeki/Watanuki. If Harry does get paired with someone, then his boy/girlfriend will most likely be an... unique choice, considering my track record of pairings. Other than that, nothing is decided as of yet.

Anyway, that's all for now. I hope that this venture of mine is successful and, if not, I hope that at least one person finds some form of enjoyment from this piece.

Until next we meet,

Ariaeris~

Ps: Does anyone know how to make hearts (alt+3/keyboard) actually stay in a document on this website? Maru and Moro aren't just the same without their heart-talk, though I hope tildes are sufficient replacements for now.

Disclaimer: Don't own. All quoted material belongs to CLAMP. I am just borrowing, with no intended profit to be made, save for the emotional satisfaction I will receive from the well-written reviews that you all will no doubt be giving me.