Title: Gnosis
Fandoms: The Elder Scrolls/Harry Potter
Author: AngelicSentinel
Rating: Teen (Explicit mirror on Ao3)
Relationships: Harry Potter/Luna Lovegood, Aela/Dragonborn (These are end pairings. There will be a number of others; only in fiction does one person settle down with the first person they ever have a relationship with. Even so, romantic entanglements do not take effect until at least the third arc, as romance is NOT a focus of this fic.)
Characters: Harry Potter, Female Dragonborn, Aela the Huntress, a number of prominent NPCs
Warnings: Canon-typical violence, Violence involving children, Underage drinking, Political machinations, Found family, Family feels, Het and Slash, Coming of age, Slow burn
Summary: A small Voice calls from the Throat of the World, and the Dragonborn comes. One person can shape the world, but two can change the realms forever.

Please note: I don't mind constructive criticism in polite language, but please refrain from anything negative, especially about content or relationships. Thank you.

Hogwarts Castle, Scotland, United Kingdom,

Wednesday, 25th of December, 1991 A.D.

Library

Harry Potter had made his way to the Restricted Section with a sole-minded purpose: to find the information on Nicolas Flamel. The dark of the library gave him little light to see, but if he raised his lamp, he could view the titles. These books were old. They had faded titles. Some of the spines were cracked, and one book looked like it was bound in human skin. Harry shuddered. Still another had an old red-brown stain. Harry didn't touch that one.

Covered in his invisibility cloak, he cracked open the spine of a small brown book that looked interesting. He'd found it hidden in the back of the bookcase, and he'd pulled it out almost as an afterthought. Still, he had to start somewhere.

It didn't seem to fit with the rest of the books. Most of the other strange books had letters he could understand, judging by their titles. This one held no title, merely markings that looked like scratches. He opened it up and saw more of the scratches, along with a title, On the Cosmology of Mundus. He didn't know what that meant. The book had neither index nor a table of contents. He continued anyway.

He flipped past the title page and read the elegant capitals on the first page.

"IN THE BEGINNING…

…ANU wanted to fill the Void, but Padomay had shattered the twelve worlds of creation. Anu and his children forged the remnants to create Nirn, but they didn't use them all. Some fragments Padomay knocked outside of space and time in his anger, and these became the Elder Scrolls. Others became relics of outside worlds. Each held power, but not all of their power was the same.

Some fragments the children of the blood—the Aedra and the Daedra—took for their own.

Daedra, being solely Padomay's blood and elements of chaos, surrounded Mundus with their fragments, blocking Nirn from Aetherius. The fragments the Daedra took became the respective Princes' planes of Oblivion: the Deadlands, Apocrypha, the Shivering Isles, and so on.

The Aedra, being of Anu's and Padomay's intermingled blood, helped Anu craft Creation. Most of their fragments became the heavenly planes of Aetherius: Sovngarde, where the souls of the heroic Nords celebrate their valor eternally, is one such realm. The god of this realm is Shor, better known to the elves as Lorkhan.

Shor tricked the Aedra into creating Mundus, the mortal plane, which encompasses Nirn and most of the other Aedric planets. In return for his trickery, the Aedra slew him, his body becoming the moons Masser and Secunda…

…BUT that is not the entire story of Creation: Another fragment knocked out of time and space floated in the Void. It caught the eye of Julianos, Lord of Wisdom and Logic and Contradiction. But Julianos could not form this realm into his alone, and called Magnus—who was magic in its basest essence and the Architect of Creation—to him. Still, together they could not do it. The new planet sat in the Void for infinity or for no time at all until they decided to seek out Akatosh, the head Divine and Lord of Time.

Intrigued by the barren planet outside the purview of Aetherius and Oblivion, Akatosh agreed to place the planet alone in Time to grow without Nirn's influence. However, Magnus had already infused the planet with ambient magic by having a hand in creating it.

As the years passed, Earth grew into a thriving world with a large magical community. Because Magnus had not torn a hole to Aetherius as he did on Nirn, not all people born on Earth had magical ability…

…WHEN some of Akatosh's children rebelled against Alduin, Akatosh gave them sanctuary here, and so the dragons came into this world…"

Nothing on Flamel. It was an interesting read, but it wasn't what he was seeking. Harry sighed and closed the book. He absentmindedly tucked it into his bag. He picked up another book from the bottom shelf. It was black, silver and heavy. He flipped it open, and it started screaming at him.

Panicked, he ran out of the room, extinguishing his lantern, barely dodging Filch. Snape was not far behind him. The cloak concealed him, but Harry knew they could hear his footsteps, so he ran harder. At night and without a lantern, Hogwarts confused him, and he wound up hopelessly lost.

Darting into an unused classroom, Harry slipped behind the door, breathing hard. He'd wait until Filch and Snape left the corridor. That had been a close call. Walking farther into the room, he saw something leaned against the wall. He moved closer. Tall and golden, it stood on clawed feet.

It was a mirror. Taking off his cloak and folding it neatly to one side, he walked towards the reflective side and gasped. Desperate flight from Filch forgotten, Harry Potter gazed into the strange mirror where dozens of his relatives surrounded him. They had to be relatives; most of them looked like him. Uncle Vernon, Dudley, and Petunia were conspicuously absent. Maybe it showed the only the dead or the afterlife?

In the center of the mirror were two figures that could only be his parents. His father had messy hair and glasses just like him. His mother had bright red hair and a kind smile. He waved shyly, seeing his parents' reflections wave back at him. He sighed, staring at their outlines, memorizing them. His father crinkled his hazel eyes, smiling proudly at him. As he flicked his eyes to his mother, she seemed to be holding out her arms, reaching for him. A hint of despair colored her bright green eyes as she looked at him. She placed her hand against the opposite side of the glass.

In that moment, he wished with all his heart for his mother. For someone to love him and take care of him. His very soul called out for the kindred presence of another. She was dead, she couldn't be real, he told himself firmly. He reached out his hand and then pulled back, afraid to touch the mirror. He shook his head and resolved himself. He was a Gryffindor. He would not be afraid. He touched the smooth glass of the mirror, placing his hand so it looked like it was touching his mother's.

She rippled and changed. His parents had disappeared. Staring at the mirror in shock, he saw a mountain, tall and proud and cold, beset by a blizzard. What looked like thousands of stairs curved their way around it. A lone figure climbed the stairs to the top, buffeted by the storm, but still soldiering gamely on.

He pulled his hand away, and the silvered glass rippled as if it were a curtain. Intrigued, Harry touched the mirror again, this time putting pressure on it. The mirror's pane gave just a little. It felt like silk. Smoke wreathed its way around Harry as he pressed harder, obscuring the mirror, filling the room. He heard whispering, a low murmur of voices he could not make out as the images on the mirror went blank, leaving the arch cast in shadow. The mist caressed him, beckoning him inside with its long delicate fingers.

He pushed harder, and the mirror grabbed hold of him, pulling him in. He struggled, but the silver mist still cocooned him in its embrace, taking him further in. He couldn't feel the bottom half of his body. As it reached his face, filling his nose and mouth and lungs, he screamed. The sound of drums pounded loudly in his ears. His soul burned. He heard singing.

His invisibility cloak lay forgotten on the floor.