replies

Epilogue
New Game Plus

Harry set down the four tankards of ale he picked up at the bar and pulled one to his seat. "To all that being over."

"Hear, hear," Dudley cheered, grabbing his own ale.

"Easy for you to say," muttered Draco, eventually grabbing the last mug for himself. "You realize I never got the gold for all the mana I collected, right? Now I have a bunch of jars that are good for pretty much nothing."

Hermione reached over to pat him on the back. "You said you don't know why Gaian wands can't cast Earth spells when the opposite is true, didn't you? Maybe you can experiment."

"I guess."

Shaking his head, Harry just sat back and took in the ambiance of the bar they had discovered as they made the trek back from the woods where the temple dropped them off. They had no clue where they were, but they knew that no matter where they landed they would need to Diagon Village to pick up Draco's mustid. Thankfully it took less than a day to find a little town called Carrowton, which it seemed to be the only settlement at all for miles and miles. The only reason they had found it at all was thanks to the compass they claimed from the Trial of the Mind, and already he could see it was far more useful than they first assumed.

He just would have preferred it if Carrowton had more going for it than a mustid stable, a few farms, and a little bar and inn called the Lovely Goat.

Harry forced himself to relax. He and Dudley had been in plenty of places that were no better. Scunth, where they met Hermione, was just one example. No, in reality he had to admit that it was the owner of this bar that put him on edge. The man's white beard and blue eyes were too familiar by half to those they had seen on Dumbledore. He caught himself watching the bartender again and shook his head. It was probably just that the old wizard's death was still such a recent memory, causing him to see similarities that were not truly there.

"Even if I do experiments, that still needs resources. Not to mention food for me," Draco continued after a few moments. "That's the problem. I always wound up investing most of the money I made from that mana into hiring people to find and retrieve the next batch. I have some money squirreled away, but not enough to live off of for long."

Dudley slung one arm over his shoulder. "Sounds like you'll have to get a real job like the rest of us, then."

The Sorcerer groaned and dropped his head onto his arm.

Harry shook his head with a smile and turned to Hermione. "What about you? What kind of plans do you have in front of you?"

Rather than return his jibe as he expected, Hermione frowned. "I really don't know. I want to head back to the Riverlands for a bit to check on Geoff's sister. By now the alchemist should have been able to prepare Sandalphon's Sigh for her, so I'm hoping she'll be healed. After that? I don't really know." She looked up and shrugged. "I spent the last few months with Geoff and his crew working on that. Besides, it isn't like I have a normal group I need to get back to. I guess I'll just… wander around and see what kind of work is available?"

That was right, Harry thought to himself. She had told him herself that she did not have a set group because she had yet to find a party she liked enough to join long-term. He would be sad to see her go; even knowing her for just a couple of weeks, it was clear they worked together well.

A slow blink, and he looked from Hermione to Draco and then to Dudley. The Knight caught his eyes and frowned, not seeing the possibility that had just crossed Harry's mind.

"So you don't have any jobs lined up, and Draco doesn't want to have to go out looking for jobs in the first place." Hermione nodded, and Draco gave him a grunt of acknowledgement. "Dud and I don't have any firm plans either, but something we've noticed is that a lot of jobs are easier with more people, and a bigger party opens up the possibility for bigger and better opportunities."

Now Dudley was following, and Hermione also appeared to have caught on. "What exactly are you proposing?" she asked.

"I'm just thinking out loud," he answered with a nonchalant shrug. "I know I've enjoyed working alongside both of you, and Dudley at least hasn't complained about it."

"Nah, it's been fun," Dudley agreed.

"It'll depend on the two of you, obviously, but if we get along and work well together, maybe it would be worthwhile for us to stick together for a while longer. If nothing else, there's safety in numbers in case Neville's mad science project gets loose."

"Don't joke about that," Draco warned, though when he raised his head a faint smile was playing on his lips. "That's the stuff nightmares are made of.

"But…" He tapped his fingers on the table for a moment. "I wouldn't be against working together. I did just say I don't have anything better to do for the moment."

"If things didn't work out, there wouldn't be problems if we split up and ran into each other later on, right?" Hermione asked, her ears sinking. "I mean, things have been fine so far, but just in case…"

Harry looked back at Dudley, who shrugged. "If things don't work out, they don't work out. No hard feelings."

"Okay. Then I'm in."

"Brilliant." He leaned back in his chair before another thought came to mind. "Then again, we still don't have any idea of where to go, but that we can figure out as we go, I guess."

Hermione smiled and reached into her pouch. "I think I can help out with that one." Bringing her hand back into few, she laid a tube of paper on the table and unrolled it to reveal green continents and red ley lines.

"That's why you were digging through Dumbledore's pockets!" Harry exclaimed as realization hit.

She shrugged, her smile growing wider and toothier. "It didn't seem like he was going to get much use out of it. We, on the other hand, will."

"It sounds like you already have a plan," Draco pointed out.

"Not a plan, exactly. More an ultimate goal." She shrugged and tapped the western continent. "We would need money to buy supplies, a ship, and a crew, and we probably need to gather some fame to make all those easier, but I'd like to see what's going on in one of these other continents. How have people there reacted to the Transition? Are there different races on each island? I have so many questions now."

"Then we better get to answering them," Harry said as a bright smile of his own appeared. "We have a whole world to explore, and suddenly I don't know if one lifetime will be enough to see everything it has to offer."

And that is Eternal Fantasy. Took way longer to get here than it should have with less than I initially envisioned, but sometimes that's just the way it goes. I will say that once I sat down to finish it, the last four chapters came a lot easier than the ones preceding it.

Not to mention, I already have another story that is starting to dribble out my ears. You can find chapter 1 of Spells in Silence on my profile page. I have a suspicion it will come significantly easier if the speed with which I wrote that chapter is any indication.

Silently Watches out.