Once Upon a Ruby Star
A/N: I ent dead! Honest I'm not. Writers block has got a firm hold on me at the moment though. It may show in this piece but I wanted the first chapter done coz it driving my brain crazy lol. ANYWAY another new fic from me :D
Chapter 1
Thunder and Lightning
Very Very Frightening
Harry Potter sat alone in his bedroom at Number Four Privet Drive listening to the rain falling outside his barred window. Locked in his room when he was not doing chores boredom was bound to creep up on anyone. With his school supplies burnt and the promise that he would never return to Hogwarts Harry's holidays were bleak.
He knew that the Dursley's would have no choice over his schooling when it came to September, but until that time Harry was locked in a solitary hell with only his hated relatives.
His wand was the only thing he had saved. All his other items, his invisibility cloak, photo album, schoolbooks and robes were now ashes. He had only saved his wand by threatening his relatives when they tried to burn it. They had believed him when he said that if they destroyed it they would blow up the entire street.
It was approaching midnight and outside his window a storm raged. It was quite a storm indeed, and if it weren't for his relative's occasional screams of alarm he might have enjoyed it. The weather had been extremely turbulent ever since his return from school, and the TV was at a loss to explain the sudden change from the warmest driest summer to the hottest wettest summer.
Harry couldn't care less one way or another. This storm was just what he needed right now. Lightning struck throughout the town, each bolt seemingly of a strange colour hidden within the brightness. He sat at the window and watched the rain hammer onto the glass inches from his nose. Lightning struck the play park down the road and Harry gasped with delight. His dour, depressed mood was lifting as the storm grew worse. Thunder rocked the house as his relative's screams were lost in the noise.
Grasping the safety bars in front of him Harry pressed his face as close to them as possible and laughed loudly, hysterically, his entire body suffused with energy and delight!
Then ruby red lightning struck the house, and Harry had time to gasp before the world around him exploded.
He struggled against unseen hands, unrecognisable words fluttering into his brain. Unable to open his eyes, unable to see, he screamed, trying desperately to reach open air, to be able to breath. Red flames licked his skin and burned his soul, leaving him a blackened husk only to be reborn again in painful clarity.
For how long he writhed in the darkness he could not tell, but when he finally woke to bright sunshine and no pain he stared about in confusion.
He did not recognise the house he was in. Lying on a bed in what appeared to be a country kitchen, his mattress made of bird feathers, the world looked nothing like what he remembered it. Gone were the grey tones he remembered, and everything looked bright and fresh. From where he sat he could see out of the window, and he could hear all manner of wildlife chattering outside.
He turned his head sharply when someone entered the room. A young woman entered, her eyes bright and a small smile on her face. When she saw Harry her smile widened.
"Good morning!" she said brightly. "I do not know if you understand me but my name is Helga."
"My name is Harry… where am I?"
She clapped her hands and walked over to the fireplace, taking a ladle and stirring what was cooking in the cauldron. Harry was surprised to see her chattering excitedly to a house-elf before the little creature popped out of the room.
"I don't know what you said young man but not to worry, Higgit is going to get a friend of mine and she'll be able to help I'm sure."
Harry looked at her in confusion. The woman couldn't understand him? He could understand her perfectly. Had the lightning damaged him somehow?
Lightning! All of a sudden his memories of that night came rushing back to him.
"My aunt, where is she? Where are my relatives?"
The woman just came and shushed him, stroking his hair out of his face gently. He grabbed the hand and continued to ask but she shook her head and went back to her cooking.
Harry sat in silence, unable to understand what was happening. When he tried to get up the woman just shooed him back until he sat with a flop.
The clothes he was wearing were not his own, he realised. They were well made and actually fitted him. They were also old fashioned, but then again, most of the Wizarding fashions were old fashioned.
A woman entered the room. Harry hadn't heard her in the house and he jumped out of his skin when she suddenly appeared in his view. She was probably in her twenties and had brown eyes and blonde hair. She and the other woman were of a similar height but this one looked heavily pregnant.
"So you're awake." She said in a firm voice with a faintly Scottish accent. She gripped him by his chin in an equally firm grip and tilted his face this way and that. "Well it's about time. What's your name?"
"Harry, my name's Harry." He said in a muffled voice from her hand. She frowned at him and looked over at the other woman, Helga.
"Nope, I couldn't understand him either."
"Well then, young man whoever you are, if neither I nor Helga know the language you are using then it must be a very remote one indeed."
He stared at these two women in awe. "What the… You really don't understand me?? But I'm speaking English! ENGLISH! The same as you! Harry! My. Name. Is. Harry. Potter. Now do you understand? Harry bloody Potter! The great Boy-Who-Lived!" Sarcasm was evident in his voice as he said this. The two women just looked at him in mild amusement, as he got more and more exasperated.
"Helga, why don't you serve lunch and I'll go see if I can find the translator charm I found a few months ago." The woman pushed herself up carefully and waddled silently out of the room.
"Well now young sir, lets see if you can stand shall we?"
Harry scowled at her and stood on his own before she was halfway to him. He strode to the window and looked out. He didn't recognise the vast wilderness that surrounded the house.
"I wonder if you recognise where you are." She mused.
"No." Harry said glumly.
"No?" Harry turned to look at her with a frown. She was frowning at him too. "Did you say 'no'?"
"Yes." He replied slowly. He nodded for emphasis.
"So you understand us?"
"Yes! I'm speaking English like you are!"
"I only got yes then. Well, it seems you know a little English then. We'll have to teach you it fully if we're going to talk at all. Though maybe we should just teach you Scottish straight out? A fresh start might be easiest for you…" she pushed him into a chair at a large oak table and got four bowls out and set them at the table. They were beautifully carved wood bowls.
Harry picked his up and turned it over, admiring it as he replied. "But I am speaking English."
The other woman had returned while he was distracted, a book in hand. "I think this should have it in it."
"Rowan, the boy understands a little English."
"He does?" that caught her attention. "Those bowls were made by my husband from the Rowan tree that gave me my name before he died. He was gifted with wood to such an extent the royal family became interested in him. Too interested. The village that he was born in lynched him, and now my unborn child and I are left to fend for ourselves."
"But… what about the police? Or the Aurours? They should have saved him!" Harry was stunned. He hadn't heard about anything like that for centuries.
Rowan hummed with a pensive face. "I didn't understand a word he said Helga. Are you sure?"
"YES!" Harry said loudly. "NO! Yes yes yes! Yes I understand! Yes I speak English!"
"Well, he certainly knows yes and no. Lets see if he can say our names. My name is-"
"Rowan! And she's called Helga," he said pointing to the woman who was serving some sort of stew into the bowls
Rowan, who had been leaning towards Harry, sat back and stared at him thoughtfully. When she spoke next her Scottish accent was thick, and only though his years spent in Scotland did he understand what she said.
"Do you think he's a wizard?"
"How else can you explain it? He appears from nowhere in that storm over by the Star Stone. His arrival changed the Star Stone! And now we wake to find a young man in our house where there wasn't one before? A young man who doesn't speak our language, who had been in a coma for three weeks, a coma you said he should not wake from for over a year. The question is, is he a Wizard born or not?" Helga's voice had taken on a faint Scottish accent too when she spoke, but it sounded slightly rough and halting.
Harry starred between the two women, wondering what they were talking about. He decided to ignore that for now in favour of answering their questions. "I'm a Wizard." He said. "My mum was a Muggle born but my dad wasn't. Listen, I'm confused, and I know you don't understand me, but what happened to me? Where am I?"
Rowan and Helga looked at him without comprehension. "If he is one of the Muggle's then we will get rid of him." Rowan said firmly. She held her hand up as Helga went to speak angrily. "No, Helga. I know you think they're not all bad but I refuse to put my child in danger. If he is a danger to us he dies, do you understand me?" Rowan was standing by this point, her entire body language screaming of anger. Anger that Harry knew was aimed at him, at the Muggle's that had killed her husband and anger at herself. She was angry with herself for having to do this. She was angry that the world had come to this.
Harry blinked and shook his head, suddenly dizzy. What had happened? For a moment when she had looked at him…
"Let us try this charm." Suddenly a wand was pointed at him and a spell shot out the end. He yelled and ducked. The spell had been green, and he only knew of one green spell.
The spell shot over his head as he dived off the chair. He scrabbled over the stone floor to the door to the outside, another spell shooting at him. He reached the door in record time, yanking it open and stumbling to his feet outside. He stared around him in fear for a moment before ducking again and, with his arms over his head to protect himself as much as possible. He stumbled across a beautiful lawn towards a lake.
"Murderer! Muggle!" Rowan was screaming. "Muggle filth!" Spells were shooting around him and he heard Helga screaming at her friend to stop.
Harry's world was spinning in slow motion. He stumbled. The grass was above, the sky below. He rolled; a spell exploded the grass where he had been sending mud all over him. His roll continued until the world was righted and he leapt forward.
And a pair of strong arms caught him, and held him fast.
A/N2: Just a quick note. I get alot of my information from HP Lexicon. Rowan/Rowena is from the glen according to the Sorting Hat, so she's from scotland (apparently) which is why I've given her a scottish accent. Helga is living in Scotland with Rowan and was raised in England (just so I didn't have to meddle with a Welsh accent as well). They're also in Scotland because they are standing where Hogwarts is going to be built (Mini-Spoilers abound btw) which is appropriate with Rowan Ravenclaw being the smart one, the one who wants to teach. If this doesn't make sense then don't worry, its midnight and I'm ready to go to bed lol. I'll read this again l8r and rewrite it probably.
Oh, and here are what Helga and Rowan look like, coz I mentioned Rowan but not Helga. If you want to know more then ask in reviews, its welcome. Reviews are always welcome.
Scottish Rowena/Rowan? – Brown eyes, blonde hair, medium height.
Welsh Helga? – Green eyes, brown hair, medium height.