Disclaimer: Whenever there’s a pool there’s always a flirt, whenever there is school there’ll always be homework… whenever there’s a drum there’s always a beat – whenever there is fun there’s always Coca-Cola. Yeah….

A/N: I can see myself screwing this story up big time, so bitch-slap me hard if you see that happening. Thanks to all who reviewed the last chapter and all who will review this one. Big thanks to the Dark Lord Potter crew for their thoughts pre-posting. You guys are kind of my beta, I suppose.

Also, thanks to all who have offered to beta for me – but I’m all good. I don’t have a generic beta, don’t use one – just a few folks who read bits and pieces of the chapter beforehand.

Shorter chapter here because it’s going to be a week or two before I can write the next few scenes – I’m back at uni and have a handful of papers due, and I’m just not feeling the writing vibe at the moment. Still, that may change. Anyways, enjoy these some 8,000 words.

*~*~*~*

Harry Potter and the Wastelands of Time

Chapter 11 – It’s Me Again, Harry

Part Two – The Trickster

He said, son, I’ve made a life out of readin’ peoples faces,
And knowin’ what their cards were by the way they held their eyes.
So if you don’t mind me saying, I can see you’re out of aces.
For a taste of your whiskey, I’ll give you some advice…

--Kenny Rogers

*~*~*~*

Okay, so time is separated by miles of regret.

And regret is forever.

So the space between Then, Now, and Soon is eternal. Which begs the question… How in the hell could I reach back in time across to eternity to roll the dice again?

It should be impossible.

*~*~*~*

“This iz fairly deep, ‘Arry.”

I winced as Fleur dabbed the gash across my head, just above my ear, with a damp towel. “Ow…”

“Oh, this you complain about?” she snapped. “You stitch two ‘alves of your chest back together this afternoon, and zis leetle dabbing hurts you?”

I chuckled under my breath. Her accent was coming through pretty strong. She was worked up, all right. “Head wounds always hurt a little more than anything else – except for hand wounds, I suppose. The hands are most sensitive to pain.”

Fleur relented, dipping the towel back into the warm water in the sink, diluted cherry-red with my blood. For a few minutes she just cleaned the wound, washed my hair clear of dirt and blood, and I grinned and bared the discomfort in silence.

I was sitting on the waist-high cabinets just next to the sink, and in the mirror across the bathroom I could see the back of Fleur’s head, her golden hair flowing to her waist in thick damp strands. Her bare feet and legs to the knee were covered in flecks of mud and blades of grass. Her dress had dried out a bit, but her form was still breathtakingly-visible beneath the floral pattern. My face looked hideous above her reflection, pale and half-slicked with blood.

No face a beauty could care for – especially one I had terrified.

The silence stretched on… a thin drabble of blood still flowed from my head, but the wound was clotting nicely.

Two more minutes passed... Fleur’s dabbing became gentler as she moved over my wound itself…

“Are you going to tell me what ‘appened tonight, ‘Arry?”

“You know what happened,” I replied, glancing at the thin line of blood that ran across the right side of Fleur’s throat, a mark from Chronos’ knife. Just a scratch, but still… it made me want to kill something.

Fleur tsked, annoyed at my side-stepping. “Then why did eet ‘appen?”

“I’ve more enemies than just Voldemort, Fleur.” I paused, reflecting on that particular understatement, and sighed. “A lot more… most of them powerful and dangerous.”

Only they’re enemies and friends, it seems. Chronos’ double nature, if that was what he had, helped me one day and sent demon-assassins after me another. All for his great benefits. And as for Saturnia… she wanted me dead, but not right now, which led me to believe I was being used and set-up for something. But what? If Saturnia was a goddess, as she claimed, what did she need me to do? And why take my blood? To keep track of me?

My headache was pounding a beat through my mind faster and surer than my heart.

“I saw the impossible tonight, didn’t I?” Fleur asked me, her eyes daring me to lie.

“You saw…” I really needed the right words. I needed time to find them. Time was all I had. “The future. You saw the future, should Voldemort seize Atlantis unchallenged.”

“That man… the one with ze knife… he spoke of Atlantis as if eet were real, too.”

“It is.”

Fleur bit her bottom lip, searching for the lie in my face – searching to see if I had dared. “You believe that,” she said finally. “Even in our world there are limits to the make-belief, ‘Arry. I want to believe you.”

“You will,” I said, quiet and sure.

Fleur finished cleaning away the blood on the side of my head, enough at least so she could see what she was doing as she raised her wand, resting the tip just above my wound. “This will stem ze blood flow, clot ze wound,” she said, and then paused. “That iz, if magic works on you this time. Verios!”

Reflected in the mirror on the far wall I saw a clear blue stream of liquid-light settle over the side of my head. It was cool, cool and tingly, and it tickled right through my head and down my spine. I giggled a little bit – very manly and tough, that’s me.

“Well, eet seems some of ze rules still apply to you. There will be no Muggle stitching, at least.” Fleur checked the gash again. “Oui, I can seal that… Hold still, Acerio!”

I felt the skin under my hair tightening and knitting itself back together, as the pain from the gash faded away to nothing. A moment later and all that remained of my wound was the blood that had flowed down onto my face.

“Thank you,” I said. With the pain of that gone, my constant headache could take pride of place once more.

“You are welcome.” Fleur picked up my glasses off the marble bench-top. “Reparo!”

The cracked lenses replaced themselves with whole glass. I slipped them onto my face, and the world came into a little better focus. “And thank you again.”

Fleur wasn’t in the mood for pleasantries. “I barely recognised you out there tonight, ‘Arry. Eet was a stranger battling the monsters and that madman with ze knife.”

“It was me,” I replied, taking a deep breath. “The me the world sees battling a Dark Lord.” I let my breath out slowly. “Chosen One, Boy Who Lived, and all that crap.”

“You looked…” Fleur struggled for the words.

We were both struggling for words this evening. I saw her deciding whether or not to say it. I admired her for a moment. She was beautiful, no question there. I wanted her the way a man dying of thirst needed water. I said what she was thinking. “Insane? Mad? Crazy? A few knuts short of a galleon?”

“Oui…” Fleur looked nervous. “Yes.”

“Well...” I worked for a gentle smile, and found one. “How do I seem now?”

“Back to normal, like you were when we were cooking earlier. Yet…”

Fleur hesitated. She was standing so close, and I struggled to keep my eyes on her face and not the rise and fall of her chest as she breathed deeply, steeling herself. “Yet?”

“Yet you arrive at my home bleeding from a stab wound, which you sew back together as if that iz just everyday for you, then we ‘ave a pleasant afternoon shopping together, as if that iz just everyday for you, and now this... this…” Fleur’s tone grew quiet. “You destroy a demon of such, such impossibility, and talk fast enough and clever enough to set ze devil on fire to a man holding a blade to my throat—”

“As if that is just everyday for me,” I cut in, seeing her point.

Fleur nodded. “There is no certainty to you, ‘Arry. No foundation, no point to start on. You understand, oui?”

“Oui,” I said softly. Oh, yes, more than you can know.

“For all that matters, ‘Arry, we are friends – you ‘ave saved my life more than once now—”

“Your life is in danger because of me.” I wanted that to be very clear, at the forefront of Fleur’s mind for the decision that had to be made soon. Whether or not she was to come with me.

“Without you I would ‘ave died in Diagon Alley, yet my life iz endangered now because of you, oui?” Fleur seemed to stand taller saying that, saying the words that cut right through me. “I don’t blame you, ‘Arry – you are ‘Arry Potter, after all, but there iz more to all of this than you are telling me, of that I am sure.”

“What do you want me to say?” I asked.

“The truth, perhaps? I’m not a leetle girl, I can ‘andle whatever you may say.”

And for a moment there I almost did say it. The truth, I mean. Why not? After all is said and done, why not? I’m a time-traveller, Fleur. I’ve lived more lives than I can remember, and each one has ended in so much blood and fire that I drowned in it even as I burned…

Why not say it?

Because in the eyes of the folks who only had one life to live, one life to give, it turned me into a monster. And after the night we’d just had, it would tip the balance against me in Fleur’s regard.

Fleur read most of what I was thinking on my face. “You show few emotions, ‘Arry, yet those you do are very easy to read. You’ve nothing to say to me, ‘ave you?”

“I’m not one to complain, but it isn’t easy doing what I do… you know?”

Fleur shook her head, and looked down at the floor tiles. “I was not much help to you out there… you must think me helpless.”

“You held your ground,” I said. “And your nerve. To me, to Harry bloody Potter – who does this kind of thing all the time – you were dazzling.”

Fleur looked up. “Really?”

I held my tongue for a moment, and brought my calloused hand – burnt from the fiery-sword in Tivoli – up to gently brush the skin of Fleur’s throat, just around the thin line of blood. “My eyes weren’t on the Bone-Man, or Chronos, more than they had to be…”

Fleur’s intense blue eyes, chips of cool diamond, were two parts unreadable and one part oddly vulnerable. “’Arry…”

I could feel her pulse under my fingertips, and the beat of it moved silkily up my arm, making me shiver. I felt a rush of pleasant warmth, and for a moment forgot my many… many worries. “Fleur…”

“’Arry…” The gorgeous French witch steadied herself, and her eyes became wholly unreadable. “’Arry, I am furious with you.”

The moment passed, and I slowly removed my hand from her soft neck. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m sorry I can’t heal that… Healing magic,” I shook my head, “just doesn’t really work for me. I’ll probably do more harm than good.”

“That’s okay—”

There was a loud knock from outside the bathroom and down the hallway, against the front door. Three hard sure knocks, swift and with authority. Someone was here – out the front of the house. My hand had reflexively gripped the hilt of my wand poking out of my pocket.

“A visitor?” Fleur frowned. “’Arry, could it be…?”

I shook my head. “Demons, for the most part, don’t bother knocking.”

The house was mostly silent and the long, slow creak of the wooden front door being drawn open echoed loudly down the hall and into the bathroom. Fleur and I waited for a scream or worse from any of her friends, who had been sitting quietly in the living room for the last several minutes, probably in several varying states of shock.

Muffled voices travelled down the hallway. One of them sounded like Grace.

“Oui, monsieur. Les Aurors.”

Two deeper voices that I didn’t recognise followed her words, too swift and too low for me to catch and translate. Fleur seemed to do better than I, for her eyes widened and she stepped away from me, making for the hallway. I leapt down off the marble bench-top and followed her, grabbing my all-too-important briefcase on the run.

We moved down the hall and to the bend in the corridor that gave way to the kitchen on the right. I paused there, resting just against the wooden-panelled wall, and dropped my briefcase at my feet. I was a mess, and whoever it was sounded very official. Fleur glanced back at me once before turning down the entrance hall.

Remaining just out of sight, I tilted my head to hear what was said.

“Good evening, gentleman,” Fleur said, and in English – probably for my benefit – maybe just because she’d been in England for the better part of eighteen months. “How may I help you this evening?”

“Mademoiselle Delacour?” one of the unseen men said. “I am Gabriel Pedont, and this is Francis Arnair. We are from the National Office of Magical Law Enforcement.”

Aurors, I thought. That’s what Grace had said.

“Aurors,” Fleur spoke aloud.

She was closest to me, and unconsciously took a step back to block me from view if I poked my head around the corner or something. From where I leaned against the wall, I could just make out the curve of her jaw, and smell the freshness of her hair. Rainfall and strawberries – always and forever strawberries.

“Yes, ma’am,” the Auror, Pedont, said. His tone was absolutely deadpan and serious. I could sense the stress in it, and wondered what the deal was. “We received an alarm that high levels of unknown magic were used within your property’s wards about thirty minutes ago.”

Fleur hesitated a moment too long. An Auror would notice that. “Really?”

“Oui, mademoiselle. Several of the wards surrounding your home ‘ave failed. We would ‘ave responded much sooner, yet you are no doubt aware of the current crisis back in Paris. Is everything well?”

Crisis back in Paris? A nervous, defeated feeling settled in the pit of my stomach. Something was most definitely… up.

“As well as can be, I suppose.” Fleur’s cool regard was firmly in place. Without a doubt any male with blood in his veins would feel intimidated by her fierce beauty.

Also, she was lying by omission – to protect me. I felt strangely saddened by that.

“There are signs of a struggle outside, and large amounts of water and churned up lawn, and the glass is cracked in a few of your windows.” Pedont was good at his job, from the sounds of things. “You and your guests also seem… out of sorts.”

“I assure you, we are well,” Fleur repeated, running a hand back through her long hair. It had gone a little frizzy due to the rain, yet that in no way detracted from her overall hotness.

“Are you people alone in this home?”

“Non,” came a voice I recognised, before Fleur could say otherwise. “There is a boy in ze bathroom, he is responsible for the mess you see outside.”

Oh, fuck you, Sébastien, fuck you…

Fleur leaned back and glanced right at me, her eyes questioning our next move. I shrugged, and decided to introduce myself. I was a mess, my face was still slick with blood, and my suit was drying wrinkled and streaked with muddy dirt. No matter, although how best to explain this one away?

I stepped out from behind the corner, around Fleur and with a smile on my face. “Hey, fellas,” I said to the two men, taking in their tight-fitting, no doubt spell-protected, dark blue robes and their drawn wands, pointing at rest towards the floor.

Both of them appraised me as I did them, and I saw a flicker of recognition in both of their eyes as they saw past the blood on my face, probably right to the jagged lightning-bolt scar on my forehead.

“’Arry Potter!” one of the Aurors gasped, his face going slack. Goddamn price of fame. That past a second later as his training kicked in, and both of the Aurors’ faces hardened into something ugly.

All at once I knew I was in trouble.

Two wands were raised against me, two grim-faced Aurors beheld me with open hostility in their eyes. “Harry Potter,” the larger of the two men snapped, and that voice was Pedont (who spoke very good English), stepping forward to face me. “You are under arrest for the assassination of President Laurent!”

What followed was a very pregnant pause…

And then I blinked. “Wait… what?”

“Surrender your wand!” the Auror growled.

My wand was in my hand – when had that happened? – and I’d half-raised my arm as if to strike. Fleur’s head snapped to look at me so fast that I was scared she’d done damage, and from the open doorway that led into the living room stood Grace, Alain, Sébastien and the others, frozen in the moment, and once again regarding me with sheer disbelief – some people, the lucky ones, were alive just to get caught in my dust.

“Assassination?” I was flummoxed. Hell of a word that, flummoxed. “Wha—? When?”

I caught Auror Pedont’s next move before he made it – I saw it in his eyes, as sure as sixpence.

“Protego!” I cried, in the same split-second that Pedont twisted his wand and roared, “STUPEFY!”

A blue shield of energy erupted wall-to-wall in front of Fleur and myself to intercept the stunning spell (thankfully stunning spell – predictable Auror’s Handbook stuff), the red magic rippling across its surface in concentric circles.

I was already moving as it hit, pulling Fleur with me back around the corner and out of the line of fire. She had her wand in hand yet seemed momentarily stunned of the need for it. I grinned at her, and it would have been terrible with the blood on my face and the dark, awful confusion in my eyes.

“Be reasonable, guys!” I called around the corner, hiding the thrill and excitement I felt. I led an… invigorating life.

“Toss out your wand, Potter,” Pedont replied. “Matters will turn from bad to worse if you ‘arm Mademoiselle Delacour!”

Oh and the absurdity of that remark made me laugh. I tried to stifle it, I truly did. Harm Fleur? I’d watched her die time and time again, I’d failed to keep her from harm so often and so epically that for her (and one particular shape-shifting other) I’d broken the Laws of Time and used the Keys of the Past.

Much good it’s done me so far – kept me in the game, I suppose – damn the consequences to all levels of Hell.

Harm precious Fleur? Strawberries and rainfall?

I’d cheated death and time to keep her safe. Her, Nymphadora – apples and white roses – the whole fucking world. And all for another shot at the world-title against Voldemort.

Still, I could use Pedont’s assumption to buy some time and think things through…

“Take one step closer, Auror Pedont, and any harm that comes to her will be your doing.”

Not exactly proving my innocence in the whole ‘assassination’ accusation, was I, but I needed time—no, no I didn’t. I had time, I needed the right order of things. But this was new, I didn’t know what had happened or why, and so far anything new was a direct result of either Saturnia’s or Chronos’ interference.

Pedont swore quite admirably in his native tongue, yet I didn’t hear any advancing footsteps. I had a minute, at the most.

During the spell fire I’d grabbed Fleur, pushed her against the wall, and I stood close enough to her now, almost holding her in place, that her lips were barely a hand’s span away from mine. I was sorely tempted to seize the moment. Her eyes – more often than not unreadable – regarded me with disbelief and… a want. A want for this not to be happening, and for me to make sense of it all. The thrill had to be rushing through her veins, as well.

I shook my head, holding her gaze. “Sorry again,” I whispered, just for us.

“You’re wanted for murder, Potter,” Pedont called, his tone daring me to step out from around the corner into the hallway. “Assassination of our country’s leader – there’s nowhere you can run that we won’t find you. No nation that will offer you protection. Surrender and all of this will come to a stop now.”

“I didn’t kill anybody,” I replied, still with my eyes on Fleur’s. “Do you believe me?”

“Oui,” Fleur whispered. “Yes.” And such is the decisions we make for those we care about, without a moment’s hesitation. I could see that it cost Fleur a lot to say that to the dangerous fool who had brought more than one war to her doorstep this evening.

“If there’s been a mistake,” Pedont said, thinking my question was for him, “then it will be cleared up in the appropriate time. For now, you must come with us.”

“You trust me then?” I said, again loud enough for the Aurors to hear me. Yet the question was for Fleur, and Fleur alone.

“If I don’t,” Fleur replied, her voice as low as a whisper. “If I don’t then a madman with a knife ‘as promised zat demons from hell will kill me. I am left with leetle recourse. It seems I need a hero, ‘Arry.”

“Oui, I will.” Pedont’s patience was wearing thin. “If you surrender your wand and come quietly, I will trust you.”

“Well, then let’s go find you one…” I smiled, and if nothing else it was honest enough to appear kind through the blood-mask on my face. Fleur’s cool regard softened a notch, at least. I very nearly started to cry. “Tell me, what time is it?”

I held up my wrist and closed my eyes, pointing the face of my watch towards Fleur.

“Eet-eet iz five to ten, ‘Arry.”

I started undoing the buttons on my dirty shirt from the collar down, with my free hand, until I could pull the shiny chain of white-gold with the tiny golden hourglass free of its confines.

The Time-Turner.

The Time-Turner… Unique in the world, as far as I knew, in that it could propel time forward. Why Saturnia had modified it as I lay bleeding at her feet I may never know. How she had modified it… worried me.

“Five to ten, you say?” I whispered. “Five to ten Fleur says.”

It was actually 23:34 and sixteen seconds – gone half eleven. My watch had stopped forty minutes ago during that bitch-slap to the ground the demon had given me. Time flies when you’re battling hell on earth, and all that’s in between. The clock in my head, the constant spinning numbers and the maelstrom of forgotten, ill-gotten memories, wouldn’t let me forget something as important as the time, however.

“Potter!” Pedont cried.

23:34 and twenty-two seconds. “Alright, you got me – I’m just deciding whether to come in peace or go out in a blaze of spell-fire. Give me a minute here, you ponce.”

“’Arry…”

“Do you know what this is, Fleur?” I held up the Time-Turner so she could see it, and at the same time slipped the slack of the chain over her head. “No? Not many people recognise them off-hand… over the next few days you’re going to find out a lot of things you’re better off not knowing, God help you. Biggest one of all is that I’m a time-traveller.” I paused for effect.

Fleur just blinked.

I rolled my eyes, and reached down to pick up my special briefcase. “Duelled a Dark Lord, defeated a slew of dark wizards, crushed a demon or two, and travelled through time… gets me nowhere. I swear, girls these days just want a sensitive guy who sips red wine and talks about his feelings in a turtleneck jumper.” Hurried footsteps from down the hall – the Aurors were on their way. “Fighting a war for the future of mankind just ain’t cool anymore… To the past then, Mademoiselle Delacour!”

I gave the tiny hourglass a flick with my ring finger and sent the sands of time, relative to Fleur and myself, spinning back an hour… two… three… four… five… six… seven… eight… nine full hours.

The world dissolved and my headache exploded in a fresh wave of raw pain. I screamed but the howling wind and the blur of colours and shapes rushing past me drowned out my voice. Warm blood trickled into my mouth, coppery and fresh, from my nose, as the pressure shook and trebled and made the whole experience purely unbearable.

Suddenly the hard floor was back under my feet, and I fell to my knees as the pounding in my head threatened to knock me out cold. It hurt – oh dear sweet Heineken it hurt – and the blood flowing into my mouth wasn’t just from my nose, but from the corners of my eyes as well.

Time travel – harsh mistress – I’ve said that before. Harsh and getting harsher. How many times could I abuse it before my head exploded?

I didn’t know it was possible to piss off universal constants, but if my recent time-hopping experience was any measure, then Time was thoroughly pissed at me. If it wasn’t for my tough, calm exterior and high pain threshold, then I’d be weeping more than just blood.

Damn it all, but I hurt.

And the pain wasn’t going away. If anything, it dug in deeper – right through my brain, which felt as if it were being compressed to the size of a galleon. Black spots swam in front of my eyes, and an overwhelming sense of being absolutely no-one in nowhere washed over me.

Fuck, I thought, as the darkness washed over me like a wave of regret. I don’t remember hitting the floor, only welcoming the sweet, sweet bliss of losing consciousness.

*~*~*~*

This is where it truly begins.

With Fleur Delacour. With Nymphadora Tonks.

Time and time again it does not matter which – it begins with one of them.

Nightmares within nightmares, that’s our game – by hook or by crook we’ll see it through. A bad dream to the very end.

You… you think you get old enough to deal with nightmares, but really you never do.

You just learn to be afraid on your own.

*~*~*~*

“Afraid on my own…” I whispered, and my eyes fluttered open to behold what was quite possibly the most beautiful sight in the world – Fleur Delacour, above me, so close that the tips of her long golden hair tickled my chin.

“Thank Merlin,” Fleur whispered. “I thought you might not awake.”

Fleur was leaning over me with a damp cloth in her hand; stained red with what I guessed was my blood. I was lying on a comfy leather sofa, my head spinning and my throat dry. “How… how long was I…?”

“Only fifteen minutes or so, ‘Arry, but eet was a long fifteen minutes. I was about ready to ‘ang ze consequences and call a Healer.”

“Oh, don’t do that…” I whispered. The pounding in my head was the constant beating of a whole platoon of drummers, bashing my skull against stretched rawhide. If this goddamn headache didn’t run its course soon I’d cut my own fucking head off… although, that would only reset the clock and make it worse. I was so, so screwed.

“I was just cleaning ze blood from your face. ‘Arry, what in Merlin’s name is ‘appening today?”

My face felt warm and fuzzy, clean, and shaking off the lethargy of sweet, sweet unconsciousness, I managed to sit up and around on the sofa next to Fleur, regaining my sense of self control.

“I used a Time-Turner to send us back about nine hours in time.” I let that sink in – from the look on her face, Fleur had surmised as much. “Probably saved a little damage to your house, seeing as how I didn’t have to wipe the floor with those two Aurors.” I took the damp cloth from Fleur and rested it against my burning forehead.

“Why am I not surprised that you possess one of ze most restricted devices in ze magical world?”

I grinned and said nothing, just relaxed with my head back.

“Tell me, ‘Arry, if this iz ze past, then aren’t we running the risk of meeting ourselves?”

I shook my head. “I’m keeping a fair track of the time – you and I, we’re shopping in Carcassonne at the moment and not due back for an hour and a half. Plenty of time to sit five minutes out and plan our next move. D-did using the Time-Turner hurt you? You know, like it did me…”

“Non, eet did not hurt at all.” Fleur seemed certain. “Made me a leetle dizzy.You are sure about not meeting ourselves?”

I had to admit, Fleur was taking the whole time-travel business fairly well. I remembered my first experience with a Time-Turner… Heh, girls are stronger than boys, more practical. Anyways, a Time-Turner was like a training broom compared to the forces that I meddled with. Forces that gave me this stunning headache and made my eyes bleed. I wasn’t fit for time-travel anymore, it seemed.

“I’m sure. We didn’t bump into ourselves when we got back from Carcassonne, did we?”

Fleur thought about that, and I knew she was questioning the choices she could make now, given the time to be relived – nine hours of events that had already happened. I pitied her for a moment there. The frustration of being able to do nothing, of being set to a path under the constraints of a Time-Turner, was still to come for her.

We’d already made our choices – going back we just got to see them from another angle. The knowledge that you could travel back in time to before something happened and still be unable to change it… was maddening. Unless, of course, one were to blast not just Time but their own soul back across the years – aye, then a difference could be made, God help the idiots (idiot) that tried.

“And what of ze Aurors, ‘Arry? They say you murdered a man – not just a man, but Thomas Laurent! Ze President for Magic himself!”

“Hmm… yes.” I’d been thinking about that. “From what they said, this assassination happens today – or has already happened today. Either way, what’s done is done. It wasn’t me though.” It could be me. There were two of me running around until about thirty-five minutes past eleven tonight.

The me in Carcassonne with Fleur right now wasn’t guilty – that chump would be chopping carrots for the next few hours. Was I, over the next hour or two, going to assassinate a powerful magical leader?

Fleur had failed to reach the same conclusions as I had, but she would. “If we warn someone of ze threat to ze President—“

I cut her off. “It’s already happened, Fleur – the Aurors wanted my head for it.”

“But if this iz ze past, then surely we can prevent—”

I was shaking my head before she even finished. “Time can be rewritten,” I said. “But not like that. This,” I held up the time-turner, “can really only extend the hours in a day, relative to the user. It can’t change what we know has happened.” I paused. “Or will happen… mores the pity.”

*~*~*~*

Time can be rewritten.

Oh, Time… sweet Lady Time... can be…

Rewritten.

What a dangerous word.

Damn it all-maybe yes, maybe no-fuck the odds.

*~*~*~*

“Scourgify!” My suit was coming out pretty clean of all the mud and blood. Back in Fleur’s bathroom, I met her gaze in the reflection of the mirror. “If you’re coming with me, and I think you should – for both our sakes – then you’ll need to pack a bag.”

Fleur nodded, yet made no move to walk away.

“Scourgify.” The hardest part to clean was always the silk shirt – getting the blood out of it – but when I shrugged on the jacket it would hide the discolouration. Still, I had to stop buying expensive shirts. Sure they felt good, and breathed well, but I only ended up ruining them. And with the days to come… I would be better off buying torn rags to start with. That thought made me smile.

Smiles are worth more than gold in my trade.

“It’s getting harder, isn’t it?”

Fleur seemed startled by my question. “Excusez-moi?”

“To pretend this isn’t happening.” I finished with my suit, it was as clean as it was going to get, and turned to face the French beauty. Fleur was more of a goddess than Saturnia, damn her demon heart, would ever be. “To see the world as a safe place.”

“You want me to come with you.” Fleur was torn.

I could tell she had no idea what to do – to come with me meant a quest for Atlantis, the threat of Death Eaters and Dark Lords. To stay, without my protection and super-duper demon fighting powers, to turn away from me, could mean death if my enemies went after her, as promised. I always, always put the people I care for in this situation. It’s the way of my world.

With my face clean of blood, my smile was a lot easier, a lot less terrifying. “I promise it’ll be a lot of fun. I know, after that thing with Gringotts, you were probably hoping to relax for awhile.” I chuckled. “That can still happen, good times ahead, it’s just that other things are happening this summer as well.”

“Like demons and death threats, assassinations and time-travel?” Fleur took a step closer to me. Her bare feet and legs were still flecked with the mud and grass, her dress was wrinkled and her hair in knots. She looked wild – as wild as a storm, uncontrollable and free. “You want to take me on a true Harry Potter adventure?”

I groaned and rolled my eyes. “If you like…” A breath of laughter escaped me. “Moreover, I want to show you a wonder before its gone forever. Atlantis, Fleur, Atlantis. Streets of gold, spires that scrape the sky, flying ships – just like the story. You believe, even if you don’t think you do.” I paused. “Everyone believes, on some level, because everyone has seen it.”

“What does that mean?”

I leaned back on the sink. “Come with me and find out.”

Fleur’s sudden grin was as fierce as it was heart-pounding. “You think you can tempt me, ‘Arry?”

“I-” At her smile – so beautiful, so alluring – every drop of manly testosterone in my body burned past boiling point. I blushed red. “Damn. Well-played…”

Fleur nodded to herself, confident in her attraction. I guess the threat of hellish demons being set loose against her didn’t hold as much sway during the warm summer’s light streaming in through the high windows. “What of this assassination you are supposedly guilty of perpetrating?”

I shrugged. “Auror Pedont said it was in Paris, didn’t he, that I did it?” Fleur nodded. “Then, as soon as you’re ready, we leave the country.”

“You are sure we can do nothing? If we went to Paris and warned—”

“If I go to Paris then I’m either going to end up actually killing this man, your President for Magic, or I’m going to make it look like I did.” I shook my head. “And that’s already the case, if those Aurors are to be believed. No, someone’s playing games in the shadows for now, and if I had to guess I’d say it’s our new friend Chronos. He threatened you to keep me on the path to Atlantis, perhaps he…” I trailed away.

Fleur followed my trail. “Perhaps he ‘as set ze authorities after you to make sure you don’t stray from your path to Atlantis. Perhaps he ‘as framed you. A leetle insurance, if I am not enough. Still, to assassinate… you deal with dangerous men, ‘Arry.”

“He’s not a man,” I said. “And you are more than enough.”

I didn’t elaborate on either statement there. Fleur didn’t ask.

As for Saturnia and Chronos, if this assassination was their work, and I had a feeling it was, then it added a whole new dimension to whatever they were. I may as well call them demons, for lack of a better word – I certainly wouldn’t think of them as gods – and I had my suspicions that freakin’ Voldemort was more human than either of them.

What was it Chronos had said to me?

“That if you don’t take up my gift, that if you turn aside from Atlantis – as you might, oh yes, yes – I will send more Bone-Men and worse after this young lady here.” Chronos winked at Fleur. “I will end her existence, just as surely as your Dark Lord Voldemort would. You changed this game, Harry James Potter, you challenged fate, and now here is how the board is set.”

I hadn’t taken up his gift – the sword that looked like the long hand of a clock – and now it was lost seven or so hours into the future. I wasn’t great with a sword. Sure, I knew how to use one, just not overly well. Fuck it, my wand and my edge were all I needed.

And maybe a few more of those Atlantean runes, in case Chronos makes good on his threat. The runes were in my head, a few I could call from memory, others were blurred and just on the tip of my tongue. Once I got where I was going from Fleur’s house, to somewhere relatively safe, I’d sit down and sketch out as much of the Old-World magic as I could.

It could be handy for wards, at the very least, maybe even against Tweedledum and Tweedledee – the Orc-mare, as Chronos had named them. I’d remember that, names were powerful things.

“We have to get going, Fleur, because we’re going to be back from Carcassonne soon.” I stood up straight, pocketing my wand. “Pack a bag – just the essentials – few changes of clothes and shoes. Don’t be too particular, we’ll be picking up a lot as we go.”

I started to rush Fleur out of the bathroom, the confidence in my step swift and sure.

“But where are you going? Where are we going?” Fleur asked.

I grinned – a gentle, innocent smile. “Have you ever tried a New York Hot Dog?”

“New… New York? America, ‘Arry!”

I nodded. “Katz’s Delicatessen on East Houston Street griddles the tastiest, snappiest dollar-twenty-five hotdog in town.”

If Saturnia hadn’t have stabbed me, I would’ve been there half a day ago. The United States… I was behind schedule – I was hours and minutes behind schedule. Hours were important, and minutes doubly so.

“That sounds quite horrible,” Fleur said.

I laughed. I had promised Fleur adventure, but she hadn’t let me forget that it was her choice to come with me. Tempt her, indeed. I hoped, I really hoped, that she would not end up regretting that choice. She would though, she always does, even if she thinks I never see it.

Before I was done, Fleur would be a warrior in her own right – because that’s what I did, at the end of the day, to those who fought with me. I turned them into warriors against the monsters. Some would argue I turned them into monsters in their own right.

Some would be right.

Maybe yes, maybe no…

Fleur was coming with me. I felt a rush of pure joy and excitement as she disappeared down the hallway and up the stairs to her room, in order to pack. Despite all that had happened, everything that had gone differently – stab wounds and demons – she was still coming with me.

I could feel a sense of crackling urgency in the air all mixed up with a sense of familiarity – this was new and exciting, being with Fleur, and yet it had all happened before.

“Time…” I whispered to no one and nothing, save myself and my merciless headache. A thought came to me then, amidst my own youthful folly (same mistakes, new ways) and I spoke it aloud. “She always dies first…”

Fleur always dies first.

I knew that to be true. Of all my lives and all my times… I’m always the last. And this time, I had to break the cycle. Because all bets were off – I felt that down to my very bones.

So Fleur and I have met before, lives and lifetimes ago, if only she knew it – and perhaps deep down she does, she must, that’s a nice thought – the same souls meeting over and over again, ready to run away together into a big wide world of adventure… and nightmare.

I, Harry James Potter, meet Fleur again and for the first time – her and Nymphadora – and I always hope to beat the long odds, and I always fail… knowing that is the hardest part.

So see me now, as I wait smiling at the foot the stairs, completely aware that, more often than not, Fleur and I, and sweet Tonks, oh we’re bound for oblivion… and yet I can’t look away.

“I can’t look away…” I whisper, almost laughing, still smiling.

Not much to be said for that… except maybe that the odds are long, life’s unfair and death’s no better.

But you know what?

Fuck the odds.

*~*~*~*