Marvel/HP: A Third Path to the Future

Harry stretched contentedly as he put the last of the lunch dishes on the table. He had made chicken, turkey, other meats and things along with putting out several different kinds of bread and other fixings so the kids could grab and eat as they wanted today.

The kids, after spending all of breakfast trying to drag answers out of him and Charles (stopping only on pain of pranking), had and gone each their own way for the morning, but their stomachs would bring them back soon enough. Logan wasn't there that morning, sent on some trip in the black-jet by Charles, which should have left Harry in charge of their morning practice. Luckily Charles had let the kids have some free time until four that afternoon, and that had allowed Harry some peace and quiet to work on his projects.

Harry had been up all night repairing the damage to the defensive warding array in his workshop and finishing up two of his projects as well, both of which he was anxious to try out. He grimaced as he placed a gallon container of lemonade on the table. The damage to the array had been severe, a visible and brutal testament to the power Jean had been putting out during the merging or whatever it had been.

Red really impressed me there, he thought as he snagged a grape a popped it into his mouth, chewing slowly. I wasn't nearly as happy about her decision to merge with the phoenix but despite my concern she survived. Very impressive, and we get to see who she is when she can cut loose. That should be fun, well for me anyway, maybe not so much for her wannabe bully of a boyfriend and Scott. Things have been building up in that cute head of hers, you can see it, and it should be interesting to see what happens when she doesn't have to button it up anymore.

His thoughts were interrupted as he felt the presence of another magical core nearby, one whose size and control startled him almost as much as how close it was to him before he sensed it. How the hell did that sneak up on me? Regardless, we've got guests, I wonder if they are the polite or impolite kind? Only way to find out.

OOOOOOOOOOO

Charles waved his old acquaintance into the sitting room, frowning a little as he wondered what Steven wanted with Harry then he frowned. "Are you a wizard as well? Did you somehow sense what was going on here yesterday?"

Steven shook his head, chuckling a little. "I had forgotten how observant you could be Charles. No, I didn't feel anything yesterday, I'm here because I was told by my manservant that Mr. Potter stopped by and wished to touch base with a local. I then found a message left by an old acquaintance by the name of Madame Harkness which told me more about our inter-dimensional visitor." A message left on the interior of my personal workroom, he thought ruefully. How the old woman had managed that undetected past his wards and his manservant was something he would never know, if her quiet smugness when he called her was any indication.

He then frowned, looking down at Charles. "I wasn't a very learned wizard when we met all those years ago, else I would have possibly been able to do something about your legs. I am sorry, but it has been too long for me to do anything about them now."

Charles waved that worry away. "I had assumed such Steven, and truly it isn't as if I had not become used to it by this point. Wait here I will get Mr. Potter for you."

"Don't bother Charles, I'm here. Lunch is ready, just sandwiches this time, the kids can grab and go whenever." The two older men turned to see Harry standing in the doorway leading into the dining room, his emerald eyes sparkling with interest as he studied the tall, dignified man standing there in a decent and well tailored suit, his black hair touched with gray.

Even if he hadn't felt him earlier Harry would have known the moment he clapped eyes on him that Dr. Strange that he was a magic user. The man's sheer presence filled the air to his magical senses. It felt like a very scary combination of Voldemort in terms of power and Dumbledore in terms of control.

A common misconception among the sheeple that had stood on the sidelines during the war against Voldemort was that Harry fought Voldemort one on one and killed him that way. In point of fact Harry never even tried to fight Voldemort in a stand up fight, instead using a hit and run strategy, never facing him head on. Even then he nearly lost his life several times. It was only after the horcrux in his scar was taken care of that Harry was able to match his power and it was the chaos of the fight after Voldemort summoned demons that allowed him to actually kill the psychopath, well that and the fact Nagini had just died, and the backlash from the horcrux in the snake had caused Voldemort to lower his guard. Harry knew he was stronger now, on an order of magnitude stronger than he had been back in his old dimension, so much so that he could have ripped Voldemort apart easily. Yet even with that he didn't want to tangle with the man in front of him, his aura of power was equal or maybe even stronger than Harry's own.

Yet what was even more disturbing was the control Harry could sense. Voldemort was easily the most powerful wizard in the world at the time of the war, but Dumbledore had Control, with a capital C. He could do with far less power what Voldemort would have to brute force. Harry never fought the headmaster head on either, indeed it was his own ignorance of the crysis suit Harry and Hermione had created and his arrogance that gave Harry a momentary victory over him. Dumbledore, even without the Elder Wand, put up one hell of a fight against the younger more powerful Voldemort before going down (or so Professor Flitwick said. He had been a part of the Order of Phoenix, and he and McGonagall were the only survivors having created emergency port-keys back to Hogwarts before the Death Eaters stormed the order's headquarters, though neither had been the same after them). This mild seeming man had a magical aura even more tightly controlled than Dumbledore's.

"You would be the gentleman whose house in New York has that rather interesting ward scheme?" Harry asked.

"Indeed Mr. Potter, my manservant Wong told me you stopped by, and then I spoke to Agatha Harkness. It isn't often I meet a wizard from another dimension. Demons yes, wizards no, so I decided to look you up for the chance to talk shop."

Harry grinned and looked over at Charles. "Do you mind if we take over the solarium Charles? I think this is going to be a long discussion." Steven smiled as well, and Charles chuckled and led the way to the solarium.

OOOOOOOOOOOO

There was fire all around her.

She could remember wanting to be a painter when she was younger, or a ballerina. Didn't all little girls want to be a ballerina or a princess or something? She remembered trying out for the art class in her first year in high school and being told that she wasn't passionate enough about it, that her paintings looked as if they had been painted by a robot, a sharp contrast to her earlier paintings, so much so she was almost accused of submitting someone else's work. She could go into realistic painting obviously or portraiture but that would be it, nothing that really interested her. She'd felt a momentary irritation and sadness, but it was gone within an hour and she moved on, going into the hard sciences instead.

Flames all around her, devouring her soul, searing it bare to the core.

She remembered trying out for the dance class when she was younger too, and being told that she just didn't have enough passion or drive to be a really good dancer. The woman in charge of it refused to keep her on if she was just going to be there to go through the motions. So she had joined the cheerleading team, and even there people said she didn't have enough passion about it.

The flames licked up all around her trying to consume her, not because of malice but because it was what it did, death and rebirth. She fought back, knowing that if she gave in, even for a single instant all that she was, all that made her Jean Grey would be subsumed by the Phoenix. Again not because of malice or because the Phoenix wanted to consume her, but because its existence was so much vaster, on an order of magnitude greater than humanity, that it could not simply understand what it's power could do to her.

She remembered her anger at some of the things that were said about her in high school and then completely forgetting her anger in a few seconds or at most ten minutes as if she couldn't hold onto the emotion. She remembered the joys of having a favorite snack or performing well on a test or something, only for it to seemingly dissipate as if she couldn't hold onto that emotion either. She remembered hearing a rumor that Duncan thought her a bit of a cold fish from one of the other cheerleaders, how it angered her and how she went to confront him about it yet by the time she found him it had turned cold and she had simply verbally lashed out at him for a few seconds before agreeing to forgive him. She remembered her anger at Scott for always trying to protect her as if she was some kind of glass figurine that needed to be defended at all costs despite being one of their best offensive weapons. She remembered trying to keep control of the anger until the end of the session but by that time it had just faded into low key irritation and she had decided it wasn't worth the effort, simply coldly snubbing him on the way out.

The flames were slowly consuming her, the power of life and rebirth filling her from the tip of her hair down to her toes. All that was left was her soul, that molten will and steely intelligence, and she refused to yield. A voice calling out from behind the flames, immune to their power somehow, calling out and urging her on, giving her strength, then other voices, remembered like a dream, friends.

She remembered that feeling the jealousy of the other cheerleaders, wondering what the hell that was about, wanting to do something about it, but then simply forgetting about it and moving on. She remembered the anger and even the fear she felt at being manhandled by the Blob when Fred first showed up, yet as soon as he let her go it began to dissipate. It was as if she couldn't contain any of the hard emotions, as if the moment she felt them they were being sucked away from her. Leaving her less than she was, leaving her almost like a drone but not quite, more like a shell or half of what she could be.

She fought and fought and fought until the flames receded, her soul still intact and her mind finally, blessedly whole, and hers alone. Then she was pulled back to reality, opening your eyes to see emerald eyes glowing with power looking into hers and behind them eyes of pure white also crackling with hidden energy and beyond them the faces of her friends, pulling her back to reality, pulling her back to herself and home.

Jean woke up, and felt everything, all her emotions, all her senses to a point that was astonishing. She tentatively reached out and felt the minds of her friends and of the professor. At that thought a spark or pure rage shot through her so strong her body shuddered but she fought it back, realizing with dismay that she would have to get used to controlling her emotions to a degree that she had never needed to before. The cracks had already been appearing, had been appearing for weeks, even months. The mental blocks that Charles had put inside her mind had stopped her from feeling those emotions consciously, but instead of dissipating they were just bottled up inside her, like a river behind a dam just waiting to burst out.

Was it arrogance or ignorance that convinced Xavier those damn blocks were a good idea? My god the damage to my emotional range, hell even the rest of my mind is… In fact she knew that it was almost certainly ignorance, the professor wasn't the sort to let his arrogance get the better of him like that, at least she didn't think so. Yet that didn't make it any easier to control her anger. After all if the blocks had shattered, on their own and the eventually would have, she saw that now, she would have been something like a walking time bomb just waiting for a place to go off, and when you added in her telekinetic and telepathic powers….

Jean looked up as she felt a presence outside her door, and she tentatively reached out with her telepathy only to find that she could only read a few surface thoughts, the rest was buried underneath something like static, or electrical discharges, and she pulled back swiftly realizing who it had to be. "Come in Ororo." She said aloud, trying to sit up and finding herself still a little weak.

Being reborn will do that to one I suppose, she thought and then had to stifle a spontaneous laugh. Evidently it wasn't only the darker emotions that had been buried so deeply in her. She hadn't felt so much happiness or joy in years as she felt when she made that little joke. A part of her mind realized it wasn't very funny, but the rest of her was too busy laughing. This is going to take some getting used to.

Ororo walked in, the African woman striding as normal towards the bed wearing her jeans and a vaguely African looking shirt and a very nice scarf. In her arms she carried a tray, and Jean nearly broke down and laughed again at seeing all of her favorite lunch meals on it. How Harry knew that her favorite lunchtime meal was a simple sandwich, just chicken, tomato and lettuce but with flat bread with rosemary in it she didn't know, but that and the bowl of fruit, filled with cherries, blueberries and passion fruit made her want to laugh.

Ororo smiled at her younger friend placing the tray down on the bedside table next to her and sitting down on the bed next to Jean, reaching out to stroke her hair gently. "How are you feeling Jean?"

Jean grimaced a little then shrugged. "Emotional. I get the feeling this is going to be a very emotional roller coaster of a time for me until I get used to having to control my emotions twenty-four-seven. Did… did Harry tell all of you what was going on?"

The white-haired woman shook her head. "No he didn't. He told us a bit but indicated that the full story was only yours to share. I won't try to question you if that's what you want, just know that the others and I are here for you if you need us."

Jean reached up and grabbed her hand with both of hers squeezing it gratefully, smiling internally at Harry letting her do the talking about what happened. "Thank you. I don't have a problem with you all knowing what happened, but regaining my emotional control is something no one can really help me with. Luckily I already started organizing my mind with Harry's mental discipline lessons, hopefully that'll keep my emotions in check as well as my powers but I might have to miss school for a few days just in case."

So saying she recounted what had occurred in her mind, as well as what the mental blocks had been doing to her. She didn't try to either sugarcoat or vilify Charles' interference in a good light she simply stated the facts and let Ororo draw her own conclusions.

The slight frown on the other woman's face as well as the fact that her eyes were snapping a little with lightning told Jean that her friend had reached the same conclusion that she had. The breaks in the blocks would have caused a tremendous issue later on, and it was only with Harry's intervention that was not the case anymore.

"Whatever you want my dear you will have, I will call the school tomorrow morning personally" said Ororo firmly, squeezing the redhead's hands back. "But tell me more of this Phoenix entity. Could you sense anything more about it? Will it actually be happy just looking at your emotions and your life through… what was the analogy, like through a TV screen?"

Jean leaned back and thought as she took the first bite of her sandwich savoring the taste. She didn't like hot things or anything like that, but she loved chicken, especially grilled with seasoning which was what this was.

"The Phoenix is hard to describe," she said around the bite then swallowed with a sheepish smile on her face and went on. "I don't know what Harry saw, but when I saw it I sensed an entity that was so far removed from our plane of existence as to be… to be difficult, almost impossible to comprehend. Yet at the same time it has avatars, like, I don't know, like fingers or something that go out and search through the universes for different planes of existence, letting the Phoenix find the areas that need to be burned out and remade. Life and rebirth are its charges, and as such it detests death, but that's not it, the good kind of death like a tree falling down becoming soil is good, that it understands and is a part of, but death that serves no purpose. It finds it wasteful, yet at the same time will not hesitate to kill millions if the total is served by it, and yet would go out of the way to save, well me for instance, when I tried to…. To save my best friends soul when I was younger."

"I see," Ororo said thoughtfully, not commenting on that last point. If Jean wanted to talk about it she would, but Ororo would not push. "So a mixed bag at best."

Jean nodded firmly. "Yes exactly. From our perspective it's a very complex, very imbalanced entity, but from its own, it sees its function as very, very simple."

"So have you become one of its avatars?" Ororo asked worriedly, wondering what that would do to the young woman who had changed from being a student to being a friend in the past few weeks.

"No, I'm not an avatar, are you the avatar of weather?"

"No but neither am I it's mistress in the truest sense, as in total command of it" said Ororo, "I manipulate the weather, I can get it to do what I like around me yet afterwards I must go back and solve any problems that I have caused in terms of weather in the area. That old saw about a butterfly causing a tornado across the world can actually be true, so I try not to overuse my power." That was actually why, even under her emotional shell, she had made certain that the local weather pattern stayed relatively normal rather than simply being sunny all the time like Kurt had once asked. He understood of course once she explained it to him, but it had still been an amusing thought.

"That's pretty much what it will be with me and the Phoenix. I can access its power a little bit, but not a lot. It just seems to augment my own power and maybe gives me access to some specialties." She snapped her fingers and suddenly a small burst of flame appeared above them for dissipating. "I rubbed a few of the molecules in the air together to do that, something I couldn't have done a few weeks ago. More," she smirked at the older woman, "I think I'll be able to get flying down now."

Ororo giggled a little, a light tinkling sound that fell nicely on Jean's ears and she grinned in response. "Very well," Ororo said, a wide smile on her face, "as soon as you are up and about we can see whether or not you can back up that claim."

"You're on," said the redhead with an answering grin and the two women shook hands firmly then laughed.

After a little while Jean sobered a little going back to their previous conversation. "This will be more like having someone just sort of watching my life through a TV like I said. The bit of it that was in me has merged entirely with me rather than rejoining the whole, but there is a little, some kind of one way connection forged there, going from me to it, but not from it to me. Again I'm really not up to really explaining things well, but that's the gist of it."

Ororo nodded thoughtfully, "all right, I can understand that. But I am glad that you as a person won't change. I like the person you are growing into Jean, and would hate to see that go away."

Jean thought back to what had been going on in the past few weeks, not just how much stronger she was in terms of her powers, but in terms of her growing maturity and her emotions which had already begun to leak out from the mental blocks. "You know," she said smiling a little "I think I would too." She resolutely ignored the fact that most of those changes brought to mind Harry Potter, and the feelings she sometimes got looking into his emerald eyes. It would never do to let her friend realize that she might be developing a bit of a crush on her boyfriend.

The two women kept talking for a time, until Jean finished her meal and started to fall asleep again whereupon Ororo took the food away and left her alone with a last kiss on the cheek.

OOOOOOOOOOO

Harry leaned back in his chair looking across at the so-called Sorcerer Supreme, a title that demanded an explanation when he first heard it, which the other man gave him readily before Harry began to describe his home universe. His respect for the older man had risen considerably during that tale, and it raised several interesting questions about the nature of demons and spirits. In return he had just finished telling the older man about his life back in his home dimension and how he came to be in this one, as well as much of the magical lore from his home dimension he could remember.

The man had sat there silently taking it all in, reminding Harry that sometimes the greatest gift a person could have was the ability to listen. He'd asked a few questions, mostly about the magical government, as well as what Harry remembered about the massive wards that had separated the non-magical from the community magical. That and a few questions about his education at Hogwarts was the main thrust of his questions, though his eyes had narrowed intently when Harry described his war against Voldemort and his part in it.

He also politely ignored the fact Harry only gave the vaguest details of his life in the Negative Zone, something Harry was thankful for. He wasn't ready to share much of that time with anyone. Indeed he hadn't even shared much of it with Reed Richards, not wanting to encourage the other man's interest in the dying dimension. I wonder if he's figured out that he can spend more time in his lab as long as he spends four hours with his family per day? Heh.

Stephen leaned back in turn contemplating the young man in front of him. "You have led a very tumultuous life Harry Potter," he said thoughtfully. "Prophecies are dangerous at the best of times, especially self-fulfilling ones like you were labeled with."

He shook his head not understanding at all how a man like this Albus Dumbledore was described could've fallen so far and done nothing with his powers for so long. If Dumbledore truly held the positions he had and used them he could've gotten most of the pureblood bigots put in jail for being Death Eaters long before Harry went to Hogwarts, thus removing the majority of Voldemort's power. "It is distressing in the extreme to see a man with that many positions of power not living up to his position's expectations."

"So, do you have any idea where my kind of wizards went in this world?" Harry asked. "I've seen a few clues that they existed at one point, but no evidence that they're still around," he said obliquely, not wanting to go into detail about a version of Hogwarts existing here in this dimension. That was going to be his own little secret for a time until he could get away to examine it properly. Only this time I'll try to teleport outside its protective area, he thought ruefully, remembering skidding across the lake like a bloody skipping stone.

Stephen frowned a little. "There were some notes from Merlin's time or should I say Merlin's original time that mentioned something about wand using wizards, who took their power entirely from their own magical cores. I understand that Agatha told you about the three types of wizardry in this world?" Harry nodded and Stephen went on. "Well Merlin was the first to use all three of them, and he was also bit of a time traveler."

Harry groaned and Stephen chuckled a little. "Indeed. There are accounts of Merlin being around in the time of Camelot in Britain, as well as well before that, at a time when the city of Atlantis was around. There's even a brief recounting of a time when he was an advisor to one of the emperors of Rome, though I would discount that one. It might've been an imposter, as I don't think the original Merlin would have had anything to do with throwing the Christians to the lions."

"What is known however was that he was able to create wards like you described, completely able to cut off magical beings from non-magicals, and did so during a war against several magical species, cutting them off from easy victims. He also held the title Sorcerer Supreme like myself for a time, though whether or not he was that throughout his life or if he was even the first back in Atlantis is still unknown. One could wish all my predecessors believed in leaving notes, but no." He said this last bit a little caustically. "Instead they leave items that sometimes impart words of wisdom, and even then no actual information about their own lives."

Harry frowned a little. "I hope time traveling isn't that normal around here, I imagine that kind of thing can really cause issues, to put it mildly."

Stephen nodded rueful agreement. "Indeed. Merlin himself left little in the way of notes, and the research myself and my master did about his time, heh, what little we did, is confusing to say the least. Some of his contemporaries described him as being a bit of a trickster, others a grim warrior, others point to him being an honorable elderly statesman, all of them point to him being powerful in the extreme and wise beyond all knowing of course."

"Of course. What is it with wizards coming over all knowing honestly, most of the times we're just people like everyone else. We might know things they don't but that doesn't mean we're wise." Harry shook his head in amusement.

Steven smiled wry agreement. "True. At any rate, during the time of Camelot there was a, a sect I suppose you could say of wizards and sorcerers who were completely core-based users. They called themselves battle wizards, and it was a name that was not without basis. You must know that at person with an actual magical core can cast spells faster than any who use simple incantations?"

Harry nodded at that, but he also knew that a person without a core that learned other types of magic could eventually build up his magical core to the point where he could use it as his main power source as well. Thus any speed advantage would be minimal against someone like, oh just off the top of my head, the man in front me right now. He might not have been born with my kind of magic, but I'm damn certain he could use it now if he knew the spells, and I'm not going to comment on what spells he already knows. And of course the effects that an enchanter could achieve through invocation, calling on otherworldly beings to power his spells, was beyond anything any normal wizard could do calling on his own magic.

"These battle wizards helped defend Camelot in its early years, and helped defend the shores of Britain against all comers for quite a while. Merlin of course was their leader, and they looked to him as something of a savior a lot like Christians would look at Jesus Christ yes?"

He looked over to see if Harry was following and Harry nodded. "That follows with the way he was almost worshipped back in my home dimension. Merlin, Morgana and Maeve were the three main, deities, I suppose you could say. Almost a form of ancestor worship really." He paused struck by a sudden thought. "That would explain the pureblood's actually they were so proud of how their ancestors had magic that they never realized that magic itself was the point, not the fact that they came from a family which had it. Magic has its own rules and guidelines, and I've seen a few examples of what happens to people who break those rules."

A life debt for example. Albus had tried to recruit Ginny Weasley to spy on Harry and get close to him, and the girl had gone along with it, but the moment she tried to use a love potion on him in their fourth year his magic saw this as an attack on him and retaliated. She lost most of her magical power as well as her ability to actually be near him at all without pain, and it was only the fact it hadn't been her idea that kept her from losing her entire magical core. This of course had only put her in a place to be killed with the majority of the Order of the Phoenix with Dumbledore.

"Yes," Stephen said leaning forward intently, "that is my thought as well. Magic seems to have some very firm, set rules, even when they cannot be seen. We may not understand the meaning behind them but they are there. My teachers felt the same, and of course there are known rules but even more unknown. Even when I speak with ancient elder gods and other beings they tell me that magic has 'some very odd but firm rules'. It isn't as simple as waving your hand and wishing something to happen, there must be a give-and-take, and unlike in the sciences the take is often hidden, or perhaps the word I am looking for is delayed. Of course, with invocation the take can be ameliorated or magnified depending on who or what you call on."

This turned the conversation from the original topic into a dissertation on magical theory that the two wizards got lost in for more than an hour before turning back to the main topic.

Stephen shook his head, reminding himself to come back to this topic at a later date before going back to Harry's original question. "At any rate the battle wizards separated themselves more and more from the rest of the magical community, which at the time was much larger and in the open than now, and began to inbreed. Oh, a few would take lovers outside their little clique, but such instances became rarer and rarer, as their type of magic bred true. About two generations on from this they became arrogant and retreated from Camelot into their own community. Merlin, seeing this and still bound by loyalty to the King's family first tried to convince and then demand they return, but they saw this as a betrayal. They wanted to rule themselves and saw themselves above normal people simply because they were inherently magical."

"Now that's a familiar refrain," Harry said shaking his head. "So the pureblood movement I fought was just falling in their ancestor's footsteps huh? Nice."

Stephen chuckled a little but went on seriously. "As sorcerer supreme I know more about magic in this world than nearly any other human alive, but there are still places where my magic cannot go. One of those places might hold your battle wizards, but if so I cannot help you find them. I would warn you however that if they are alive…"

"They aren't," Harry said firmly. Stephen looked at him in surprise and Harry sighed. "There are several spells, spells developed for wand wizards who have had too much to drink while abroad amongst muggles if I'm honest, that help a user to find his way to other wizards. I did a few when I first arrived and I didn't receive a response. As strong as I am if there was another wizard like me, one whose power is purely based on manipulation of the world around him via his magical core anywhere on this whole planet, I would've found him or her. That's not to say," he said thoughtfully to himself, "that there aren't any other people with magical cores, just not wizards trained like me." He shook that off and went on. "More I've looked at some of the places where the wizarding world was in my universe and come up empty on almost all of them."

"Almost all of them?" Stephen asked interestedly, leaned forward.

"Yes," Harry said blandly, his eyes twinkling with humor, yet his tone unresponsive to Steven's overture to learn more, "Almost all of them. Whatever happened after they broke off, they're no longer around." Ah, is this what Dumbledore felt withholding information. Huh, rather amusing from this side of things.

Stephen nodded thoughtfully, realizing that the young man before him was a little cagier than he had expected, but respecting his reticence. One thing Harry was not was evil or a magical threat to the world, which was his purview, so he would let the young man keep his secrets.

"So what are your plans going forward? I realize you are also a mutant, and that you seem to be fitting in well with Charles and his group," Stephen smirked a little. Charles had tried to downplay things, but Stephen saw Logan when he came back from his mission abroad, and even ignoring his odd (and rather singed around the edges) suit that was the kind of man that wasn't around just to teach a bunch of kids. That was a warrior, a soldier training soldiers. "All that I would ask as Sorcerer Supreme would be to keep your magic as secret as possible."

Harry frowned a little, thinking of his long term plans and his research and projects. "In the long term," he said slowly, "that might not be possible. I'll keep it a secret for a while, not just because you're asking me to but because it makes sense, but in the long term I might be forced to out myself as a Wizard. I won't tell anyone that there are other magic users obviously, but you and I both know that there are at least a few other dabblers in the world and I doubt that the world governments are completely ignorant of magic as it is."

"But surely you can see that if you share wizardry with the world at large people will start to come to you as a miracle worker?" Stephen asked. In his opinion the normal man on the street just wasn't ready to realize that magic was real but couldn't solve all his problems. "And that doesn't even consider the religious aspect."

Harry frowned again "I don't see that happening the way I'm going to go about it. The majority of what I propose to share is in the form of potions. Some items, but most of them will be, well I found out how to do things magically and now I'm searching for how to do the same things scientifically."

"What sort of potions?" Stephen asked half warily, half interestedly. Potion use in this dimension wasn't very well thought of by most mages and sorcerers, sort of like hedge witchcraft really. Agatha was the only respected sorceress he knew who used and created potions and her potions were more along the lines of short term pick me ups and other simple things.

"A truth serum for one, and something that will, well, I need to see how well they work on somebody without a magical core first but several different types of healing potions, particularly two of them. I already know one of them can work on non-magicals but I need to see about the others. One of them targets bones and can grow back bones, and the other can repair nerve damage."

Stephen gaped. "If they work those would be worth their weight in gold. But do you really think that it's such a good idea to introduce them to the world at large? Couldn't they be abused?"

"I've been thinking along those lines myself already and will be certain to put in place several different kinds of protection to stop that from happening. I don't think I'll stop it entirely, but as I'll be the only source for the ingredients, I'll be able to stop most of it."

"Even so, I would really prefer magic to remain largely unknown Harry." Stephen said.

"I can't promise that, I won't go out of my way to show it, and my being a mutant will cover a lot of it, but I won't make a promise I might not be able to keep." Harry replied firmly, locking eyes with the older sorcerer.

After a moment spent looking into that firm, almost implacable emerald gaze Stephen looked away, rubbing his forehead, and decided to give up on this point. It was obvious that he and Harry were not going to see eye to eye on this issue and really they didn't have to. So long as Harry didn't out any of the other wizards and sorcerers in the world it would be fine. After all, even if his use of magic did come out Harry had a ready-made excuse for why magic was real in his case, he came from another dimension entirely, that didn't imply magic existed here after all. That will satisfy the majority of people at least.

"I cannot say I am happy about that but I won't try to force you or convince you further," he said looking back at the younger man and Harry nodded agreeably.

Stephen went on changing the subject. "Still, if you have this magical draining power or mutant magic draining power whichever the case may be, would you be willing to drain a few items for me? There are several items in my collection, mine and my predecessors really, that are simply vile and I would much prefer that their magic was utterly destroyed as well as the items themselves."

Harry stilled a moment. It shocked Stephen, seeing the young affable man go completely still like that. He suddenly gave off the impression of waiting menace, like a volcano that had just decided it would go off in the near future. A very dangerous young man indeed.

"Tell me," Harry said, his voice still conversational but his eyes beginning to flare with power, "there aren't any items that, Oh I don't know, could be used to resurrect someone is there?"

Stephen raised an eyebrow in surprise then excitedly leaned forward. "One of the items I was thinking about is such an item yes. It's an old sarcophagus that was in a tomb in Egypt. The hieroglyphics on the side of it say that it could be used to resurrect an ancient mage. Another has some storied links to Morgan Le Fay."

Harry scowled angrily then nodded firmly. "I'll do it right now if you like. Do you know how such a thing is created?"

Stephen leaned back a little feeling the energy around him now crackling with Harry's anger. "No," he said soothingly, "perhaps you could enlighten me."

"It is called a soul trap or a horcrux, and what the user does is break off a portion of his soul and embed it into the item in question. The user then cannot truly die he will simply live on as a shade until someone resurrects him. But that isn't the whole story. You can only break off a piece of your soul when you use magic to do something inherently beyond the norm evil, such as killing a newborn babe, a true and complete innocent."

Stephen frowned angrily. "Then it is even more important these items are destroyed. I will call upon you as soon as I can to destroy them, and any others I can think of it turns out you can do so."

Harry nodded. "Do so and I will drain them dry, or if not I know very well how to destroy such things" he promised. "It will be a wonderful feeling to send another asshole like that to the end that he deserves."

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