Lilybet03

I'm not an author, I just tell stories...

[lilybet03]

Aedre's Journey

Once there was a wandering wigmann named Aedre. He held his spear high and his shield broad. Across the world he journeyed, seeking out adventure. It had been long since he had set foot near his home, and this was as he wished, for whilst some wander in seeking, others travel to forget.

[lilybet03]

Chapters: 14/14 Fandom: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger, Sirius Black, Draco Malfoy, Neville Longbottom Additional Tags: Action/Adventure, Harry has a brain, Alternative Magic, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Book 4: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Merlin - Freeform Summary:

What if Harry had taken a look at the dragon in the Tournament and realised he wasn't facing a challenge but a monster? And instead of being a hero had noped out; and ended up with a whole other kind of adventure? One with Merlin, and magic, and more friends, and solving problems with his brain. Oh, and Ron doesn't mysteriously lose his strategic abilities, Malfoy gets seriously into philosophy, and Neville has a bigger part to play.

[lilybet03]

A canal walk from Rose Hill Marple to Romiley. #canal #marplelocks #fungus #romileypapermill (at Marple Locks) https://www.instagram.com/p/CoF5Vd8IFm9/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[lilybet03]

Harry Potter and the Wonderous Wizard

Chapter Two

It should have been, Harry reflected, like looking at someone staring into a mirror, or at twins. Albus Dumbledore: long magenta robe covered in twinkling stars, tall pointy hat rimmed with glittery golden fur, long white beard and half moon glasess, elderly yet spry. Merlin: long dusky blue robe, belted at the waist, pointy hat with silver pinprick stars embroided on, long white beard, elderly yet spry. Yet for all their similarities, it was Merlin that Harry now preferred to sidle behind. There was something just a little off about the twinkle in Dumbledore's eye. He didn't think he'd ever noticed that before.

"You, sir," began Merlin, once the raucous din of Harry's reappearance had settled, "Have stolen my look."

"Perhaps great minds think alike," smiled Dumbledore benevolently.

"Doubtful," responded Merlin, "Else there would never be any new inventions."

"A fine point. But perhaps we might be introduced before going further," Dumbledore rejoined.

"Merlin." The older wizard replied shortly, knowing a little something about the power of names,  "And you are the idiot who forced this boy into a Champion's Duel, when he's only four and ten."

"Ah, the Triwizard Tournament is, in fact, not a duel." Mr Crouch explained, "It is a competition."

Merlin leveled a silent blank look at the grey-suited man, and Harry decided that now would be a grand time to make his escape. Latching fingers into the folds of Ron's robes he silently backed out of the Great Hall, leaving the adults to argue his future. Somehow he knew that either everyone would end up agreeing with Merlin, or everyone would end up frogs.

Before they had reached the Great Hall, Merlin had quizzed the two students on the current and past lessons of Hogwarts, hummed, and told Harry that the Alchemy rooms should be suitable. Somewhere, he stressed, with lots of light and air. Now Harry dug into Ron's pocket and pulled out the blank parchment.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Ron asked, looking back at where voices were steadily climbing.

"I solemnly swear I am up to no good," said Harry, which worked as good an answer as any.

The Marauders Map swept into being in front of them, filling the parchment with black lines and inky dots. Harry was sure that the Map, despite having no brain, knew what he wanted whenever he opened it. This time there were tiny labels in the corners of every room, written in a cramped hand that he recognised from his third year essays.

"Where's Hermione?" he asked, eyes not leaving the map as he scoured for the word 'alchemy'.

"She wouldn't leave the tower. What do you expect, that girl is…" Ron trailed off uncertainly. There was a look in Harry's eye. He seen it before. It preceeded giant chess sets, enormous spiders, and losing house points. He swallowed. "I'll get her."

"Meet you on the fourth floor, near the fighting swords."

The fighting swords were just that, a pair of swords, without apparent owners or wielders, fighting in mid-air. Most students thought that there were really a pair of unseen ghosts locked in eternal battle, but Harry had always loved the idea that the swords fought on alone, even after their bearers had gone.

"Harry! What did you think you were doing? Where did you go? And what's this nonsense about Merlin?" Hermione berated him even as she attempted to hug the life from his bones.

"Using my brains, Chamber of Secrets, and, er," Harry stuttered, then picked up cheerfully, brandishing the Map, "Want to find the Alchemy rooms?"

"Oh Harry," Hermione said, shaking her head. She seemed to say that a lot. Perhaps, Harry pondered, he ought to run his plans by her and forstall the head shaking. But then, he mused as they climbed a set of spindly stairs, she might enjoy saying 'oh Harry', and he didn't want to curb her enjoyment.

"There's a solar up in the east tower, that's certainly got lots of light and air," Hermione said authoritatively.

"East tower," Harry opened, folded, refolded, closed, and turned the map upside down, "Got it. Wierdly shaped room on the top floor?"

"It's an octogon."

"Okay. Nope, that's not alchemy, it's," Harry frowned, "Embroidery? When was sewing taught at Hogwarts?"

"Why was sewing taught at Hogwarts?" added Ron.

"Fourteenth century, it's in Hogwarts: A history," Hermione huffed, pointing her wand at a stubborn door.

"One day I'm going to read that book, just to check she's not making things up," Ron muttered to Harry as they emerged into a long gallery. 

It was a beautiful wooden space with diamond pane windows running the length on both sides, and in the distance they could see another glazed and ornamented window at the end. Yet every straight line: the walls, the ceiling, the windows, even the fireplace, was crooked. Even the floor undulated. Harry grinned, there was something supremely comfortable about a room reflecting his life.

"Where are we?" asked Hermione, fingers clearly itching to tear the Map from Harry's hands.

"The Long Gallery," read Harry.

Ron wandered down a-ways, turned back to them and commented, "But there's no paintings."

"Oh, honestly, a gallery just meant-" Hermione began.

"Look!" Harry pointed at the Map, where, off the far end of the Long Gallery, was a set of rooms, each bearing labels: Alchemy Master's bedroom, Alchemy workroom A, Alchemy Calcination room, Alchemy garderobe. "We've found them."

As Harry, Hermione and Ron began the long walk down the Long Gallery, Merlin was taking tea with Dumbledore in his office. There had been a good, envigorating discussion, a grand demonstration of magic, a bewildering argument with a man in a green hat, and only the briefest moment of frogs.

"What I do not understand is how things have fallen apart so completely," he said pensively, swirling the hot amber liquid. "Magic is…was no more separate from life than breath. Now you channel it through wands, divide it into dark and light, and vast multitudes define it as 'science'."

Dumbledore smiled gently, "I think that is the nature of change."

"To be forgotten," Merlin murmured, gaze fixed on a now far distant past, "is to cease to be."

"Quite. Now, in the matter of Harry. I do think it best that he participate," Dumbledore's eye twinkled, "There is a sense of propriety to observe, not to mention a binding contract."

"Hmm?" Merlim roused himself from a dream of round tables and crystal caves, "No, no, I don't think so. Harry Potter is my apprentice now, a tradition which is still observed, yes? I do not give my permission, and so he will not compete, and thus any contact is void. I think a more well-rounded eduction would serve such a curious boy well."

"Curious?" Dumbledore leapt on the word, though neither face nor voice betrayed his interest.

"Who else would spend hours examining a long abadoned space filled with a dead basilisk than someone who is curious by nature?" Merlin questioned.

"Yes, yes, indeed," Dumbledore relaxed, and offered his guest another lemon drop.

"We can discuss further at a future time, now I believe I will see where my new charge has got to," Merlin refused the sweet, and extricated himself from further social obligations.

Even as he wandered the halls, instinctively following the call of magic to his apprentice, Merlin took the time to ponder. He thought about the events Harry had related regarding his time in the wizarding community, he examined the interest a headmaster had in one orphaned student, and questioned all he knew about curses that killed. It was quite a tangled web.

The Long Gallery had moved like a space in a dream: first the trio never seemed to be getting any closer to the end. Then, on looking back, they found they were more than half way along. The final step happened all at once, moving stretched distance in a single footfall. Harry had once thought that all magic would be like this - the impossible made real. He hadn't imagined that it could become mundane.

"Alohomora," commanded Hermione, on finding the door locked.

As Harry passed through the doorway he reached up, and his fingertips met metal. The key fell into his hand from atop the doorframe. He sighed.

"Wow, mate, this is amazing." Ron said, wandering through the open room. "What's all the glassware for? Pretty odd drinking glasses."

Hermione and Harry shared a muggle look, before saying, "Chemistry." 

The room was indeed amazing. Large windows dominated one side, with worktables placed before them. Each long bench was covered in flasks and condensors, funnels and cylinders, piles of vials, and a whole maze of distillation glassware. At the end of the room, a balcony offered a place to freeze in winter, and on the opposing wall from the windows two huge tapestries flanked the marble fireplace. There were several doors, each carved with a different symbol, some of which Harry vaguely recognised from potions or Hermione's arithmancy homework.

Ron looked puzzled at their simultaneous repsonse, but quickly moved on to opening doors and discovering more workrooms and suites. 

"Is that where it comes from? Chemistry, from Alchemy, I mean?" asked Harry in a curious manner, poking a retort.

"Oh yes, even the word itself. It's Persian, I think, Al Chemia. Came to England in the 12th century, where it slowly untangled into Divination, Alchemy, Chemistry, and Medicine," said Hermione, distractedly flipped through an abandoned notebook. "I did some research after all that business with the Philosopher's stone."

Harry loved the way a traumatic episode in his life could be sumarized as 'that business'.

"Why was the teaching of it abandoned, if so many other disciplines emerged from it?" asked a voice from the doorway.

"Oh!" Hermione gasped, cheeks colouring slightly at the sight of Merlin. "You, um, I, er, I don't know." She hurried out of the room, muttering about fetching Ron.

"Politics, I expect," Merlin said, running fingers along one of the moving tapestries, "It's usually politics. This is a fascinating work."

Harry looked closer at the pair of tapestries on the west wall. To the right there were small scattered scenes in bright colours: a unicorn chained under a tree, a peacock in a bottle, a red king and silver queen embracing. Throughout there was a group of men and women, who Harry assumed to be alchemists, working at kilns, watching liquid drop through glass, sitting by a compost heap. The group migrated from one tapestry to the other, where over their work were two dragons, sinuous and pale, one golden, one silver. They seemed to be fighting or, well, Harry blushed and hastily looked away. 

In the middle of a woven forest in the left work there was a never repeating scene of three men trying to cross a stream. One tried turning a stick into a bridge, another charming a cloak to fly, but whatever they did the magic always failed halfway across the stream, dumping them into the water. They never looked very happy, and seemed to be constantly arguing.

"They remind me of Gwain, Kay, and Bedwin. Now there was a trio who could never do the easy thing." Merlin commented.

"What do you mean?" asked Harry.

Merlin leaned against the wall next to a huge window, "What is the easiest way to cross a stream?"

Fearing a trick question, Harry thought carefully, and on spotting Ron and Hermione lingering in the doorway, tried to indicate that help would be useful. Ron shrugged, and mimed walking with his fingers, whilst Hermione seemed too taken aback by the casual mention of knights of the round table to focus on the problem.

 Finally he gave up, and said, "Swim?"

"But you'll get wet," said Merlin reasonably.

"I'll dry."

Merlin smiled and tipped his head back, closing his eyes, "They cut down half a forest, angered a local sprite, and sent the stream down an entirely new path. Took them three days. Don't be a knight, Harry, they have very little brains."

Thus began Harry's teaching with the oddest wizard he had ever met.

[lilybet03]

Harry Potter and the Wondrous Wizard

For want of a nail the horse was lost, for want of a horse the battle was lost, for want of a battle the crown was lost. As Harry Potter stood, broom in hand, 'Potter Stinks' badges flashing at him from the crowd, dragon roaring in front of him, he wondered if this was the nail. Or rather if him going along with all of this madness was the beginning of the end. His end. Slowly he backed away from the black spiny monster, and back into the safety of the champion's tent. Time to use some of those brains Hermione claimed he had.

"Mr Potter, what do you think you're doing?" Mr Bagman came bustling into the tent, looking harried.

Harry spun round to face him, "Being a teenager, sir."

"What? No, now come on, there's no need for nerves now, just go on out. I see you've got your broom, fine flyer I've heard, come along," Bagman tried to herd him back out of the tent flap towards the Horntail, but this time Harry was having none of it.

"Sorry, sir, but as a… a minor, I can't compete without a guardian's permission." Harry continued backing away from Bagman, towards the other tent exit. "A magical guardian!" He dregged up a useless fact from one of Hermione and Ron's late night arguments about the wizarding world's 'backwards nature'. "I'm not apprenticed, my godfather's a criminal, and Professors don't count, so really, sir, I can't compete, you see, it's illegal."

And with that Harry ran. He didn't get more than a few yards before he saw the other judges bearing down on him. Which was when he finally made use of the broom he'd summoned. Swinging a leg over, he buzzed past the astonished adults, enjoying their stunned expressions as he took off for Gryffindor tower.

Squeezing his way through the window, whilst not falling to his death from seven stories, was not an experience Harry wanted to repeat, but at least it was better than  being burnt to a crisp by a dragon. Hurriedly, knowing that this would be the first place the search party would look, Harry opened his trunk, and threw his invisibility cloak over him, broom and all. Then he headed for the door.

It was not an easy task, avoiding the confused groups of students and determined adults, but Harry eventually made his way to Myrtle's bathroom. It was empty. Like always. Trying not to make a fuss, Harry found the right sink and hissed at the snake carved tap. A familiar grinding noise filled the room. 

"Who's there? Come to call me names I bet," Myrtle whined from one of the stalls, but Harry was gone. Sliding down the pipe and into the dubious safety of the Chamber of Secrets.

It had been very difficult to tell exactly how long the Basilisk was when fighting it with only a mythical sword, but Harry discovered in the course the next several hours of exploration that it was approximately 65 feet long, which was rather large. He also discovered that the Chamber of Secrets was accurately named. There was the Basilisk (secret number one), the network of bedrooms and studies (secret number two), and the large library and potions laboratory (secret number three). All of these paled in comparison, however, when he discovered secret number four: Merlin.

Sometimes Harry thought his life was like an adventure story. But if it was he wouldn't have ended up stuck expositing his way through 1500 years of British history, starting with some poorly remembered information about the Anglo-Saxons, and ending with the rather too personal recent affairs. In all Merlin, complete with long grey beard and pointy hat, took events rather well. There had been some swearing at the beginning, in what Harry assumed was Welsh, but after that he had settled down to listen with interest.

The room Merlin had been hibernating in was carved out of the natural rock that Hogwarts sat on, had a simple stone shelf for a bed and a metal brazier. Merlin himself seemed incredibly spry for a 1600 year old man, and jumped up around the Georgian era to pace across the small space. Finally, he turned to the amazed young wizard and asked, "Do you want to be my apprentice?"

Harry, having had a rather long day, with one too many dragons in it, blurted out, "Why? I'm no one!"

"You have a problem, yes?" Merlin waited until Harry nodded, "I can be a solution."

"Wasn't your last apprentice Arthur?" Harry queried, the image of a knight throwing Excalibur into the lake as Arthur died behind him stuck in his head.

"Yes. No. It's a little complicated," Merlin admitted.

"I'd rather not be a hero," Harry said, "If that's alright."

"Arthur was not a hero," Merlin said sternly, looking down at the young man folded on the floor of his cave, "Arthur was an idiot with a sword. Which was, admittedly, my mistake. The sword, not the idiot."

"I had a sword," muttered Harry, thinking of the giant dead snake miraculously not decomposing in the main chamber.

"You are a wizard, Harry," said Merlin.

Harry looked up in shock. Those words had saved his life from Dursley-shaped oblivion once, and now they were here again. Could they save him from possessed teachers, teenaged dark lords, evil rats, and goblets of fire?

"Would you like to learn magic?" Merlin asked, oblivious of Harry's turmoil. He swept his hand in a small circle, and presented a gold coin to the boy.

Later Hermione would ask, "But how did you know? How did you know he was Merlin?" Which was a really good question, with the very unsatisfying answer, "I just did." This moment was the same. How did Harry, the boy who had learnt how to hide, to protect everyone except himself, how all promises were made to be broken, how did he just know that Merlin would give him freely the truth of what it meant to be a wizard? To do magic. He just did.

"Yes. Please."

When Harry emerged from the pipe in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom, Merlin clinging gleefully onto the broom behind him, he was expecting a mess. The sort of mess that began with Snape shouting and ended in Dumbledore's disappointed look, with a tearful Hermione sandwiched between. He did not find that. Instead, outside the bathroom, he found Ron.

"About time," he muttered, handing Harry a squashed sandwich, "Everyone's gone nuts."

"Er," Harry said usefully, taking a bite of the sandwich (not egg and cress, he might be forgiven!).

"We've all been sent to our dorms, the teachers are scouring every floor of the castle, there are Aurors on the grounds, and mum's here." He said the last with a truly glum look, "She had a go."

"Well, you might have believed me," Harry said, trying for calm and somehow achieving it. It helped, having the most renowned wizard ever to live examining his broom as if it were a new species of cat; the level of surrealism was oddly relaxing.

"Yeah," Ron muttered, his ears going red.

"How come you're here and not," Harry waved a hand in the vague direction of Gryffindor Tower.

Ron pulled a rather battered, old piece of parchment out of his pocket. "Figured you might be hungry," he shrugged.

"Excellent, a man who knows words feed the soul," declared Merlin, and strode off down the hall, "Let's sort this tumaultuous affair out, shall we. This way!"

"Who's he?" Ron asked.

"Merlin."

"Right. Wait, what?"

[lilybet03]

Tangled skies #trees #winter https://www.instagram.com/p/CnNWKUYI9wH/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[lilybet03]

Monsters

“Sir, I have never seen such a sight before. The boar was as large as a horse, as black as a bear. He had huge tusks, and an evil look about him,” said the hunter, his fist clenched tight upon his broken spear. “I and my dogs came upon him, and though they attacked with full strength they were routed all. I cast my spear at him, and it broke on his hide! His den must lie in the Ingelwood somewhere, but the other creaures of the forest let him be, no doubt too afeared of his nature. My lord, I believe that it may be that the fey folk walk with him.”

This is the accounting in ‘The Avowynge of Arther’ that the hunter gives of the monster in the forest. Monsters are a strange class within fiction, quite separate from villians. Monsters, unlike villians (think Moriarty), are usually under described. In Lovecraft’s work the monsters are never described at all; in fact that is the very description of them – that they cannot be described or understood by human minds. Grendal is somewhat described, but like all this class is more described by metaphor or effect than a literal height, weight, hairy image.

This is, of course, the point of a monster: to be that which is scary to the point of indescribability. There is a well known effect in criminal psychology in which the victim or witness is only able to recall the weapon of the attacker – weapon focus. This causes memory impairments, leading to less retained information about the attacker’s face, clothing, vehicle etc. Translated into fiction, therefore, the description of a monster must be unreliable in order to retain a level of believability. If a monster was described perfectly it would jar the reader from the atmosphere of the writing, and lead to a less accurate account of the attack.

In this instance, lack of description is a description in and of itself.

[lilybet03]

This is no fantum, ne no fabulle, Ye wote wele of the Rowuntabulle. The Avowynge of Arthur, my new project on tumblr. (Photo by Ann James, my wonderful mum) #writing #kingarthur #woods #inmemoriam #middleenglish https://www.instagram.com/p/Cm-CX0ko5IY/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[lilybet03]

Blogs

I don’t really like blogs (hence my absence).

They usually end up sounding pretentious or childlike. Blogs are for people who do things, usually with other people. Look at the blogs around us, they are written by people with jobs, families, pets, holidays. Not someone who just likes words. Take the project I'm working on at the moment - translating "The Avowynge of Arther" from middle English meterical poetry to modern English prose. Not what you usually find in a blog, especially not from someone who has no degree or other qualifications in English. Yet there is a stanza which reads:

The king atte Carlele he lay,

The hunter cummys on a day,

Sayd, "Sir, ther walkes in my way,

A welle grim gryse!

Which I love. There's that fantastic tumpty-tumpty rhythm and rhyme to it, combined with that last line - a grim gryse. It reminds me of Beowulf, and Grendel being refered to as a grim ghast.

You can see the scene clearly. There's Arthur on his temporary throne (the royal progress may have begun with the 'king' being a warrior traveling from battle to battle), talking with the gracious knights of the Roundtable, those filled with "kindness of courtesy" and who "hunt wilely", when in comes this hunter from the forest of Ingelwood. There he stands, in leathers, sweaty and bloody, perhaps with a broken spear in his hand, and declares before the court, "Sir, I was walking in the forest and suddenly there was a monster before me!"

Tumpty-tumpty-tump.

[artwoonz]

By: David Zinn Instagram: @artwoonz

[clockwaysarts]

This appigle is a walkin! And walkins what they do~

I may make a a little simple background for this one but I do love the little walk cycle by itself! It’s so satisfying to see the appigle come to life. I really got the calm yet peppy sort of step I wanted. I think appigles are very mellow critters on the whole- other than the bad apples of course.

[lesstalkmoreillustration]

Kristen Meyer

[livewellthinkdeeply]

Life and logic of my favorite character, Mr. Spock.

[ghostbri]

Yes I'm alone, but I'm alone and free Just stay away and you'll be safe from me

[sdzoo]

Birds are easily some of the most colorful animals in the kingdom.

1. Fischers lovebird 📷: Ian Gill 2. Violet-backed starling 📷: Lisa Diaz 3. Himalayan monal pheasant 📷: Liz Sauer 4. Allens hummingbird 📷: Ian Gill 5. Wompoo fruit dove 📷: Ian Gill 6. Spotted tanager 📷: Ian Gill 7. Nicobar pigeon 📷: Ian Gill

[thewightknight]

The 25 Best Protest Signs from the March For Our Lives

[kim-jisoo]

Where’s this man’s Emmy? (Captian Holt’s best bits)