Chapter Text
Ancient Bonds
A Harry Potter/Anita Blake Crossover
By Sif Shadowheart
Chapter One: Setting Up Shop
Stonehenge, England; August 1, 2000
In the pre-dawn of Lughnasadh, there wasn’t a soul in sight to play witness as something hit the ground with an ignoble whump in the center of one of the most famous ancient sites in the world.
As that whump was followed immediately by a spate of cursing that would make even a pirate sit up and take notice, it was safe to assume that the pile of there-but-not person and clothes would be rather glad about that when he got his clumsy behind up from the ground where he’d fallen and gotten himself all tangled up in his Invisibility Cloak.
If one asked Hari “Harry” - and yes there was a difference - James Potter, a bit of clumsiness was entirely justified after having a bevy of incorporeal somethings digging through his brain and judging him heart and soul before tossing him out arse over teakettle out into the other side of the Veil.
That he truly felt what he thought was his godchild/godparent bond with Sirius flare with life for a split-second before dying back down - it felt strained but it was definitely there, Sirius might be a considerable distance away from what he’d learned about that particular bond - was all that kept him from actually trying to figure out a way to open a new Veil there in the middle of…
Bloody hell they’d dropped him in Stonehenge.
That was a bit too on-brand even for him, flying broomsticks and pointed hats aside.
Shaking his head and once more reining in his desire to actually curse the beings in charge of soul processing - or whatever-the-fuck they did in the Veil - Harry rose to his feet and tucked his Cloak firmly about him.
Just because he recognized Stonehenge didn’t mean that anything else in this new world or dimension or universe or whatever-it-was that the Veil could access would be the same and he’d pass quite fervently on being locked away in a muggle government lab somewhere or ending up chained to a throne as a pet magician or any of another dozen or so wild iterations his brain decided to pop up with on the fly.
Tasks.
Harry knew he worked best and thought cleanest - even with the Occlumency training - with tasks in front of him.
There were two - maybe three depending on how he thought about them - that he could think of straight away.
First: get to London, start getting an identity set up, and find a place to rest.
The Veil really took it out of a bloke, especially the part where they ripped Tommy Boy’s horcrux right out of his fucking head.
Second: start tracking Sirius.
There.
Tasks set.
Now...how the bloody hell was he going to get to London.
And for that matter...what fucking day was it?
The judges of the Veil - which was what Harry was going with since he didn’t have anything better to call them - apparently had a sense of humor, who knew?
Or maybe it was that they were literal in the extreme.
Harry was twenty for all intents and purposes so they’d kicked him out the other side of their domain at the proper year and time for him to be twenty if he hadn’t abused the crap out of a time-turner for just under a year.
A quick Tempus told him that he’d skipped ahead by his reckoning to the morning after what should have been his twentieth birthday, leaving him wondering if Sirius had been booted out of the Veil back in this world’s 1996 or 1999, whether a year had passed for Sirius or four years.
He didn’t bother pondering on the subject for long, one year or four he wouldn’t know until he found his godfather and to do that he needed to get himself sorted.
A bit of loitering near the village travel center allowed him to do some investigating via a lifted wallet and ducking into the nearest open shop’s restroom.
He flipped through the wallet quickly, scanning the contents and comparing in particular the identification and the pound notes to his own. A quick duplication spell on the identification card - since his own was significantly outdated and from before Harry went off to Hogwarts - and a change of the numbers to match his old ones plus the addition of his picture gave him something that should pass at least casual scrutiny until he could spell his way into one that would stand up to anything this world had to throw at it. The pound notes on the other hand were in the same style as those he already had on hand.
That at least was convenient and gave him hope - along with not immediately spotting any major differences between muggles from his world and this world - that this wasn’t so much as a world that had undergone a major divergence from his own. Or vice versa. As it was a world that had taken a bit of a step to the left instead.
He hoped anyway.
Shucking off his Cloak, he tucked it in the pocket of the dull black motorcycle jacket he rescued from Sirius’s closet since from what he could see there was nothing about a young man in a leather jacket, t-shirt, jeans, and boots with a rucksack that would ring a false note to the muggles around him. His athame and pocketknife were hidden as were his wands, the ring on his hand was plain, he was about as normal as he could be. Especially for southern England. Being desi wasn’t odd here, even paired with features and eyes that shouted his mixed heritage.
But that was just fine.
It had been hidden from even him more than long enough, he wasn’t about to hide it now that there was no reason for it - even whatever bullshit reasoning Dumbledore had had in the first place.
If anything it was his scar that would draw attention as it always did even from strangers.
Which: fair enough.
He’d been sensitive about it for so long because other people made a fuss over it.
For Harry it had been a part of him for as long as he could remember: healed silver-white scarring (now, anyway) on the upper-left quadrant of his face in a lightning/starburst pattern with the origin point centered over his left eyebrow and the scars spiraling/spinning out from there down onto his cheekbone, temple, forehead and up to his hairline.
It was a major identifying mark, the sort of thing that drew questions and curiosity long before he knew it as the curse scar it was and it became a symbol of a magical feat that both enchanted and repulsed everyone who saw it with rare exceptions.
Harry left the restroom, turning in the wallet as found on the street at the coffee-seller. Already there and feeling bubbly with excitement he bought himself a large hot chocolate and a chocolate scone from the coffee-seller near the bus stop, not necessarily needing the boost to his magic that chocolate gave but in the mood for it anyway as he felt free. No expectations. No secrets, no prophecies. Just himself, his personal quest to find Sirius, and all the magic he could harness at his fingertips.
Buying a few copies of the newspapers on hand at the Amesbury bus station along with his ticket to the next-closest train terminal in Salisbury, Harry arched his brow as he read the headline on the first one, having decided to start with the Times :
Bill of Life Ratified into Law in Thirteen Countries
Some forms of Living Dead now granted same rights in the United Kingdom as Human Beings
“Okay…” Harry drawled, blinking then he shook his head as he folded the papers back up when the bus arrived. He’d read the articles once he’d gotten settled. “Maybe things are a bit more different than immediately apparent after all…”
It was a statement that became more and more true as Harry tore through first the Times, then the Independent, before finishing up with the more localised Salisbury Journal by the time his train from Salisbury arrived in London’s Waterloo station.
Already kicking himself for making an assumption based on a few minutes’ worth of observation, he snapped up a copy of the free Metro and added copies of the New York Times, the Washington Post, and several tabloids including the Star and the Daily Mail even though the international papers were rather expensive at the periodical stand.
To get a better idea of what he was dealing with in this strange new world that looked so much like the old one on the surface but was so different underneath, it was worth the expense as he sat at a table with a coffee and a sandwich as he made as much sense of things as he could from the papers.
Not the easiest thing in the world since all of them made an assumption of pre-existing knowledge but he still managed to pick up a few things regardless.
That the super- er, correction - preternatural wasn’t in hiding was the major one.
The Bill of Life that the papers were all discussing, or in the case of the ones from the States discussing new laws and bills that had come from it, meant that vampires were known and in the open and numerous enough for things like open acknowledgement without getting exterminated by fearful muggles.
So were animators and/or necromancers capble of raising fucking zombies which was an act of Dark Arts in his old world that would have had the public shrieking for the witch or wizard’s head on a platter.
Lycanthropes were also alive and well and known about, though heavily discriminated against from what he could tell from his reading of current affairs.
Vampires were too, but for some reason - numbers or power maybe? - the laws were skewed from what he could tell in favor of vampires over other kinds of preternatural beings or people.
As if since they came first into the open they were reaping both the first fruits of coming out as well as facing the first wave of condemnation if the dross in the tabloids was any sign.
Setting the papers down, Harry sank back against his chair, deep in thought.
There wasn’t enough information about magic and magic users other than these animators for him to make a decision on how open with his magic use he could or should be.
Right. He nodded mentally to himself, rising and gathering up his papers and rucksack. Moving over to the Underground entrance he bought himself a ticket to Paddington Station.
There was a hotel right in that station, and it was a major transition hub.
His bond to Sirius hadn’t grown any stronger by arriving in London, wherever his godfather was it wasn’t anywhere close.
He’d have to travel again to find him if he was a betting man.
Having all the trains right at hand would only be to his benefit once he got a location on the Marauder.
And given that it was Lughnasadh, he knew just the ritual to find him.
Harry had to hand it to the receptionist at the hotel, she was a definite professional.
He’d known there was a hotel in Paddington Station, he hadn’t remembered it being a bloody Hilton for Merlin’s sake!
Though he expected that dealing with tired travelers who chose the location likely for much of the same reasons as Harry: location, convenience, exhaustion, etc., she probably dealt with more than her fair share of travel-lagged pillocks so even someone who didn’t quite look like he belonged in her establishment must be a nice change since he was polite even if he was wearing broken in leather and hand-me-down jeans.
At least they were Sirius’s hand-me-downs from when his godfather was a teenager, rather than Dudley’s that would’ve fit three of Harry inside them.
Harry would take old enough to be vintage over worn-by-a-whale any day.
“Welcome to the Hilton, Mister Potter.” The woman smiled at him with her brightest company smile. Young and a bit rough he might be but he paid in cash, had a valid id, and was quite handsome despite the scar on his face. “Here is your room key, you’re on the third floor, take the lifts here,” she gestured, “and your room will be down the hall on the right.”
“Thank you, ma’am.” Harry smiled back, then let his eyes flicker over to one of the amenities noted on the informational placard. “Where would I find the Business Lounge? I need to check in before I give in to jetlag.”
She chuckled obligingly, then told him the lounge with computers and internet - free of charge to guests, of course - were on the second floor.
That’d work.
Harry might not have much of any experience at all with computers outside of what he’d learned piecemeal from internet cafes when there was a friendly worker to help him, but he knew enough to do a basic search and research.
This world was stranger than it’d seemed at first glance.
He needed to know more before he found himself sent to prison for breaking some muggle law that in his old world never would’ve existed because of the Statute of Secrecy.
And research he did, hitting the business lounge after a quick wash in the room’s loo and a fresh pair of clothes, plus a Pepper-Up to handle the travel-lag from changing worlds or dimensions.
He’d been up all day and night now, after all, and still had longer to go before sundown when he could perform his seeking ritual in the comfort of his hotel room.
So long, that was, as there wasn’t something like the Trace or the Ministry of Magic in his new world.
He’d rather pass on getting slapped with a fine or jailed because he performed magic in a muggle area - and it was definitely that. Other than Stonehenge, he’d not felt a drop of magic around him since landing in this place. He needed to know what he was dealing with and he needed to know it now.
His muggle money was also dwindling fast, he also needed to start selling off some of his precious metals to replenish his supply unless being forced to depend on spellwork for everything appealed to him.
Which it didn’t.
Don’t get him wrong, he’d use spells and charms if he had no other choice.
But he brought the gold with him specifically to avoid what amounted to stealing from hapless muggles who had no defense against his magic, so he didn’t want to get lax and lazy and use them because it was easier that way.
Harry found himself having to create an email address to get access to some of the sites that popped up on his search but it was worth fumbling and lying his way through it for what he found regarding what this world knew about magic.
He ended up with two main takeaways by the time his wand vibrated silently against his arm in warning for dusk nearing.
First: either the Wizarding World didn’t exist in this world or they’d gone way underground and totally locked themselves away from the muggle world.
And second: While the muggle world knew of some magic it wasn’t anything like his magic. It wasn’t wanded. It wasn’t natural or easy. And every last bit of it was based on rituals of one kind or another to harness what the user didn’t have in their heart and soul and blood.
Animation was a combination of blood and death and soul magic using ritual sacrifice.
So was vaudun.
Wiccans tried to harness natural magics of the earth, psychics might have some minor inborn talent but it was nothing like an actual Seer.
It was all very strange to him, as strange as having vampires out in the open and legal citizens of the muggle world.
But maybe that was the point of this world.
Magical humans weren’t the most powerful people here. From what he could tell, vampires were. Magic had taken a step to the left, that was for certain.
Still, given that for the most part the world was trucking along in relative peace, he couldn’t say it wasn’t a terrible change or an amazing one for that matter.
Just different.
Well, Harry knew all about being different from everyone else, he’d lived his entire life that he could remember that way.
He’d adjust.
For the moment, he had an errant Padfoot to track down and no magical governing body to worry about.
Now that was what he called freedom.
Harry dug through his rucksack back in his room, pulling out what he’d need for the tracking ritual.
With Harry’s proclivity for blood magic and having both an existing bond and a blood-tie to Sirius, there wasn’t much he needed but there were a few tools that would make his life easier than blindly shoving power down the bond and using it like a homing beacon - which was problematic with as muffled the bond was from what Harry was assuming to be a great distance.
Together with a map of the world he’d purchased from a shop that included major cities, he needed some candles, his athame, and the correct spell from the Black Library.
He was glad of his own foresight to say the least, as he’d left the book with the tracking spell he wanted to use on the top of the pile of book trunks since otherwise he might be there for days digging through all of them for the right one and he would’ve kissed his window to use the power of the high day goodbye.
Laying the map flat on the hotel room’s desk, he set the candles on the cardinal points then lit them with a thought. He’d never get tired of that. Binding fire as his to call was the best decision he’d ever made, short of breaking free of Dumbledore to begin with.
Beginning the chant as the sun set, Harry picked up the athame and pricked a small hole in the meat of his palm on the outside where it wouldn’t bother him until he could heal it later.
Rich drops of ruby red steadily hit and pooled on the center of the world map, Harry immediately lifting his hand away once it began to twist and move in place as if it was coming alive as it pulled on his magic and tried to follow the bond to the other end of it.
Absently pulling his hand to his mouth as he pressed his tongue to the shallow wound to soothe it, he watched avidly as it began circling the map in wide circles that became tighter and tighter as the magic focused and did its job.
As it found Sirius.
The blood moved left of center, over the Western Hemisphere, then quickly narrowed in on the States, then fell inert just over right - or east in this case - of the middle of the country.
Leaning forward, Harry tilted his head a bit as he read the city name attached and partially hidden by the ring of blood surrounding a city marker.
St. Louis.
Sirius was at this very moment in the city of St. Louis, in the United States, more than six thousand - give or take - kilometres away on the literal other side of the globe.
Well then, no wonder their bond was muffled.
Now Harry really had to get his identity in order for this world unless he wanted to Imperio himself through airport security on both ends as well as onto the plane.
His godfather was so close and yet so far away.
Times like these he wished that international portkeys were a thing since he had the power but not the training to Apparate a distance like that.
Would certainly make things faster.
But he’d waited years to see Sirius again, the few days it should take him to get everything straightened out is a much milder price to pay than the work and cost he’s already put in for them to be reunited.
He could wait.
That didn’t mean he was happy about it.
Alright, so maybe Harry had underestimated how long it would take him to set up his identity but in his defense, he’d never had to worry about this sort of thing before.
To that end, after a couple of days of futility trying to figure out a way to create a digital footprint for himself or legal records that would come up if ever anyone searched for him, he went with what had worked well enough when he first arrived: borrowing documents from unsuspecting muggles, copying them with a charm, and then either putting them back or turning them in as lost to the nearest business.
It wasn’t legal, it wasn’t ethical, but fuck it.
Laws don’t exactly cover what to do when your mysterious archway of doom spat you out into a strange world so at this point all Harry cared about was surviving.
When he had his ill-gotten documentation - birth certificate, passport, and a better UK identification card than the original he’d rushed on - he started altering the numbers and codes on them to match up against each other and replaced information such as his parents’ names and addresses, his address, and his picture to match him and his personal history.
And to his shock when he went in person to Heathrow to buy a plane ticket in cash to Switzerland - since their confidentiality laws were the best he could find anywhere according to his research - it worked.
Everything matched, he didn’t set off any alarms thanks to secrecy, security, and notice-me-not charms on his wands and knives, and even his rucksack passed through the x-ray inspection using its “muggle-worthy” setting without so much as a whimper.
And, to be honest, watching the jaw literally drop on the snooty banker who only agreed to see him after he flashed actual gold in the lobby of the private bank in Geneva he’d located after a few mental scans of the people in the Swiss city, made his day.
He also found out that phrases like “it’s highly irregular…” tended to be stopped with the presentation of a bar of pure gold bullion, so there was that.
Hari James Potter was the proud owner of a numbered Swiss bank account, a stack of traveler’s checks, and a debit card linked to the account that didn’t have a limit though would require an authorization call for any purchase over a half million dollars.
Somehow, he figured this was a little different than Sirius’s first week in their new home, but at least after working with Fangorn for a year Harry wasn’t too touchy about being sneered at by bankers.
That they were more than happy to take his gold and the majority of his silver and invest it after tallying the exchange rate for him to francs, was beside the point.
Bankers were bankers.
As long as they kept up their end of the deal and invested his money wisely they wouldn’t have a problem.
Harry used his new account the next day to purchase a home on the outskirts of St. Louis sight-unseen using a direct bank transfer, and the bubbly - if shocked - realtor in Missouri was more than happy to give him a reference for a handyman who could handle a few minor problems the property had.
A series of emails later, and a purchase of a one-way ticket to St. Louis, and Harry was ready to set up shop in a new base.
And then start the hunt for his godfather in truth.