Keywords: M/F, F/F Author: W R Jenkins Title: Potter: Woad Warrior Disclaimer:(standard) Do not screw up. Do not do anything illegal. This includes specifically (but not limited to) reading on if you are under 18- 21 in some localities If you are underage you must leave now. If you're young and curious, this is not the place to get the straight story. You act like this and people will look at you strange and give you a wide berth. Also, don't try this at home. Some of this stuff is just plain wrong, most of it is unsafe in the present viral climate and some of it doesn't work in this universe. They are stories. They deal with ideas, fantasies and thoughts that might not even be pleasant in real life. Thoughts are like that. Fantasies are there so we can toy with the sensations without feeling or inflicting the pain, despair or humiliation. End Sermon. Untold Hogwarts: Woad Warrior - (HPwoad.txt) - Who can tell what's going on in this fan's mind? Too many Arthurian Romances perhaps, but only those of a specific type- Anyway, Ancient magic in Britain is very strange but not as much as the customs of an ancient people. M/F, F/F [REpost to REformat] Harry'd had his adventure. He'd been through the looking glass, or perhaps to Bizzaro world. It was interesting and all, but Hermione had not for one instant envied him. Still, compared to the pebbled, tide-revealed strand, some alternate Hogwarts seems paradise. Of course, it will pass. It must be a dream. One doesn't wake on a deserted spit of land under the glow of the full moon, not really. Hermione is safe in her bed suffering some bizarre reaction to some worry she doesn't even know she has. There's no other explanation, really. Being naked is the first clue. That only happens in dreams. She gets up, wet and bedraggled as if she has been thrown up from the sea, and sets off. Better to confront whatever it is and be done with it, she thinks. She doesn't let the creeping question that she's aware she's dreaming interfere. That brings up questions she's not prepared to answer. Better to hold to it being a dream. At least then it will be over in time. She seems, from what she can gather from the land formation and the water, to be on the western coast, she guesses Wales. Astronomy was never her strong suit, but her weakest suit can still be of avail. She will look again in some time to see the motion, although a dream world doesn't have to conform. She holds firmly to that belief. Still it seems wise to move to cover. It is warmer out of the wind from the North Sea and she realizes she is chilled to the bone. She finds tall grasses to huddle in, in the lee of the trees and shivers. That she only noticed it when the air was warmer, she takes as another sign is it a dream. She has to fall back on the vaguries of a dream to explain the rustling around her. When the blue-dyed people stand up, she's too terrified to care why it's happening. They treat her with deference, not even touching her, but Hermione feels their will as a force making her get up and accompany them. It is better if just as shocking. They lead her, like a pig in a bubble they surround, to a campsite in a clearing. She huddles near the fire in gratitude for the heat. They bring her food, carefully moving back so she does not touch them. Their actions say the reverence her, but they are more scared of her than she is of them. They bring her skins to wear- deerskin she guesses. That is contrary to the wolf skins they wear, but they are warm and covering and she wraps herself in them without further question. There is something about all of this, but she can't quite remember. She wishes she could go to the library to look it up. The blue dye suggest Picts, but they should be far north of where she believes she is. The early Welsh have some weird traditions, but she doesn't recall dying with woad among them. There is some significance to the deer, however, and she thinks it is connected to ritual sacrifice. She thinking too much, she realizes. Perhaps if she lets her mind wander she will move to another dream, one not so troublesome. When she wakes, her hopes of a dream are fading. She doesn't recall ever sleeping in a dream to wake in the same one. She feels too awake. Everything is too real and solid. There's no hint of dream vaguery. The tribespeople are watching her. See feels their eyes on her everywhere she goes. They still keep their distance until an old woman, both facts clear because she is naked and painted with strange signs in the blue dye, comes up holding a stick with charms swinging from it. Hermione watches expectantly, trying to think how she can communicate when the old woman begins to beat the air around Hermione and chant. It seems to be some sort of ritual. OW! The woman shouts and begins to hit Hermione with the stick. Hermione tells her to stop, but it does no good, she turns to flee and is fetched a good swat on the bottom. Her nightmare has become dire. There is nothing to do but run and she is chased by the old woman, swatted on the rear as she is driven toward a stand of trees. The old woman is sprightly for her age and stays apace with Hermione spanking her many more times as she runs. What has happened to make them change from the respectful, even fearful regard to beating her, she wonders as she runs. Is the woman their witch doctor or shaman banishing her because they've decided she's evil? She is a few paces into the glade when she shrieks. She didn't notice the first of the tribespeople lining the path. As they close in, she sees they are all around her. There is one opening and she is urged to it by all of them striking her with sticks. She hurtles into a clearing and her heart stops. They are driving her into a wicker cage. She knows enough of myth and rumor to know that ancient people were accused of burning victims alive in wicker cages. When the sticks no longer propel her, she is shoved inside and the cage closed behind her. If she only knew what was going on. If she knew where she was. Sheer frustration and despair make her collapse to the floor of her cage and sob. Burning to death, what a horrible way to die. She can't even think about that. In contrast, the tribe is joyous. They dance about her cage brandishing knives and spears and singing. Well done, she thinks bitterly, you've managed to trap the dangerous helpless girl. She's given food and drink in a confusing kindness, based on what she thinks they are to do. Perhaps it is poisoned, or drugged, she thinks as she looks at it. Then it is kindness, she thinks. Better to be dead than to burn alive. She eats the food with no ill effect, but as she drains the wine, she feels dizzy. That's it then, she thinks as the world swirls in front of her eyes. That's the short life of Hermione Granger. She is startled when she regains consciousness later in the evening. She is no longer in the cage. She is tied to a frame between two drying deerskins and the glade is lit by two fires and a myriad of torches. She is being ritually 'skinned', the skins she was wrapped in pulled off her until she is naked in the frame. The people are again very careful around her and Hermione wishes they'd make up their minds if she is a guest or an enemy. Her nemesis comes forward, speaking some harsh language that sounds almost like Gobbeldy-gook, and begins to draw on her. Hermione doesn't like the import. The old woman starts with squiggles down her belly and lines up her thighs and then proceeds to drawing circles, make that a spiral, on each of her breasts. She pulls Hermione's ear to make her close her eyes and then puts a swath of blue across them. she draws a line slowly, and with much harsh talk, down her throat. Now she fears they are to slit her throat. She is cut down by two of largest men, still barely taller than herself. They head her between the fires as she looks for an opportunity to escape. She is surrounded in a circle of the whole tribe. There's no gap and she despairs of bursting through without being dragged back. She senses they will not be kind if she attempts escape. The men lead her to a rock. It is just the sort for sacrifice. Hermione sees herself on it as they slit her throat and dance as her life spurts out. What worse can they do? She must try to escape. But as she thinks it, the two men take her arms. Too late. She is laid out on the rock, still held there by her captors as the old woman begins to croon. She sounds appeasing, as if trying to charm some force or some god. Hermione lifts her head to see the old woman is facing out into the wood. They aren't even thanking her for being killed for them, Hermione snorts. All in all it's been nothing but horrible since she woke on the pebbly strand. She sees movement, the old woman is cooing, cajoling as she backs toward the stone. Something breaks from the brush. Hermione sees the antlers first. It is only when he is much nearer that Hermione can see it is a man in skins, wearing the antlers and bent as if he were a stag. He looms over and the men release her arms. Hermione feels the need to flee, but she seems paralyzed. Perhaps it is fear or ancient magic but she can't make herself spring from the stone. Then he is over her, looking into her eyes. This is the hardest to explain. Hermione feels she knows him. She feels his sorrow and his burden. She feels he is examining her to find if she is worthy. She feels she is his one hope. She hopes she is. Then suddenly, or seeming so after the intense look that seemed to make time pause, she feels him enter her. It is the rough stab of an animal and Hermione jerks at the invasion. He thrusts vigorously like an animal mating. Hermione stares at him in wonder. His eyes have not changed. She can see no indication that he is having her in them. His thrusts pick up in intensity. Hermione feels herself begin to warm. She cannot help being caught in his fervor. His need surrounds her like the air as well as pounds inside her. She is no longer just resolved but accepting of her fate. When he arches in the short strokes of ejaculating, she is hanging in many senses. She is hanging on the cusp of some meaning she senses as well as on the climax she has not quite achieved. She feels that her entire body hangs from his spurting penis as well. She screams. As it is clear he has completed his task, her deer lover's head is pulled back and she is flooded with blood. It was not her, but his throat to be slit in the ritual. The bloody rain pelts down on her as the deer-man is pulled off her and dragged away. She sits up in horror to see what will become of him, but she is surrounded by the tribe and helped from the rock. She is wrapped in a regal robe- of woven cloth, not the skins they wear, and led off in a procession to the huts of their village. She knows enough of this to guess more. The Golden Bough, the Sun Hero, the yearly reign and the blood sacrifice to end it, she can recall. It makes her the Goddess incarnate, but, worrisomely, she can't recall what happens to her. Sensibly, she should be revered, but that's little comfort. What sense does it make to kill the king? She is confined, as it seems, in her own hut of mud and wattle. The door is closed and the smoke hole in the center is dark in the night. She is alone and feels a prisoner. Oh for a wand, she laments. If I had my wand I'd sort them out! But Unicorn hair, Phoenix feather, Dragon heartstring, where is she to find them even if she were able to fashion a wand for herself? The woad sigils on her body under the robe seem to glow warm and she is taken by another dread. What if the Deer King's seed takes root? What is to become of her if she is pregnant with the dead man's child? She has no idea where she is. She cannot know the time or how likely it may be. If there was magic in the ritual, as she fears, then it could be the intent and all the more likely. Given how things have been going, Hermione is distressed that it is too much another thing to go wrong in the long series of things gone wrong since she awakened wherever she is. She finds she is sensibly revered. This does not extend to letting her go where she wishes, at least unattended. She might be the object of their worship and the best they have, but she still feels a prisoner. Yet, where is she to go when she doesn't know where she is? How is she to survive in this strange place on her own? She is not rudely banished again in the strange vacillation between the poles of love and hate, but the reverence comes at the hands of the old woman who chased her into the clearing and the ritual. She walks around Hermione in dizzying circles and it sounds as if she is speaking in tongues. Not some intelligible gibber, but one language after another. Finally she squats where Hermione sits and presses her forehead to Hermione's. She puts her hands on the sides of Hermione's head and holds her tight. Hermione has a terrible headache. It feels as if her head has split open and birds have hatched from her cracked skull. There is certainly a growing din of twittering that seems to come from inside her skull. Hermione doesn't even wonder that she didn't try to resist, or even lift her hands until the woman falls back, looking as dazed as Hermione feels. "Your head is too full, little one," the old woman says. The speech sounds different, neither the harsh gutterals she heard before nor English, but Hermione is certain of the meaning. "Do you understand me now?" Hermione asks. It sounds like English to her ears but her mouth has moved in strange ways pronouncing it. "Yes, we all can," the old woman assures her. "I am Oland, priestess of the Earth." "I'm Hermione and what do you think I am?" Hermione asks. Her name sounds more like Alala whe she says it, but Hermione is more interested in the priestess's reply. "Don't be concerned you don't know. You are Mother Earth. I have read the signs which are hidden," the old women says, "When you are re-born you often forget your past." "Will you teach me what I need to know?" Hermione is concerned. "You will know," Oland assures her. "The wisdom will return. You have been- something Hermione dimly takes to mean re-attached- to the spirits of this place." That is quite enough to absorb for a while. Hermione nods, she hopes wisely and waits to see what comes next. It is a ghost from the wood- or at least should be. It is the man who had sex with her and was sacrificed. "My queen," he says with a deep bow. "King Stag," Hermione says without knowing why. She wonders if there is some other effect to the magic that allows her to speak with these people. The sigils begin to warm again and interrupt her wonder. King stag offers his hand and leads her ceremoniously back into her hut. He closes the door and turns to her. "You are distressed," he says. "Oland says I do not remember my past," Hermione explains. "I did not understand why you were slain. I did not understand anything." He nods and then sits opposite her and kindles the fire. She notices two things with a start. He needs no flint or steel, only an outstretched hand to bring forth the fire. There is still a deep mark across his throat where she saw it slit. "Ask me," he says simply. "If I am to be King Stag, I need Mother Earth to nurture my herd." It is as if this stirs something- like memories. Hermione is hard pressed to explain, but she sees King Stag- as a stag- leading the deer to the hunters. She sees herself gathering- the souls of the slain? to return them to the cycle. It's like some pageant in her head, but at the same time she feels the importance. Her marks are getting hot again. "They feel your power," King Stag says without her asking. "They glow with it. I feel it here." Hermione opens her robe to stare. The spirals on her breasts are indeed alight. She looks up with a strange unconcern that this strange man is looking at her. She feels he has the right. It makes sense in a logical way if he is her ritual husband that he would be permitted, but Hermione feels it. She isn't guided by her reasoning. She is perfectly comfortable that he can look on her naked body. She is somewhat more perturbed that she feels she should give herself to him. It is the desire of her heart, but makes no sense. It makes no sense that he must be here for that very purpose and still sits calmly, making no advance. "We are mated, yet until you remember, I will stay," he says. It seems the mated thing gives him access to her thoughts as well. Still... When in Wales... Hermione drops the robe from her shoulders and then gets up to walk the two paces to the skins on the ground and lay down. Derwyll, she knows his name, unties the deerskin thong of his skins and comes to join her. He takes off his loincloth as he lays down, but Hermione isn't watching. She is searching his face for the recognition she felt before. She is mildly surprised his eyes are gray and not green. They don't kiss much, she reckons. But his hand tenderly trace the blue spirals on her breasts and the wiggling lines on her belly and the streaks of her thighs. She easily falls into a reciprocation, tracing the dye on his body until she feels him position himself and move into her. He is gentler this time. It is making love and not a ritual. She feels desire and not burden nor sadness as he moves inside her. She is his queen and she feels worshipped. It is not a modern idea that her place is to accept him, but she understands it differently as his thrusts become more urgent. Her acceptance is the position of power. She validates him by accepting. And this time she doesn't hang on the cusp of excitement. As he becomes frenzied in his pursuit of climax, she feels herself come with him. His power flows into her body like the rapid beat of her heart and she feels completed as he works to his own feverish climax. It's like an echo in her head to hear her thought and have the feelings, or visions, or memories break in on them. Still, it's the most content she's felt since awakening on these shores. And for the first time she thinks she has a chance to understand. "My queen," he says and bends to kiss her forehead. "Do I call you King or Derwyll?" she asks. His eyes light up. "If you have found my name, use it. Your past returns quickly to share my mind." "I am Hermione," she says, it coming out Alala again. "My queen," he says again with an inclination of head that might be a bow if he weren't laying between her legs having just shagged her. She thinks for a moment he is reufusing to use her name, but he gets off her and she decides it might be some polite address on parting. It is rather funny as she thinks on it, both bowing while still in that position and needing to politely withdraw, but it is also soothing to feel the reverence after the terror she had experienced when not knowing their intentions and fearing their customs. She tries to hide her impatience for him to leave, knowing his sensitivity to her thoughts, and sensing or not, he soon does. It is not a wish for solitude or to be out of his company, but another thought she wishes to test. If she is queen, she thinks. She concentrates on fire and reaches out her hand. The fire roars into a blaze. She pulls back as to not singe her hair at the sudden conflagration. There's one thing, she thinks. I can do magic without a wand. Now down, she thinks, concentrating on a smaller fire as she lowers her hand. The fire obeys. She is quite pleased. It is a wonderful discovery, and it gives her many things to try in the time to come. She can't mate with the king all the time, she giggles. Amid confirmation of things she's guessed, Hermione has another, very different surprise. She's a witch and a rippin' good 'un as Hagrid might say. There's no need of muttering "Wingardium Leviosa" here. She needs only picture a branch rising and move her hand to make it float in mid-air. It seems the same with all simple spells she tests. But the training at Hogwarts is not for naught. She is sure the discipline she learned makes her concentration better, more focused and allows her to control this native power. The other surprise comes as she looks into a pool. Her face is unchanged, save for the fierce-looking swath of blue across her eyes, but the eyes are not hers. They are green, moreover, a familiar green she has looked into many times. She has Harry's eyes and by extension his mother's eyes. This is more to ponder than all the rest, despite all the rest is the complete alteration of her world and her relation to it. She is left to wonder if her eyes are the sign Oland saw. It has gone as naught that she is suddenly free of her guardians. She realizes it only when she returns to the village and is reminded that she was allowed to venture out alone. "Before, I was... tended," Hermione says to Oland. "Before, you were a frightened doe. You were protected," Oland says and Hermione again feels that the old woman, like Derwyll, knows more that her words. "Now you can talk. You know your part. You and the land are one." The phrase jangles in Hermione's ear. It certainly is part of the king being responsible- and killed for failure- that she has read about. It being a woman's duty is not something she's encountered before. She is as unfamiliar with the customs she sees. There is no need to go into the long grass to stumble over two of the tribe copulating. They are liable to drop down anywhere, in camp or out, and start in. And they have no compunction about being watched, except Hermione notices no one else does. The rest of the tribe might cast a look that way, but it is so natural they don't stare. Hermione adapts the behaviour, but has more trouble with the nonchalnce. "You need not fear," Oland intrudes on unspoken concerns again as Hermione is receiving her wisdom. "You are the Goddess." Hermione feels awesome weight in that word as she has learned sometimes happens in talking with Oland. It is as if a word does not translate, but comes with some sense of its fuller meaning. In this case Hermione feels some power too grand for words is meant. "I don't know, I don't even know these spells you teach me," Hermione says modestly. Oland snorts. She is not impressed by the modesty. Hermione knows in the same way thought passes from Derwyll, that Oland feels mocked. Oland has taught Hermione how to make clouds. It is a pleasing little thing, rather simple once Oland makes her understand how to draw the moisture and draw it where she wills. She had been amusing herself making shapes with her creations. "Then we shall call the tempest," Oland says shortly. It is some doing, Hermione learns. Oland and she set out the next day with food and water. They walk to the coast and then north. Oland is quiet and guarded. It is as if there is a dark shape where the interchange normally occurs. Hermione realizes Oland can shield her mind from their communication and is doing so. "Why won't you talk to me- think to me?" Hermione tries to describe her discovery. "It isn't time," Oland says. It seems to have something to do with knots. Oland tries to demonstrate, but Hermione is frustrated by the little Oland will allow her to understand of the things she says. The sense of fuller meaning seems also impeded by whatever control Oland maintains over her thoughts. Not knots, but undoing, Hermione manages to draw out. As Oland unties her knots, Hermione feels the breeze rise. There is a calling as well. Storm- low pressure- empty out the air- thermoclines- hot up, cold down- set in motion. Hermione falls back on her recall to try to fill in what Oland seems unwilling to say. Then I'll give it a go, Hermione thinks peevishly. As important as it is for Hermione to know, it is as important for Oland to discover. Oland is a wise woman and feels the power in the young charge. The cynicism of old age does not grant it its due, perhaps, or perhaps it is too marvelous to believe. The impending catastrophy, then, serves a purpose. "No! No! We are not far enough away! Everyone will be destroyed!" Yes, there is that, Hermione agrees, herself standing in wonder as much as fear as the darkness of night rushes upon them. She is soaked to the skin and yet her heavy, wet robe billows behind her in the gale. Oland's fear has been released to beat against the inside of her head as severely as the wind-driven rain lashes her face. She has unleashed the whirlwind. So many things seemed to come hard on each other as she created the depression, set the winds to whirl and then called them to her. It was quite the task to do so much at once. Hermione did not bother with how hard she wished it. She wished to do it well, to prove herself, to make Oland stop her angry exile. She threw herself into it with all her usual fervor. She sees the result in the terrible storm that careens toward them with as much amazement as Oland feels fear. She sees the danger as well. The rain has become ice shards that cut at her face. The storm will carry everything before it. Great trees will be rent, fortunate to survive. Any younger growth, including beasts and people will we swept away. It's her fault. There must be something to do, but she knows without turning that Oland is helpless in fear, already resigning herself to death. She feels so helpless and so distressed she could bring this on them. It isn't the memory of meterology or even magic that makes her throw out her arms. She is distraught beyond thought and it comes as a cold, blue light as if from her center, a feeling, an emotion, a knowing. "STOP!" Hermione isn't aware of the word she utters, or if it was a word. She feels only rebuff- something that seems to draw out of the very earth at her feet and rush through her out her outstretched arms. She doesn't control it. She doesn't know what it is. She is only aware that she speaks her will. And her will be done. It is something like watching clouds race across the sky, high above the earth. The black mass flees, spreading like an attacker turned in rout. The clouds turn lighter as the storm turns away. The rain- the ice ceased at the sound of her voice. It is almost less than a minute, far less than two, that the sun emerges to warm her. Oland is on her belly at her feet. She is muttering rapid prayers. "You may as well get up," Hermione tells her crossly. "I require you to explain this to me." Hermione hears her tone and does not regret it. It is how she must be. She has learned that in the same way that she could stop the storm. It is in her and it is her destiny. More than it makes no sense, she knows it is true. It is as impossible as that she could raise her arms and bid a storm to cease. She is not the Goddess. The Goddess acts through her. She has understood much of what Oland tries to tell her. It seems she understands more than the old woman. She knows how it is, not only what is seen by the others. "But there is more I do not know," Hermione says, "I will need you to guide me in those things." Oland is open to her as she can be. Hermione feels the gratitude, undeservedly as she thinks, but welcomes the allegience in a world she has yet to fully understand. Hermione doesn't play with lightning often and mostly when she is alone. Beyond the tedium of the superstitious fear, she is often not as careful as might be and fears for other's safety. But there is something about calling up the dark clouds- which she now understands is regarded as a great feat, and the beginning of her little spat with Oland- and calling the lightning to her. She doesn't do it often because she also understands the pride it shows. Mere mortal as she seems, she commands the heavens. If that were her purpose she would worry more, but lightning tickles. It is more than that, sexual and intoxicating, but Hermione only craves the feeling that it empowers her, makes her better able to perform her duties in the protection of her people. That was much more of an adjustment- her people. But she has gifts. And she knows the power that works through her is not hers, but a trust to be used for the Goddess's people. "You cannot tempt the Gods if you are a God, but it frightens me," Derwyll says. "Come away. Come to me." Hermione's eyes glow as if the lightning still sparks in them. She looks on the king and feels the flush of desire. However it has come to be, it is her world now and he is her mate. He is a strong man, a fine man, fit to be king. He is a brave man to trust the God's revival at the new year. She shrugs off her light spring covering, a bit crisped in places by her play, and lays down with him. She is a woman in her prime here. Derwyll is eager for her and nuzzles like the deer they represent. The kiss is too sacred for her to disturb by showing him its other uses but he does as well running his hands and face over her and allowing her to return the carress. There is much more gained, as judged by her own small experience before, as his emotions bridge into hers and his content assures her. He is a strong and virile lover. He has little patience for art or play, yet Hermione finds herself satisfied. He moves in her with his urgency but never lack of care. He seeks completion but takes the pleasure of it with a restraint that allows her to join in his joy. He would be a fairy tale god, but that she is the Goddess and he is very real. She sighs contentedly as he takes her. She feels his desire as her own. It is an auspicious night. "I think they will soon scrub your belly," Derwyll teases her. Hermione smiles wistfully. For a long time after the first panic that her lover had planted his seed, Hermione thought it might come. She has not denied him, even sought him, since the first time in their hut, but she was proven wrong on every moon. But tonight... She thought it might be hope again, but Derwyll mentions it, if only in jest. She will see, but she will not be surprised. She is not as Oland and all the elder women take her to a creek and scrub the dye from her belly. She has seen it and understands. The square of woad that replaces the markings is the window for her child to peer out at the world. It also announces she is pregnant to everyone that sees her belly. As summer comes on, that will be anyone she meets in the minimal covering of warm weather. That no longer concerns her. Her time has been proof against her prior modesty. Nearly everyone in the village has seen her naked and few of them cared even the first time. She is also used to pairs dropping down and fucking in front of her. She may have been willing to give it a go herself, but Derwyll says it would frighten the people to be in the presence of the goddess. Since it is a ritual recreation of the first making, Hermione can see how it might be taboo to see the rite of creation. She is surprised she is expected to shag every woman in the village when it is known. Fertility breed fertility, sympathetic magic, she understands, but it is strange. It is even stranger, although convenient, to lie with a partner whose mind she can hear, but who cannot hear hers. It prevents a grave misunderstanding when she is first called to perform her office. No kissing. No kissing down there for certain. Hermione's preconception of shagging another woman suffers a devastating blow. She does not expect the pleasure of it, Hermione quickly understands. It is a rite and magic. If she does thus, then she will conceive. Well, she bloody well deserves more, Hermione thinks. "Your child will need to feed," she says aloud as the woman looks at her in uncertainty when she touches her breasts. They are rather afraid of her in general, she's noticed. She hopes it is with some faith that her purpose is beneficial that the woman lays back and allows Hermione to arouse her. From what she sees in the woman's mind, Hermione was expected to go between her legs and mimic a man thrusting for a bit. Then this will be better, Hermione resolves as she makes love to the woman as Derwyll makes love to her. It is not to be said no pleasure can come for a woman with another between her legs. Hermione finds, properly positioned, that she can bring delightful friction to them both as she fulfills the expected mime of intercourse. She just doesn't leave it at a brief wriggling for show. She twists and turns until the connection brings at least the other woman pleasure. Then she kisses her forehead in blessing. She's the most fortunate of women. Hermione hears that in her head as she happily, but still in awe of Hermione, bows herself from the hut. For the most part it is the same, but there are some, mostly among girls who seek their first child, that respond and dare touch the Goddess in return. As troubling as it may have been in another world, Hermione finds it as gratifying here. They are indeed the source of life, best beloved of the power in her. To share that, feel their need to offer it back, is endearing as well as exciting. For these she dares to touch them more. She can stroke them in the pleasure, not stopping at the crest. She lie on them and press flesh to flesh as they squirm to find the gift of joy in their sheer womanhood. It's pleasure as all pleasure is, Hermione contends. And it holds even more shared between women. She has the fruits of pleasure in her belly. They can rejoice in the woman's sole ability bring forth life, even if it is only to raise hope in the others. Hermione goes to the strand where she first awoke to puzzle sometimes. It is hopeless to wonder how it came about. She has exhausted all theories and can prove none. She only thinks on the miracle, because miracle it now seems. How, bedraggled and scared out of her wits, she washed up, as if from the sea, and how, now she has become the hope of a people. She ponders most the fate of the child inside her. How, once, she was a child concerned with the approval of others, and now is to bring another life into the world- this world- her world. How small her other concerns now seem. How real her destiny looms before her and for - her son. She does not say, but she thinks some of the old woman, Oland certainly, at least suspect. She's the Goddess. How could she not know? The ceremony marks an anniversary. The sun has made its round. The solstice has come. Hermione trots, gravid in her eighth moon, toward the pen for the doe. She eats and drinks, though no drugged wine is needed for her to be hung and skinned this time. She waits spread on the rock as her huband, the King Stag comes to her. She feels the child shift in her belly as the stag takes her. They both, mother and son, undergo the rite- and the murder of their mate and sire. "God grant my son an easy passage into the world." Hermione is not amused at the irony that Derwyll would choose to call on the God that refuses to return him. The revival is in His hands, not Hers. She chafes that she has the power to bring this mewling pretender to His knees, but she is pursuaded it is not in the interest of her people to start a war between the God and Goddess. She understands. She understands in a way she hates herself for. She will bear her loss to keep her people strong. It is to keep them strong that the new King Stag will come. That she will accept it rankles both her and the Goddess she serves. She will not be mated until he comes forth at the next new year. Her son, Derwyll's son, will be nearly a year old then. It is a comfort to keep to herself as her time comes. She is a peace with her thoughts as she prepares for the child. He will be great as his father was great. He will be great as his Mother was great, Oland echoes over the dead Goddess. She will find the next vessel for the Goddess. Oland knows it will be her last act as well. She knows that the new Goddess will never be the equal of the one gone before. "Now where have you been?" Madame Pomfrey asks Hermione. "Saying all these rude things in that rude language." She only supposes it is rude. No one, even Dumbledore can decipher a word. Only he even suspects it is a language and not gibberish. There is enough to be troubling. Poor Hermione nearly bled to death. She was found in her blood-soaked bed and no one is certain of the cause. "Would have thought she had a child, if that was possible," Madame Pomfrey regards Hermione with a suspicious look. There was something suspiciously like an afterbirth involved, but it is clear Hermione was not remotely pregnant the day before. Everyone saw her and she wasn't. "How long was I gone?" Hermione asks. "Gone? Where did you go?" Madame Pomfrey asks. "You did not go," Dumbledore interrupts. "You were very near, but Madame Pomfrey pulled you back from the edge. That was two days ago, I fear, but you have been in this bed the whole time." Hermione doesn't ask any more. She has much to think about. She remembers it all too clearly. She remembers more than a year in a time Dumbledore says was two days. She remembers feeling so content returning to the Goddess. She remembers dying all too clearly. She remembers letting life go with great relief at the news her son was born and was healthy. "A dream, you think?" Harry asks eagerly. "But much too real to be a dream. And I was there for a year- more," Hermione has decided to share at least her perceptions, although she is keeping the part about having Harry's eyes to herself. "And you were a naked native girl?" Ron asks with lacivious glee. "I thought I was someone called Alala," Hermione confesses. "So no one important then," Ron snorts. "Just some tart named Alala." "I wasn't a tart! Customs are different among different peoples!" Hermione says hotly, and a bit guiltily. "And you happened to be called Alala?" Ron smirks. Hermione nods. "Picked a good one then, eh? Don't hear that one used much," Ron continues his derision. "'Course not many people dare call themselves after the name of Merlin's mother. Except you, I mean." Hermione is lost for a retort. She never did look at the sky to determine the year... ###