Amongst the Hunted Moons

Aphrodite, Hogwarts.

Heartstrings. This little term has been used from time immemorial, from Sappho sitting at an inn and gazing at a woman so beautiful she had cursed Aphrodite for pulling at them, to the modern day as a God stood on a beach with his wife looking at a young woman in a blue bathing suit, both feeling the strings of their hearts pulled to each other by a weave of knots and entanglements. Heartstrings were powerful, possibly the most powerful thing in the known universe, if one knew how to pluck at them that is; and Aphrodite certainly knew how to do just that. There are three common types of heartstrings, the most common were the gray threads that attached a heart to things they care for, be it an object, a pet, or a person, these tied people together in friendship mostly and were the most fragile of the heartstrings, prone to wear and tear until they snap or are forgotten about.

The next are the golden threads, which show the love between two or more people that could be wound so tightly together that they become a Gordian knot in and of themselves. They were uncommon, but still in abundance considering the last heartstring, the golden thread tied deep friendships and love blooming between to hearts together, they connected family with one another and those who were like family together. Aphrodite tries to avoid playing with the golden threads for while tied to her domain, it was also a part of Hestia's more deeply, and she did not want to cross Hestia any more than Hestia wants to cross anyone.

Then there is the last of the threads, the red thread of fated love, the one Aphrodite was most interested in. The red thread connects two or more hearts to each other so thoroughly and so tightly, that the hearts start beating as one at first sight. They were unbreakable and impossible to serve, even for a Goddess of Love like herself, but it did not mean Aphrodite could not manipulate them. All Aphrodite had to do was cut her finger and run it along the thread that connected two people together, and voila, instant red thread. Her son Eros had a simpler way to do this with his arrows, but her way works just as well.

The gray and golden threads can and would switch between coloring as mortals and gods went through their lives up and downs, gaining and losing color till they either die and all threads but the red ones snap or till they snap for other reasons. The red threads always stayed even after death and would normally drag the other person it was connected to, to their death as well. It was a rare power that only one in a hundred of her children could see them, one in a thousand that could pluck at them as she did. But as Aphrodite weaves these threads into a complicated and convoluted tapestry that no other being other than herself could make sense of, she was cursed as cruel and wicked, and praised as loving and wise, the goddess of love could do this to anyone, to anything, at any time; if one were to ask her Aphrodite would simply shrug and tell them it was just a part of her nature.

It was the heartstrings that would lead her to the boy, she was sure of it. So as she appeared on the green grounds of Hogwarts she was surprised to find not one, but two strings attached to the leather jacket she held folded in her arms, one gold and one gray, the golden one was pulled tightly leading off into the woods, while the other was snap and flailing in the wind. Aphrodite follows the golden one because she was sure it would lead to Harry, besides it was leading into the woods, son of Artemis, this was a no-brainer. But she didn't find a boy, but a large black hound laying under a tree looking up at the castle, and as the Goddess of love approached the hound, it stood looking between the jacket and her before growling and backing away. As Aphrodite ponders this odd occurrence of the heartstrings, the hound turns tail and runs away.

"Such a strange dog," Aphrodite murmurs to herself watching it run off, it was almost as if…

No, focus. She was here for the boy, nothing else. Sighing to herself Aphrodite came to terms that she was going to have to do this the hard way. So turning on her Gochi heels she starts walking to the castle, shifting her form from that of an adult to that of a seventeen-year-old, copying the outfits of the students she sees off in the distance and walking through the doors of the castle.

As she walks the stone halls, and through the corridors of the castle looking for something she couldn't find thanks to a spell based on her domain, she looks for the heartstrings that bound the boy to others. But she found a shockingly little amount of them, it was like trying to find a needle in a needle stack. No gray strings lead her to the boy's heart, no golden ones that bound him tightly to others, it honestly worried Aphrodite a bit, for even a sociopath who could not feel love had the strings of others bound to them. Aphrodite searched high and low in the castle looking for the boy or any string that would lead her to him, if it wasn't for the looks of lust and love during her day, she would have given up by now, but with the bursting breath of power she got from the worship of the mortals inside the castle celebrating the day of love, she knew this was the best chance she had to find the son of Artemis.

She got her first hint as to where the boy was down in the dungeons below the school, who has dungeons at a school? I mean it did put an even more kinky spin on the whole teacher naughty schoolgirl/boy roleplay, but really, this was a bit much even for her. But as Aphrodite stood at the dead end of another corridor cursing her luck in finding the boy, a shadow peeled itself off the wall and walked into the torchlight.

"Has Azkaban rotted your brain so much that you thought impersonating a woman twelve years dead was a good idea, Black?" Severus Snape snarled at the imposter in Lily Evans' form, "Or did you wish to insult the dead as well as finish the job the Dark Lord started?" The dark man says as he raises his wand against the Goddess, the fires of hate burning in his eyes.

Azkaban? Black? Insulting the dead? Aphrodite feels like she was missing something as she turns around to take a look at the man pointing a stick at her like it was going to do something. First off, eww. Second off, D'aww.

Eww, because of…all of what that man was, he needed a makeover and wardrobe change ASAP, because as much as Aphrodite liked the goth dom daddy look as much as the next girl, he was not doing it for her. His hair was greasy, he needed to trim the goatee, and get some proper skin care and some sun, a manny peddy wouldn't hurt either, He also looked like a giant bat in that cloak of his, he could work it though, she'd give him that.

D'aww because this man had more golden threads than grey ones wrapped around his heart, as well as a string tying him to someone dead, a flame carried around all these years, that was impressive to have a golden thread tied so tightly around his heart for, …for, …oops. Charmspeak time.

"Professor," Aphrodite begins her tone of voice layered with the double timber of her personal magic, "I think you may have gotten me confused with someone else in the torchlight, perhaps you need to go back to your office for a nice cup of tea and a nap."

Severus' eyelids droop as the magic worms its way into his ear, Aphrodite smiles her charming smile, as she watches the dark man's eyes look around confused, and his wand hand lowering. As Aphrodite begins to walk forward and around the man, his eyes open wide and snap to the Goddess, stopping her in her tracks and slashing his wand upwards sending a burst of mortal magic at her. Aphrodite has no choice but to swing her hand forward, shattering the dark magic, otherwise, it would have ruined her cute schoolgirl outfit. As the look of shock grows on the face of Severus Snape, Aphrodite speaks.

"First off, Rude! I came to this school with no intent to harm anyone and here you are slinging your thick stick around trying to ruin my outfit." Aphrodite reprimands the now shocked Potions master, "Second off, Shampoo, have you heard of it?" It takes a second before the rage leaks back into Snape and he flings another spell at the disguised Goddess that shatters like crystal against steel on her as she swings her arm again, "and finally, sleep!" And as the Goddess of love finishes, she raises her hand and snaps her fingers, forcing enough mist and Charmspeak into the order to knock out a god, and Snape was no god, so he crumpled to the floor like a puppet with its strings cut.

Aphrodite lets out an aggravated sigh as she goes to step around the man, she feels it, a heartstring, waving in the wind much like the jacket, not quite broken, but not quite attached to something. It wasn't the sleeping man's fault, it was what it was attached to trying to push it away, and best of all, it was a heartstring attached to one Harry James Potter. It was at best a direction to the boy, at worst only attached to something with the boy's name. Either way, a clue. But first the man, Aphrodite kneels, brushing a greasy lock of hair from the man's face and inspects the heartstring attached to Lily Evans, a death the man had never gotten closure to, so the heartstring pulled him down more than it uplifted him. If Lily was still alive Aphrodite wouldn't have bothered, she'd probably grab some popcorn and watch the show, but the woman was dead and so was the hope for her, and it was best to let the dead sleep.

"Sleep, Severus Snape, sleep and dream of red lilies telling you to live a life for yourself, and not for the dead," Aphrodite speaks softly in the ear of the Potions Master, knowing Morpheus would do the rest, she moved on and back up to the main floor of the castle, following the heartstring that leads her closer to the son of Artemis. As she moved through the castle she would cast her gaze left and right, stopping every now and then to poke and prod along the thread of the young couples encouraging the puppy love, to lust, to forbidden romances. Watching the blushing faces of young women and the stuttering words of young men confessing their feelings, or the secret looks two boys would give each other. She smiles back at the coy looks she gets from boys and girls alike, it's around this time she sees the next threads that connect to the boy she seeks, a pair of strings flashing between gold and gray, not quite a crush but not quite caring for the boy, looping up to the upper floors of the castle. So the goddess of love takes note of the two girls in green and silver robes before heading upstairs, a crash from below almost stops her but as one of the two girls says something makes her laugh more than anything.

"Honestly Tracy!" The blonde one says.

"Did you not see the thighs on that bird!?" Says the girl in the beanie who had just crashed into a suit of armor because she was too busy being a woman of culture much like Aphrodite.

As the Goddess of love wanders around the upper floors looking for threads that tie the boy to anything, her worries grow, no favorite class he likes more than others or favorite desk he sits at, nothing. But as she passes a painting she was sure she had passed three times now, she can't help but feel as if the castle was leading her in circles. She was quite sure she had gone up three flights of stairs and yet it felt like she was on the same floor like the castle was alive or something. That thought stops her dead. Was the castle alive? It wasn't unheard of for magical architecture to gain a form of sentience, the Labyrinth was proof of that. Aphrodite approaches the wall and lays a hand on it, focusing on the stonework and what lies below, she feels it, a pulse much like a heartbeat. While the stonework was based on mortal magic, the very cornerstone that the school was built upon was something else, something divine; and it did not like her being in the school.

She tries to apologize, tries to reason with it, tries to explain that she meant no harm to any that dwells within her walls. But while it was alive, it wasn't alive enough to listen to her, like a mostly faded god, more feeling than thought.

Aphrodite sighs, "Great, a stupid lump of stone stops me, you're lucky we're so far away from the flame of the west, or I'd turn you to rubble." The goddess tells the wall angrily.

"You shouldn't talk to her like that, she doesn't like it." A voice says in a dazed and dreamy tone from behind Aphrodite, who jumps at the sound and quickly turns around to find a girl, a little too close for comfort. She had impossibly wide misty blue eyes framed in a pained face and blonde hair, with a wand tucked behind her ear, she smiled a dreamy smile up to the Goddess of love that didn't quite reach her eyes.

As the Goddess of beauty inspects the girl, with no heartstrings attached to the boy, she can't help but to ask, "Where are your shoes?"

The girl, in the same tone of voice as before, says "The Nargles took them."

"I…see. Well, I don't think the castle likes me very much anyway, so it doesn't matter much on how I talk to her." Aphrodite says as she turns back to the wall with a frown.

"That's because you killed her," The girl says, pausing as Aphrodite turns back to look at her with surprise on her face, "Well, not you specifically Miss, but those who worshiped you. They came and spelt the blood of the old Gaelic gods, spilling it upon her stones. Or, that's what she told me." The girl says as Aphrodite's mouth opens slightly in shock, the girl could see through the mist. The Goddess turns her full attention to the girl with narrow eyes but says nothing.

The girl doesn't say anything either, just continues to look at the Goddess with a dreamy smile, so as the Goddess looks at the girl, the girl looks back at her for a long moment of awkward quiet.

"Are you looking for something?" The girl asks finally, tilting her head and Aphrodite coo's in her head at the cuteness of the act.

"More like someone," Aphrodite says as she bends her knees getting on eye level, their noses almost touching, "I'm looking for a boy by the name of-"

But the dreamy girl cuts her off, "Harry Potter."

This shocks Aphrodite that the girl knew, "Did the castle tell you that little one?" The Goddess asks.

"No," replies the girl, never losing her smile, "but you glow like him, but you're a kaleidoscope of all beautiful things, and he glows softly silvery, like moonlight."

Yup, that was the child of Artemis alright, "do you know where he is little one? I have something of his I'd like to return." Aphrodite says, holding up the jacket in her arms.

The girl looks at it tilting her head, before nodding. "He's normally in the owlery just above the defense tower," the girl says before holding up her hand, "I can show the way if you want."

Aphrodite smiles at the girl, and takes her hand, "Why thank you my little guide, I accept your offer." The girl's smile finally touches her eyes as she drags Aphrodite down the corridor and around the corner as the Goddess giggles.

With the girl as her guide, the castle seemed to move out of their way, shifting and turning to make longer-looking hallways impossibly short, or moving staircases to connect to the right corridors all the while the girl with the misty blue eyes and the Goddess giggled as they ran. In no time at all the girl stops pulling the Goddess along outside a seemingly random stairway that looped up and around the tower above.

"He's up there," she says as her smile turns a touch sad, "I think he likes to be alone too much, he needs help." She comments as she turns to look at the Goddess.

Aphrodite narrows her eyes at the girl, did the girl think Aphrodite was her to help? Oh no, she was here for her own selfish wants to toy with Artemis. The hunters may be off limits, but the boy? The boy was fair game. But the girl doesn't need to know that.

"May I have the name of my little savior?" The Goddess asks with a smile.

"Luna. Luna Lovegood." The girl says with a curtsy of her skirt, and as Aphrodite opens her mouth to give her name, the odd girl turns on her heel and skips off deeper into the castle. Aphrodite tilts her head with a look of amusement at the odd little Luna girl's back.

As the Goddess of love turns back around and looks up the stairs, she giggles once again, a smirk forms on her plump perfect lips as she begins her ascent to the boy, the smirk turns to a grin, to a smile full of playfulness, to a malicious teeth-baring grin of manic glee because finally, finally! After three millennials putting up with nettling words, open insults, and disrespect paid to her over and over and over again by Artemis, the Goddess of the Moon finally had something more precious than her Hunt to lose. How many of her children lay dead because of Artemis and her hunt? How many of her beautiful baby boys turned to animals before being set upon by the hunt and hounds? How many of her gorgeous daughters did Artemis have stripped and humiliated before being killed like animals!? Countless. So now, as Aphrodite climbs the stairs that lead to the son of the hunt she could finally have the justice so often denied to her.

But it won't be quick, oh no, that was too good for Artemis. The boy will suffer, she'll drag him through the fields of razor wire and broken glass that was toxic relationship after toxic relationship. Having the boy's heart break again and again as he gave up piece after piece for "love", and when there was nothing left to give, only then would the boy die, and he'll die with a smile and a prayer on his lips venerating her and her alone for helping him find "love". The look in Artemis' eyes when it happens will be orgasmic.

But as Aphrodite got to the top of the stairs and cracked the door open ever so slightly to get her first peek at the son of Artemis, her plan fell to ruins. She now knew the reason why the boy had no heartstrings attached to anything or anybody while Aphrodite looked around the castle, the thick stone walls the boy had built around his heart had only let one string out, and it was tied tightly to the owl sat perching on the boy's shoulder. The string burned and glowed with the force of the sun and if it wasn't the fact she could only see one from the boy, she would have missed the thread from the owl to the boy that burned just as brightly.

But both paled in comparison with what was buried in the stone wall around the boy's heart, it was breathtaking, a matrix of golden thread spun and threaded so tightly around it that Aphrodite almost couldn't tell if it was his or not. It weaved in an intricate pattern like a complex knitting project that hugged the boy's heart as firm and tight as a mother's hug, and Aphrodite understood all at once where it had come from, Lily Potter's willing sacrifice, the woman had given up her power, her core, her very magic and walked into the jaws of death with a smile on her face just so her son could live.

The Goddess shuts the door and begins to curse, while Artemis had told her about the sacrifice of Lily Potter, there was no way the Goddess of the hunt could understand what it truly meant. Hades, not even she, the Goddess of love, understood until she lay eyes on it. While still the highest end of esoteric Magic bordering on the realm of the Gods, it was much more than that, it was the type of magic that beat like the heart of Aphrodite's very own divine domain. A power so grand and all-consuming that it would even stave off death itself, and it had, she could practically feel death's touch on the boy, as deep and as intimately as any lover's touch. The boy was wrapped up in death and fate so tightly that he almost seemed to be a puppet to both.

This wasn't something Aphrodite could just brush aside like it was inconsequential, a willing sacrifice in the name of her divine domain was to be venerated and respected, Lily Potter wanted her son to live a long and happy life, and if Aphrodite were to go against that, it would be considered heresy of the highest order and earn her the wrath and anger of every God, Dava, Demon, and Devil that dealt in the domain of love, including Hestia. Then there was the wall around the boy's heart, built from the inside out. He wasn't like his divine mother, who was the cold unfeeling calculation right before the kill in a hunt, no. The boy could love so deeply and so true that after being hurt by hands that should have cared for him, he had built a stone wall around his heart to never feel that pain again. It was no wonder this boy had no heartstrings attached to a person or thing, the boy wouldn't allow himself to care, and why did the heartstrings of others could not attach themselves to him, because he wouldn't allow it.

No, Aphrodite could see the writing on the wall and the hands of fate guiding her, she was no fool. To harm the boy would be sacrilege and the antithesis of everything the goddess of love was, she would not get her revenge this day. Aphrodite sighs out in frustration, it wasn't fair! But then again, all was fair in love and war. So the Goddess of love takes a deep breath and composes herself, revenge may be off the table, but her drama will go on, she would help the boy tear down the walls that surrounded his heart whether he wanted to or not, for no living mortal should be bereft of love. So, with that thought in mind, Aphrodite reaches out and turns the handle of the door, and steps inside of the room with an angelic smile on her lips.

"Hello, Harry Potter." Aphrodite closes the door behind her.

Harry Potter, Owlery, Hogwarts.

Harry Potter was hiding away again, he was avoiding Ron, Hermione, and Miss Atalanta tucked away in the Owlery with the only person in the world he felt cared for him, and he for them, his owl, Hedwig. She was currently perched on his shoulder, not wanting to leave her friend and master alone in his stewing misery. The owl felt the pain in Harry's heart as much as she could feel her own heart break for him, so like the silent ghostly Guardian she was, she would stand vigil till her master could pick himself up again as she has seen him do many times before. So they sat together overlooking the grounds of Hogwarts watching couples and friends alike enjoy the budding spring day by taking walks around the lake or finding hiding spots to express their love on this day of love. But as Harry Potter's guardian with wings as white as the fiercest angel's hears the doors to the owlery open, she turns her head to the newcomer and is instantly on guard, turning on his shoulder and puffing up to warn the woman from her master, she feels Harry shifts as he lifts a hand to calm her, but stops as he hears the woman speaks.

"Hello, Harry Potter." She says in a soft tone and with a smile.

To Harry's credit, he doesn't jump, but turns his head to look at the soft voice and narrows his eyes. She had a scent to her, one that smelled of roses and light rain, with the undertone of something musty he couldn't put his finger on. Her features seem to shift and change, jumping around as if she couldn't make up her mind about what she wanted to look like, from soft round features, to sharp and defined, from warm brown eyes to purple, to a shade of green that he only saw in the mirror. A cascading color and hair type twisted and shifted from short and blond to long and bushy brown, to curls of red licked by flame. She was dressed in robes that flashed through the house colors of each of them, her hands behind her back and a smile on her lips. Still, Harry isn't moved by the sight, he knew this day would come sooner or later when Miss Atalanta had told him on the Quidditch field of what he was.

"Hedwig, go," Harry tells his owl before it barks at him in indignation, she was a guardian, she was going nowhere, "I don't want you to get hurt too girl, please. Go to Hermione, she'll take care of you." Harry smiles sadly at his owl.

The unknown girl giggles, "I'm sorry that's just way too cute, but I'm not here to hurt anyone, Harry." She says with a sigh at the end of it, as if she was disappointed in that.

"But, you're a monster, right?" Harry asks, confused.

The girl grins and raises an eyebrow, "To some," she says with a shrug, "but to most, I am a blessing."

Harry's eyes narrow further, "Then who are you?"

"Hmm," the older girl hums, "how about this? Let's make a game of it, I'll give you three hints about who I am, and you'll get one guess." The girl says as she walks forward towards Harry, "and if you get it right, I'll give you a treat." She smiles down at the boy.

"And if I get it wrong?" The son of the hunt asks.

The girl just shrugs again, "Then you get nothing, but do try to get it right, my treats are to die for." She says in a low and sultry voice causing the boy who lived to blush, before just nodding dumbly.

The girl winks at him before giving out her hints, "I am the reason that one of the most famous wars of the ancient world was fought, I lay in the heart and soul of every mortal, whether they know it or not, and finally: I am the antithesis to your divine mother." The girl says, making Harry flinch at that last part and look away.

The moment of quiet carries on for a minute or two as Harry puzzles out who she could be, famous wars, the Trojan war? In the heart and soul, heart and soul, in the heart! Love! Oh shit!

"Tick-tock, Harry Potter." The girl says before Harry looks back at her.

"You're Aphrodite." Harry states.

"Ding-Ding-Ding, he gets it in one, hmm, smart and cute," Aphrodite says giving Harry a calculated look, "You gonna be a panty dropper and a heartbreaker when you get older." She says with a laugh and as Harry blushes deeper.

"What are you doing here?" Harry asks, not trusting the Goddess of love due to all the stories of her flights of fancy she was prone to.

Aphrodite doesn't even blink before waving her hand, conjuring a thrown of gold and pinks to sit on before tossing Harry his reward, the Jacket he had left in the woods to Artemis, he blinks in confusion, and before he could ask how she had gotten it she answers his first question.

"Well, I was just coming back from a shopping trip and getting back to my temple on Olympus, when I walked into the deepest chambers that are my rooms when I found I had a guest." She tells him, "None other than Artemis herself." A smirk forms on her lips at Harry's confused look.

"Why would she go to you?" He asks, he knows the stories, Miss Atalanta had told him of his mother's greatest enemy and some of the things they had done to one another.

"Why else Harry?" She says as the answer was obvious, "for matters of the heart."

Harry quickly looks away, "She doesn't have a heart." He says with anger and stinging pain still fresh in his mind.

"As the foremost expert on these things that you've met Harry, I'd have to disagree," Aphrodite affirms him, "Your mother does have a heart, she just has the emotional understanding of a thumbnail."

"She's not my mother," Harry says firmly, his hands curling into fists as he denied a truth he didn't want, as he continued to look away from the Goddess.

Aphrodite is quiet for a moment, "Yes, she is Harry. No matter how much you wish it wasn't true, you carry inside of you a piece of her, whether you want to or not, just as my children do for me." The Goddess of Love says in a soft tone.

Harry doesn't say anything as he sits stiffly looking out the window that his legs dangle out of, the corners of his eyes burning, but he wouldn't cry, Vernon hated it when he cried.

"She came to me after she had visited your home." Aphrodite continues softly as she watches the boy's shoulders stiffen at the mention of it, "She saw the cupboard, and the room, but most importantly she found out why she couldn't hear your prayers."

"Why?" Harry whispers barely loud enough to hear.

"The spell your mother cast before her death made for two things to happen, first was to protect you from the next person that tried to kill you forevermore and made sure that no one was able to find you if they wanted to hurt you till you came of age, when someone had expanded that into a ward, the ward made sure nothing could find you by any means unless the person who cast the ward allowed them," Aphrodite explains

"Dumbledore." Harry mumbles.

Aphrodite nods her head slightly, "Whoever did it, Harry probably didn't even understand what he had done unless he knew you were a demigod at the time. But the ward had made sure that no prayers that you made within it could leave it, so when your mother went to your home they hit her all at once, and for the first time in a long time, made Artemis feel something with her heart." Aphrodite finishes.

"... she's not my mother," Harry says stubbornly.

"Yes, she is." Aphrodite says still in a soft tone, "and she loves you, she just didn't know till she crossed the ward line."

"No, she doesn't," Harry says, refusing to believe it because he wasn't worthy of love, that was for smarter, better people, not a waste of space like him, "I'm just a curiosity to her, she told me so herself." He focuses on the black lake, willing the Goddess to leave him alone, why couldn't anyone just leave him alone!?

"You're wrong Harry," Aphrodite tells him, "She's loved you from the moment she laid eyes on you when you were a baby, she just didn't know it."

Something snaps in Harry's chest, he turns to look at the Goddess, to yell at her, to tell her to go away, to ask what would she know about any of this! But as he turns, the rage and words die in him, and his eyes widen, because sitting on the throne was no longer the ever-shifting form of the Goddess of Love. But bright emerald green eyes, so painful to look at, set into a round friendly face and hair like the fires of hell hanging down straight over her shoulder, the smiling face of Lily Potter looks back at Harry.

And as if she read his mind, she answers his unspoken question in a voice only Harry's walled-off heart remembers as his mother's, "Because Harry, a mothers love is one of the most powerful forms of love in the world, I've seen it move mountains and topple empires, I've known titans and gods fall to its power." Aphrodite stands and moves over to Harry, kneeling to look him in the eyes at his level, emerald meets emerald under wings of white as the Goddess reaches forward and presses the palm of her hand to his heart, "Because without the love of your mortal mother, death would have reached you, Harry Potter, and I can still feel her love in you, around you, and through you. It shields you, because she loved you, and still does."

Harry was shocked still as the form of his mother standing from the throne conjured and walked over to him, kneeling before him, she talks but he doesn't hear, too busy remembering the curves of her face that weren't a reflection in a mirror. Harry tries to open his mouth to say something but the hand over his heart is warm, and the words soft, and before he knows it he's choking back sobs threatening to burst from his chest as the Goddess in the guise of his mother, slowly and cautiously, wraps her arms around him pulling him into her embrace.

He feels Hedwig fly off from his shoulder and land somewhere else in the room, Harry stiffly leans into the embrace, not sure what to do. What he would've given for this, all the gold in Gringotts, his cloak, his magic, just to embrace like this with his mother. But now that it was happening as close as it could Harry knew not what to do, until Aphrodite spoke again.

"Shh, Harry, Shh. Don't think, just…let go." She whispers into his ear after a moment, "You've been so strong for so long, and made them both so proud, just let go, Harry. You don't need to be strong now, just let go."

And Harry did, he wept. He wept for all the horror and pain in his life, he wept for the parents he never got to know, he wept for the seven-year-old still locked in a cupboard asking what he had done wrong just to get the belt for asking a question, but most importantly he wept for himself and the damage done upon his heart and mourned the loss of his innocence so young.

Harry didn't know how long he cried, with sobs ripping through his chest as he hugs the form of his mother for dear life, as she rubs his back and whispers sweet nothings into his ear about how it wasn't his fault, that he wasn't weak or worthless, and how he was stronger than he would ever know. And when the tears all dried up, Aphrodite still didn't let go of the sad and broken boy with walls around his heart, she just held him tighter.

It wasn't until a few minutes later when Harry felt her head leave the top of his as it snapped up did she say something, "Harry, I'm sorry to say it but looks like our time is up." She informs the boy.

Harry looks up with bloodshot eyes and says in a voice thick from crying "What?" And when he looked at the Goddess that held him as he wept, he saw her not in the form of his mother, but in the ever-shifting visage she had worn when she walked into the room.

"It seems your mother has figured out where I'm at and is not very happy with me, she's probably sending Atalanta here as we speak, so listen to me and listen well to the words of Aphrodite." She says as her voice is laced with power.

"The stone wall that you've built around your heart so thick, thicker than the walls of this castle, is built on a faulty foundation, of sand and shells that will crumple before the sea that is waiting for you beyond your walls of clay and straw." She speaks as her words feel as they sink into Harry, and all at once he feels something build in his chest.

"HARRY!" He hears his name being called at the end of the hall, the Goddess of love doesn't break eye contact as she flicks her hand to the door. Harry hears it screech as it does, …something.

"You are loved far more and far deeper than you know Harry Potter, than you can even feel now, but heed the words of Aphrodite, before this year ends the walls around your heart will fall, and you will know," Aphrodite speaks with power that could not be ignored by anything.

"HARRY, GET AWAY FROM HER!" He hears yelling as a few sets of feet come charging up the stairs getting closer.

The Goddess of love finally smiles at him, "oh, Harry! I have such fun plans for you, the romance, the drama, oh you'll love it. From a pureblood princess, to a will they won't they, to the daughter of your greatest enemy, and so much in between. Don't worry, I'll make sure the last one is scrappy enough to keep you in line." Aphrodite says with a coy and teasing smile.

BOOM, BOOM! The door shakes as something on the other side hits it, "GET AWAY FROM HIM YOU FUCKING CUNT!"

"You're going to fall hard and fast for so many, and love so deeply and true…" Aphrodite says as she grabs his chin and leans forward.

"Move, you stupid girl!" Another voice shouts

"That you will walk to death of your own free will for them." Harry hears the Goddess of love whisper into his ear before kissing his cheek.

BOOM! The door explodes into the room and all the owls but Hedwig scatter, and as the dust and feathers settle Atalanta charges in, bow out and arrow drawn aiming right at Aphrodite, who just smirks at the hunter.

"Hello, Atalanta, cute ears!" The Goddess of love says before Atalanta fires, but it's far too late as Aphrodite disappears in a puff of pink mist with her giggle echoing around the room.

Mount Olympus

Hestia sat at her Hearth in the throne room of the god's stirring the ash and ember of the flame of the west, she had finished talking with her favorite niece just a short time ago, she was the shoulder the girl had cried on as they talked about the boy, about Harry, and her feelings to him. Hestia had helped her sort out her emotions about the boy, they had spoken about the boy's life and Hestia boiled with rage.

But with the rage, also came confusion, she had gotten the story of how Harry had ended up in the home that he did, it wasn't right. When she had looked into it with her own power, she found no strings attaching the boy to his aunt or cousin. But she did find a thread that was connected from a hound to the boy, so when Artemis found the Jacket missing she had charged off after Aphrodite, who was without a doubt, off to stir up Mischief with the boy in the center, Hestia had watched as the hound that remembers changed into a man who has all but forgotten.

And as Hestia stirred the ashes and embers of the flame of the west, stoking it as she always did, she thought about the strange hound and of Harry, and as she looked into the flames the flames looked back and she saw inside the ash and fire what was to come.

She saw a hunt…

A hound and a rat…

A wolf under the silver moon…

And the last two fragile threads that held Harry to his humanity snap, and the boy goes feral…

And of blood…

"Well," Hestia whispers to the flame, "That won't do."

Notes:

Raise your hand if you actually thought that Aphrodite left to go help Harry willingly in some capacity?

That many? Dunce caps are to your left, please put one on.

Aphrodite is not a nice god, she is capricious and fickle, petty and vengeful and just an all-around cunt.

This means I fucking love writing her.

I tried to make her absolutely terrifying, because she really is that scary.

Did I hit the nail on the head?

Now we finally see the gods poke around with Harry's life and oh boy, he is going to an amazingly terrible time with it. As in it will both be amazing and terrible at the same time!