Daphne Greengrass was relaxing on the velvet couch of their manor, yet her mind was not relaxing at all. In fact, her thoughts were spinning, caught in a loop of worry, longing, and irritation.
It had been a week and a few days since Harry had stepped through that jagged violet rift.
Nine days to be exact.
To anyone else, a nine-day trip was a blink of an eye, but nine days without Harry felt... odd. It felt like the sun had forgotten to rise, or like the atmospheric pressure of the house had shifted just enough to make every breath feel slightly thin.
At first, she hadn't thought much of it when he left. But after about two days, she started to miss him badly. She was used to him being the center of her life, since they had gotten together, that was what he was, the piece she called her center.
She really didn't expect a few days without him to feel like this, but not even a few days into his absence, it hit her like a Bludger to the chest.
She missed him. Badly.
She and Harry had been together for years now. Hell, they were engaged, though they had purposely not moved past that stage. They were young, and there was no rush to walk down an aisle just yet.
But he had been by her side almost constantly since they officially got together, and his sudden absence was like a physical ache.
And she wasn't the only one suffering from this lonely syndrome.
Anya, who usually tried to project an aura of crystalline, unshakable stoicism, had been moping around the estate like a kicked Niffler. It was almost jarring to witness, usually, the mage was the embodiment of dignity and composure, but without Harry here now, she was like a moppy cat.
There were days she didn't even bother going to the Mage Association, skipping meetings to instead wander through the house, not doing anything but sighing with such dramatic gloom that it bordered on the theatrical.
Tonks, on the other hand, was different. The Metamorphmagus had buried herself in a self-imposed landslide of work. Focusing on fixing the things in the ministry and keeping her mind off Harry.
They really hadn't expected him to be gone this long, he had told them just a few days, and that they wouldn't even notice he was gone.
But then again, they never set a return time. Traveling between dimensions wasn't exactly like catching the Hogwarts Express, so she and the others didn't really know anything and had no choice but to wait.
They knew he was alive, at least. Daphne looked down at her left hand, where a lovely red ring gleamed with an inner, pulsing light. Harry had forged it himself. He'd explained that it carried a vital piece of his essence, linked directly to him.
If his heart ever stopped beating and he died, the ring would react.
The ring was her tether, her constant reassurance. Tonks wore a matching band, and Anya carried a rune-etched bracer that served the same purpose. The artifacts remained silent and warm against their skin, which meant their lover was still breathing, and that was good.
Daphne sighed, leaning her head back against the plush cushions and staring at the ornate ceiling. They could call him back if they really wanted to, they possessed the daggers Harry had forged specifically to get in contact with him in case of an emergency.
But they had made a silent pact not to use it, not for just missing him. They wanted Harry to have his fun, to explore without the leash of responsibility as a campione or the constant demands of his "tyrant" mantle.
Besides, the girls had talked about it and decided that British wizardry needed a break from him as much as he needed a break from it.
Every time Harry interfered, it was because some arrogant fool always managed to bring out the cold, lethal side of him that he preferred to keep buried. Britain needed time to heal and recover from the scars without the Godslayer looming over their shoulder like a divine executioner.
Still, the selflessness was wearing thin. She wanted her Harry back. She wished to see his arrogant smirk, to feel the radiating heat of his magic, and to hear his laugh echo through the halls.
The universe, it seemed, had a very specific sense of comedic timing.
A rift tore open directly behind the couch, a violent, hissing tear. Before Daphne could even turn her head, something shot out of the portal like a spell-fired cannonball. It missed the back of her head by mere inches and slammed into the opposite wall with a sickeningly loud BOOM.
Plaster showered the rug. Dust filled the air in a thick, grey cloud. Daphne shrieked, jumping off the couch and spinning around to see a perfect, Harry-shaped hole in the expensive masonry of their living room.
A low, pained groan emanated from the debris.
"Arh... damn it..." a familiar, gravelly voice muttered from the floor, he looked up from his position to see Daphne." I'm back".
"Harry?" Daphne whispered, her heart leaping into her throat.
She didn't wait for a reply. "HARRY!" she shouted, lunging across the room. She reached into the settling dust, grabbed his arm, and helped haul him out of the crater. The moment he was on his feet, she slammed into him, hugging him so tightly she felt him groan under the hug.
He was back. He was here.
He was grumbling about the landing and the lack of "soft targets" to hit. He was fine.
"Hey, Daphy," he said softly, his voice vibrating against her ear and sending a shiver down her spine. He smelled like woodsmoke, iron, and something metallic.
"What took you so long? It's been over a week!" she cried into his chest, her voice muffled by his shirt.
Harry laughed, a low, melodic sound as he wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her flush against him. "Over a week?" he repeated, his brow furrowing as he checked his own internal clock.
Daphne pulled back just enough to nod aggressively, her eyes stinging with unshed tears of relief. "Nine days, Harry! Nine days of Anya moping like a tragic heroine and Tonks turning her hair beige out of sheer stress!"
"Hmmm," he hummed thoughtfully, his eyes glowing with that faint, emerald light.
'I should have known. I can't expect the time flow of different worlds to sync perfectly. Spatial rifts are fickle things, a few hours in one place can be a decade in another if you aren't careful.'
He looked at the hole in the wall and then back at her, a shadow of genuine concern crossing his face.
'I'll have to study the chronal anchors next time. I got lucky this time, but if I'd landed in a world where time moved faster, I could have come back to find they'd all aged eighty years... or worse. I won't let that happen again."
"Sorry," he added sincerely, brushing a stray hair from her face with a calloused thumb. "I must have worried you."
Daphne sighed, the last of her frustration evaporating as she leaned into his touch. "You did," she admitted. "When you didn't come back after the third day, we started thinking... well, we thought the worst. But we decided to wait. We wanted to give you the chance to finish whatever business you had without us tugging on your sleeve like children."
Harry nodded, leaning his forehead against hers. He was deeply grateful for their strength and trust in him to handle himself without just using the dagger and pulling him back before anything even happened, and maybe even potentially trapping him between folds of reality.
"So," she asked, a mischievous glint returning to her blue eyes as she pulled back. "What happened to make you late?"
"I'll tell you when the others are here," Harry said. He closed his eyes for a moment, extending his senses through the manor and the surrounding city. "Speaking of which... where are they? I can't feel their signatures in the immediate vicinity."
"Work," Daphne said simply.
"Both of them? At the same time? During my absence?"
"Yes. Anya had some high-level research to verify at the Association and decided today was the day to finally stop her moping and be productive," Daphne explained. "And Tonks is probably currently leading an operation, raiding a smuggler's warehouse in Knockturn Alley just to vent some of her frustration on something she's allowed to punch."
"And you?" Harry asked, his hands sliding down to rest possessively on her hips. "You're home here all alone? That's not like you, Daphy. You usually have a line of people waiting to be insulted or managed."
Daphne groaned and rolled her eyes, leaning her weight into him. "I just needed some peace. I was with Astoria earlier this afternoon, and she wouldn't. Stop. Talking about her upcoming wedding. She's in full wedding-planner mode, Harry. Everything is 'lace' this and 'centerpiece' that. She's so bright and happy and bubbly and... ugh." She made a face of mock disgust. "It was spiritually exhausting."
Harry barked a laugh, pulling her closer until there was no daylight between them. He could perfectly visualize the "little hellion" Astoria putting her ice-queen sister through the wringer. "Alright, fair enough. There, there," he teased, patting her back with exaggerated, condescending sympathy.
She sent him a half-hearted glare, but it quickly melted into his embrace. "Welcome back, you idiot," she whispered, her hands tangling in his hair.
"I'm back," he said, his voice low and soft.
The atmosphere in the room shifted instantly. The playfulness vanished, replaced by a thick, heavy heat. They stared into each other's eyes for a few heartbeats, the air between them thick with unspent longing.
Harry moved first, tilting his head and capturing her lips in a passionate kiss. It started softly, before it erupted into a vicious, hungry battle. It was a tongue-warfare.
They moved like two hungry predators reclaiming their shared territory, breathless and desperate to erase the distance of the last week.
Nearly a full minute later, they broke apart, both gasping for air, their foreheads still pressed together as their magic hummed in sympathetic resonance.
"I'm never letting you go for more than forty-eight hours again," Daphne panted, her eyes dark with intent.
Harry smirked, his eyes blazing with green fire. "I can live with that arrangement."
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