//------------------------------//
// Destination 
// Story: Harry Potter and the Crystal Empire 
// by Damaged 
//------------------------------//

The train was an odd thing. It wasn't anything like the Hogwarts Express, but yet was at the same time. It was an old-style steam engine, but I could feel such a pull of magic in the locomotive that I had to wonder if it was actually purely magic driven. 

Where it differed from the Hogwarts Express was that it had two carriages on it, and it seemed like we were all piling into just one of them. Addera put me down on the step and I trotted inside and looked around.

The first thing that struck me about the train was it had never been designed for humans. All the "chairs" were low and lacked backs, there was room for pegasi to fly above other passengers (which the blue one was taking advantage of), and in all it seemed just right for ponies. 

A little unsure if I should pick a spot on my own, I walked slowly toward where the apparent heroes of Equestria were and got nearly halfway there when Fluttershy rushed toward me.

"Do you want some help getting up on the seat? Are you alright walking on your own? I know Twilight wants to talk to you too, but I really want to know everything about you." As she spoke, Fluttershy guided me toward their group and up onto the bench she had been sitting on.

"Excuse me, Addera? If you don't mind, I'd like to ask you about where you're from." Twilight Sparkle was on the other side of the carriage from Fluttershy and me, and seemed intent on drawing Addera to her for a talk.

I was left with Fluttershy. I turned to her and could see her expression brightening like the sun coming out. Done-for, I could see the headlines—Harry Potter talked to death by most adorable creature in existence. "So, uh, Fluttershy? What did you want to know?"

There was a sense as if a million-billion pens all bespelled to copy words down seemed to focus on us. I didn't think it was possible one person—or pony—could give so much focus to another. "I-I think I should start at the start, and please excuse me if I ask anything too personal. A-Are you a colt or a filly?"

Oh, there was plenty of questions I was preparing myself for. What is the nature of magic? Why is the sky blue? How many Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans did it take before you were guaranteed to be sick? (The answer's about 12, or so I've found.) "I'm a boy—colt."

Fluttershy's pure excitement was a perfect match for any attempt I might have managed at embarrassment. "And how old are you?"

"Uh, 12." My previous musing on beans came back to haunt me. Were the two numbers related? From what I'd heard about Arythmancy, all numbers were significant in magic. How many beans could Dumbledore eat safely? Could Addera eat a thousand?

Covering her snout with both forehooves, Fluttershy gasped. "Oh my goodness. You're the same age as Applejack and Rarity's little sisters and their friend. It'll be so ador—Right. Questions. How long do kirin live for?"

"I don't know," I said.

It was as if there was a solar eclipse. Fluttershy's bright smile faded for a moment, then was back full-force. "Silly me. You weren't born a kirin. Can you use your horn like a unicorn can theirs?"

"Not really. Well, definitely nothing like even Hermione can, let alone what I've seen Twilight Sparkle do, but I can use it like a wand. Want to see?" I might not be able to use my horn like a unicorn, but I'm still a wizard! "Err. Are these trains fireproof?"

Fluttershy giggled behind the edge of one wing and shook her head. "Perhaps use magic that doesn't make fire?"

"That should be easier than it is, you know? I don't actually know a lot of fire spells, but somehow I use a lot of magic and fire just happens." I looked around while trying to work out what I could do to start with. Normally I'd start with a simple wand-lighting, but purposefully making light seemed a little too close to making fire. "Do you have something I could make fly?"

Across from us, the pink-on-pink pony reached into her mane with a hoof and held out a cupcake. "Will this do?"

Not wanting to look a gif—Okay, that wasn't as funny a gag as I'd hoped, for the tenth time. Aiming my horn at the offered cupcake, I cast a Locomotion charm and rattled off the activation word. With so much ambient magic, and using all the parts of the spell, I had the cupcake in my control and brought it closer. "Like that."

"Ooooh! Floaty! And you can't even see it glowing!" Pinkie (I just remembered her name) said. I still can't believe she's that pink and named Pinkie. 

It was actually nice to have a bit of praise, even if she seemed to have no idea what I was actually doing. "Once I've cast the spell, I can do just about—" 

Pinkie leaned over and took a bite of the cupcake. 

My focus on the spell shattered and it was dropping to the floor, only to have a pink hoof grab it and shove the remainder in its owner's mouth. To my surprise, however, Pinkie reached into her mane and produced another cupcake and held it out to me.

I cast another Locomotion charm and floated the cupcake closer. "Thanks."

The moment I bit into the frosted top, I'd been sent to a heaven that even the wonderful desserts of Hogwarts could not hope to match. My eyes widened and everything became indistinct as I chewed on the sweetest treat I'd ever had. 

As the cupcake melted in my mouth, I could feel the warmth of it spreading throughout my body. It was like lightning had struck my mouth and was now flowing out all over. 

I couldn't stop myself. Before I'd even finished gulping down the first mouthful, I was biting into it again. And again. And again. Only when the cupcake was gone could I think properly again. "That was amazing!"

"Would you like to try one of my favorites? It's not for the faint-hearted!" She reached into her mane and produced another. "It's got—"

"Hold up. Is it something really odd?" I asked, looking between Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie. When the former winced and the latter seemed to smile even more, I couldn't stop grinning too. "We've got these jelly-beans, you see. Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans. You name it, from ear-wax to praline, slug to caramel. If you're lucky, you can have half a dozen before you feel sick. Don't tell me what's in this."

Time to be a wizard! I cast a Locomotion charm that was almost second nature now and floated the cupcake over. It smelled just as sweet and delicious as the last one. I opened my mouth and took a bite. Chilli, lime, and malt-chocolate milk. It was akin to grabbing three good Bertie Bott's and shoving them in my mouth at the same time.

The fiery heat of the chili, I could tell, should be making steam come out my ears. It was the first spicy thing I'd had since becoming a kirin, and I loved it! The second cupcake, to me at least, was even better than the first (even if the lime made it a little odd). 

"Chili, lime, and chocolate malt milk?" I asked when I was done.

Five ponies were staring at me with utterly shocked expressions, but Pinkie Pie was all smiles. "I know! They have just the right balance of heat, bitter, and smooth. I've got some more!" She pulled out two more of the cupcakes and passed me one—waiting for me to cast a Locomotion charm again.

We sat and discussed cupcake flavors for what felt like the entire morning. Lunch passed at some point, but for some reason I wasn't really hungry. All the time, Addera was talking quietly with Twilight Sparkle about something. 

"Oh. Oh! Come over here and you can see Canterlot!" Pinkie Pie seemed to be excitement and energy incarnate. She rushed over to the left side of the train and stuck her face up against the glass.

I wasn't quite as fast as Pinkie, but I jumped down and walked over to where she was standing and jumped so my forelegs were braced against the wall just under the window. Outside, the countryside was smooth grassland and farms as far as you could see in one direction (behind us) and led to a mountain ahead. "Where's this Canterlot?"

Pinkie reached her hoof under my chin and lifted—forcing me to look up. And up. And up.

"Holy—" I managed to keep from saying something rude, but only just. There was a city literally stuck to the side of a mountain. It looked like it'd need all the magic in Hogwarts a hundred times over just to exist. "Is that where the kirin are?"

"No, silly. That's Canterlot—the capital of Equestria." Pinkie Pie gestured up at the layered disks that held a castle and (apparently) a city practically in mid-air. "Hey, Twilight, are we stopping in Canterlot?!"

Her shout had me clamping my ears down.

"No, Pinkie. I asked them to drop us at Ponyville and wait for where we're going next," Twilight Sparkle said.

"Ooooh. Well, I guess we're not going to Canterlot, but you get to see Ponyville!" Pinkie Pie pointed toward the horizon and the edge of the massive mountain Canterlot was built onto. "It's just around that corner."

Addera slithered up beside me and looked out and up. "Is that really a city up there, Harry Potter?"

"I guess. Pinkie and Twilight said it is." For a moment I wondered if they'd take offense at me using their first names. Adults—human adults—generally didn't like that. When no obvious reprisal came, I figured it might be alright to continue like that. "I'd like to see it once I have my fire problem under control."

"Then we shall. I'd like to see it too. Wizards, I understand, hide far too much. There is much beauty, Harry Potter, in the things magic can do, but wizards and witches hide it and keep it to themselves." Addera's hoof rubbed behind one of my ears and I found myself leaning into it a little. 

A bark drew all our attention to Hedwig—who was sitting calmly at the other end of the car. She turned toward the window and barked again. While everyone else looked at her, I turned to look out the window. "Is that another owl?" I asked.

Addera slithered closer, but quickly backed up when the owl suddenly looked terrified. "I'll leave this to you, Harry Potter."

Trotting to the back of the carriage (where the owl was keeping pace with the train), I jumped up on the seat only to see glowing purple magic unfasten the window and pull it down. 

The wind of the train's passage rushed inside—bringing with it a screech owl. Fluffing its feathers, the owl looked up at me from the bench it had landed on, and let out the most horrid scream. Then the owl lifted one leg up to show it had hold of a letter.

I managed to grab the letter with my teeth before the silly owl let go of it, which was when Twilight closed the window with her magic again. Carefully using my mouth and a hoof, I managed to unfold the letter.



Harry! Where'd you go? Everything's gone crazy at the school. First some Ministry wizards arrived, and then some Guardpony announced "the royal princess" and the biggest pony I've ever seen walked inside. 

Hermione says there was so much magic coming from her horn that she probably could have picked up the whole school and juggled it. I reckon she's daft—they might look bigger, but no one has that much magic power. Not even Dumbledore.

Anyway, it looks like they want us all to go through the portal as soon as we can. Students at least. Why'd you run off? Don't want to go back to that muggle family? Can't blame you. 

I borrowed Percy's owl to send you this message so you can send Ginny back to us. Mumd have a fit…. Well, she'll have a fit anyway, but can you please send her back?

—Ron



"What's it say?" Twilight asked.

"They want me to send Ginny back so Ron and his brothers can take her home to their parents." And I would, but I needed to let her know that first. "I need to tell her."

Twilight looked around, then back at her friends (who all shrugged). "You'll excuse me for asking, but, uh, who's Ginny?"

I heard Addera explain to Twilight while I lifted Ginny out of our pack along with the ballpoint pen I'd borrowed. Using spells was so easy in Equestria, and no one tried to tell me I couldn't. Back to Addera's comment from before, I guess. With a few Locomotion charms cast, I had the diary and the pen well under my control.



Sorry I haven't spoken earlier.





Harry! It's okay. I'm still recovering from what I did to Percy. I wouldn't have been able to do that if you hadn't given me so much energy. What's going on?





We left the school. Me and Addera. Twilight, she's one of the hero ponies, said she'd help us find the kirins here so I can ask them how to keep my cool. Turns out, they might have a way back





Back up! There's a way home?!



Alright. I winced.



Sorry. I wasn't thinking. I should have asked before leaving with you.





I



No more words came up, so I waited for her.



I asked you to keep me close. It's no one's fault, Harry. They're really going home?





I still didn't ask. And it seems that way. I'll send you back to Ron with Hedwig.





You assume I want you to send me back.



As I stared at the page, a big line appeared through what she'd written.



Harry, I need to go home. I just can't





You want to go home to your parents?



My question hovered there for barely a moment before her answer came.



Yes. Sorry Harry.



So it'd just be me, Addera, and Hedwig. I let out a little sigh and tried to think of what to say. What could I say? I might not ever see her again.



I'll miss you.



Using my Locomotion charm on the diary, I started to fold it closed. She wasn't even a girl anymore. I knew I'd start feeling stuff about girls soon—everyone said so—but she wasn't a girl. 



Wait!



I stopped closing the diary and opened it again as more words started to appear.



If I can find a way back, I will. I need to see Mum and Dad again, but I'm going to tell them I want to come back. Someone will probably come looking for you eventually. I'll get them to bring me. Or you can send Hedwig to get me. She's a smart owl.



In tiny print four words appeared.



I'll miss you too.



These aren't tears and I'm not crying. I closed the diary fully this time and found a piece of string in my bag to tie it up with. (Locomotion charms are the best.) Passing it to Hedwig, I let out a bit of a wheeze. "Can you take this to Ron?"

Hedwig's bark meant more to me than words. Confidence and surety radiated out. I reached out a hoof and gently ran it down her back. It earned me some gentle preening—her beak would have been scary to anyone whose skin wasn't covered in impenetrable scales. "Will you be able to find her again, if she went back to Earth and got back here?"

She whistled in response and leaned against my hoof that was doing a number on her neck. 

"Good. Now, make sure Ron gives you something to eat. You know how to bug him until he does." I held out the diary to her, which she promptly grasped with one claw. "Find me as soon as you can, okay?"

I closed my eyes and let her whistle and rub her beak against the bridge of my nose. Not wanting to watch, I kept them closed as she turned and tapped her beak on the glass. Twilight must have opened it, because a moment later I felt her going further away from me. 

"She'll be back as soon as she can, Harry Potter. Hedwig will not leave you alone for long." Addera's hooves scooped me up and hugged me. 

It was such a casual gesture between us that I didn't think too much about it and stuffed my snout against her chest. She smelled of nothing less than safety and warmth. She smelled like a cozy night in bed and waking up to the dawn. "Thanks."

The train lurched, and if I weren't in Addera's arms I'd probably have stumbled. Pulling to the left meant that everything in the car wanted to go right. The train had tilted slightly into the corner, but it was moving fast enough that I was amazed it held to the tracks at all.

The sound of the train got louder for a moment as a pony opened the door at the front of the car. I focused on him. He looked like he'd been working hard doing something. His white coat was slick and his chest seemed to be heaving. "Next stop is Ponyville. Ponyville is the next stop." He walked closer to us and looked to Twilight. "We'll have to return to Canterlot, ma'am. I'll send another train down as soon as we reach there."

"What's wrong with this one?" Twilight asked.

"The race to get you to the north was not kind to Elegance. She's an older engine, and shouldn't have been rushing around—but she was the only one fully steamed up." The stallion sounded both a little sad and a little worried. Worried for the locomotive, or worried Twilight would tell him to wait?

"Oh. Okay. We'll only be in Ponyville for a day or two, will you be able to get somepony to bring another train in time?"

The stallion's face brightened, and he stood a little taller. "In a day? Ma'am, that'll be a piece of cake for the Friendship Express!" 

To say this was different to how I was used to things working was an understatement. This just wasn't how things worked back home, and it was absolutely wonderful. 





The beast roared, as dragons are wont to do. It reared up to be taller than anything around it, opened its jaws even wider, and froze at the hand touching its side.

"It's alright, Norbert. That's Whistlewing. Come on, boy, calm down. You don't have to defend me against everything that comes near. Whistlewing's a friendly sort, so long as you feed her." Charles Weasley patted the flank of the dragon to calm it down, but Norbert was not one to be completely at ease around other dragons. 

"Oi! Whistlewing! Catch!" Drawing his wand out with one hand, Charlie skillfully pulled a cube of salted meat from a pocket and tossed it. With focus born of much practice with the spell, he flicked his wand through a little twirl and a golden blob of magic shot out and engulfed the tiny cube. Mid-air, the piece of meat grew and grew and grew to resemble the deer haunch he'd carved it from originally. 

It was one of the simpler food magics, and it only worked on reasonably fresh meat, but it was the only way one wizard could keep enough meat on hand to pacify dragons. 

"How you doing, girl?" With Whistlewing ripping into the haunch of venison, Charlie knew it was safe to approach her. Any truly wild dragon would still have ripped him apart, but not only did Charlie have a way with the beasts, he'd been a peripheral part of Whistlewing's life since she'd been hatched. "How's that scar healing?"

Running his hand along the dragon's flank, Charlie found the puckered wound by feel only because he kept his eyes on the front end of Whistlewing. He'd learned very quickly that you could trust a dragon to do only one thing—be unpredictable. The only way to know what a dragon was going to do was to watch what they were thinking, and it had taken him years to build his empathy with the creatures to tell that just by looking at their heads.

Whistlewing was as calm as a dragon could be. She knew the human—knew that it'd give her food—which was why she didn't just bite its head off. Besides, she'd tasted human and found it to be rather bland. She liked the meat this human gave her, so in her own way she liked this human. 

What Whistlewing didn't like was this human touching her sore spot. When his hand touched the puckered edge of the old scar, she turned her head to snap at him—maybe snap him in half—but he was already taking his hand back. 

Fixing her eyes on the human's, Whistlewing blew a snort of smoke at him—a warning—Don't touch me there again.

"Still tender? Let me get the cream." Reaching into his cut-down robes, Charlie fumbled around in his magically-enhanced pockets for what he was after, and pulled out a large pot of horrid-smelling gunk. It wasn't that it smelled horrid with the lid on, but both Charlie and Whistlewing knew the stuff smelled bad—as did any creature that knew of ointments. It was a foundation of medicine that the worse something tasted or smelled, the better it worked.

Charlie's ointment worked well enough that Whistlewing remembered it and was far more willing to put up with him touching her just to have it on her old wound. It helped that she liked the smell too.

Whistlewing relaxed a little more as the numbing-soothing feeling spread through her old wound. Her mind tickled over the fact there was two reasons she put up with this human. Stretching her head out to him, she nuzzled his chest and sneezed. 

Familiar with a dragon showing affection, Charlie did nothing to wipe Whistlewing's mucus from his robe—if a dragon was predisposed to mark you, it was less likely to eat you. "That's better, isn't it?"

The reply almost knocked Charlie off his feet. Whistlewing shoved her snout toward the pocket he kept the meat cubes in, the lack of pain in her side turning the dragon's mood to capricious playfulness.

"Alright. You do look a bit skinny. One more won't hurt you." Charlie reached into the pocket with all the cubes of meat—magically enchanted as it was to keep its contents safe—and plucked one out. The moment it left the safety of his pocket, Whistlewing could smell it. "Hold up. You get a tiny bit now or a whole hunk if you wait just—"

It was a very simple motion for a dragon the size of Whistlewing. She pushed Charlie and he fell down on his back. Leaning over him, she was about to bite at his hand to get what it hid when a gout of flame seared the air above her. 

Norbert had had enough. The other dragon might be bigger than him, and Charlie might have told him to back off, but he was fairly sure Whistlewing was about to eat Charlie, and Norbert didn't want that. His first gust of flame had been to warm up his throat. Now he stepped forward and eyed Whistlewing, preparing the main event.

Whistlewing reared up at the sight of an aggressive dragon and readied her own breath. Eyes narrowing to defend her face from the flame she would produce, she was distracted at the last moment by movement.

"You're both being idiots. I'm okay, Norbert." Charlie brushed himself down and quickly worked the food restoration spell on the cube. "Here's your meal, Whistlewing. You two will be the death of me one day. You're worse than me brothers."

It was a good rule of thumb that Charlie had discovered that a dragon wouldn't breathe fire if it had a mouthful of a food. There was a single exception to this and it related to the idiocy of trying to raid a dragon's nest—Charlie wasn't that much of an idiot. 

Producing a second cube and bespelling it into a full haunch, Charlie tossed it to Norbert. He sat back down and pulled a sandwich out of a different pocket, and started eating. He'd only gotten his pockets mixed up once, but one afternoon having had the saltiest tartare was more than enough for him. 

Sitting down on a rocky, sparsely grassed hilltop in Romania, with a pair of dragons that would as soon rip him apart as the venison in their claws if they were hungry, Charles Weasley felt his lucky charm tingle.

"What'n the nine hells—?" Charlie was faster to move now than he'd been with Whistlewing about to eat his arm. The crystal hanging from the chain at his throat had gone from tingling, to warm, to searing-hot in seconds.

Clenching his teeth at the pain, Charlie ripped the chain from around his neck and tossed it away from himself and the dragons. Rather than focus on their meals, both creatures watched with him as the crystal hit the grass some ten yards away before exploding.

Unlike a good, old-fashioned explosion (like with gunpowder or other such chemicals), the crystal exploded magically. One moment it was a neutral part of the world's matrix of magic, the next it was being supercharged by magic pouring into it. That magic managed to hold its shape in the tiny crystal for nearly five seconds before it needed to get out rapidly.

Rapidly, when applied to expulsions of magic, is a term that is just as exciting—if not more so—than when applied to such compositions as blackpowder, guncotton, and things with more nitrogen than sense. But magic was tied to the reality of another world far more intrinsically than Earth. Instead of exploding out, it exploded through.

It felt to Charlie as if all the magic in the world had rushed toward the point before him before  a million times more came rushing back. He stared at a blue shape in the air that looked nothing so much as a rip in the air itself. Like magic had torn its way through the world and into another.

The rip was small, barely coming higher than Charlie's chest. He took a few steps toward the rip and could already feel waves of magic washing in and out of it like the tide. 

"Well, you don't see that every day." Dusting himself off and making sure he hadn't actually broken anything or hurt himself, Charlie walked closer to the rip to take a look at it. 

At each flank of the human, a dragon walked. Both Norbert and Whistlewing were fascinated by the rip. Each had felt a little under the weather for several days, and the rift stopped that—completely reversed it and went back the other way a little.

Whistlewing was the first to break. Her back legs bunching, she pounced forward and dove head first into the rip. 

Charlie shouted wordlessly, not the least of which because Whistlewing was stuck. "You have got to be bloody kidding me? You stupid dragon!" Stomping up to the squirming dragon's rump, Charlie grabbed onto her tail—innately careful of the sharp, blade-like ridges down her back. Leaning backwards with every fiber of his being he could manage, Charlie was nonetheless surprised when instead of managing to pull the 900 lbs of dragon out of the rip, she pulled him through it when one of her tail-spines caught on his robes.

The disorientation of being tugged through the non-space that divided worlds was brief but nauseating. Charlie thought he was fine for a moment until the physics and rules of this new world got its hands on him and pulled down. 

"What the bl—?" Charlie could feel the pull of gravity downward and the rush of air going up—though he knew the last one was all backwards because of his point of view. 

A wizard of Charlie's profession and ruggedness would not be caught flat-footed by a mere high-altitude drop with no warning. Squirming around in the air, Charlie stuck a hand into an outer-top pocket on his robe and closed his fingers around a wooden shaft. 

The stick was almost two inches across and polished smooth by use. Pulling, Charlie drew more and more of the shaft from his pocket until his whole broom was free of his robes. Swinging the broom around, Charlie got it under him just as the ground below was rushing up. 

It was just about then that Charlie realized that the ground wasn't a rolling, soft grassy hill that was reaching toward him—it was a craggy mountain that, when he looked a little closer, had actual lava flowing down from the caldera atop it.

Jamming his feet into the stirrups and willing his broom to life, Charlie felt magic rush into it. "Up!" 

His momentum was arrested by the broom as it tried to haul him up, but even as it slowed his fall to nothing, Charlie could feel his legs getting far too warm. The sound of crackling wood, sulfur, and something burning caught in Charlie's nose as the broom lost its mojo.

Red and simmering lava below him seemed impossibly close, but just as the last of his broom's upward momentum faded, something grabbed Charlie by the back and pulled him away from a well-done fate. Angling his head to look upward, Charlie watched as Norbert pumped his wings as hard as the adolescent dragon had ever pumped them. "Good boy, Norbert!"

Norbert wasn't the smartest of dragons, but when the human he liked was falling—and Norbert knew this human couldn't fly so well without his stick—he knew something was up. Now he was struggling to keep himself in the air while carrying the human away from the warm, warm ground. 

By the time Norbert let go of him, Charlie was ready to sing the dragon's praises. The claws wrapped around his hip and shoulders released and Charlie fell just two feet onto actual soft ground. 

Caught between a desire to kiss the ground and kiss Norbert, Charlie opted to instead show the dragon how much he appreciated having his life saved. "You are going to get so much venison you won't be able to walk without burping up antlers. C'mere you great guy." 

As Charlie wrapped his arms around Norbert, he was aware of the sound of footsteps-that-were-too-heavy-to-be-human approaching. He felt Norbert tense up under him, and slowly let go and turned—not the least of which to let Norbert move if something was going to attack.

"Huh. Never seen a dragon like that before. Hey, new guy, what's with the pet?" 

Charlie looked up at the oddly proportioned dragons that stood over him and had the distinct impression they were talking to Norbert and not him. "Bloody hell…"