#when mab is far more open to being vulnerable around him

[nerevarbean]

A slight alteration of this sketch

[minaminokyoko]

The Soulgaze (Part I): Harry

(A/N: I finally stopped being a big chicken and wrote the inevitable Soulgaze fic. Part II is on its way with Harry’s POV of Murphy’s soul. Crossposted on AO3. Big thanks to @xserpx for inspiring me to get off my ass and write it.)

“I took the stars from my eyes

And then I made a map

I knew that somehow I could find my way back

And I heard your heart beating

You were in the darkness too

So I stayed in the darkness with you

The stars, the moon

They have all been blown out

You left me in the dark

No dawn, no day

I’m always in this twilight

In the shadow of your heart...”

-”Cosmic Love” by Florence + the Machine

Harry Dresden has asked me to do a lot of terrifying things since I first met him, but this was by far the scariest.

And I don't scare easy.

Ironically, what we were about to do had nothing to do with myriad of monsters and beasties and dark things without names that he and I fought on a semi-regular basis. That was usually what scared me, but working with him meant I could get over that fear and get things done. He was still here for me, and he always would be, but this was something he couldn't help me deal with. I'd have to come to terms with it on my own, and I'd done that a thousand times before; just not from this angle.

He and I sat on the floor in his new place, so new that it still had that fresh steamed carpet smell, on a comfortable rug that had similar patterns to one at his old place. We faced each other, seated Indian style, and we were holding hands in an attempt to keep each other grounded and calm for the moment. How did we get here? Well, about a week ago, we'd had a conversation the two of us had been avoiding nearly since we'd met each other all those years ago.

"If we're gonna go for it," I said, swallowing the lump trying to form in my throat. "Really go for it, you know what we have to do, right?"

Harry cleared his throat, looking a bit pale, and nodded. "Yeah, I know."

"So...when?"

"I have to get through this week. I don't want to be...distracted. Might get me killed. But once the week's up..." He trailed off and then shrugged one shoulder. "Should be free."

"Okay. I'll be over on Saturday. We can do it then."

"Yeah."

A suffocating silence descended. Both of us were breathing a little too fast. We were nervous as hell and we hadn't even done anything yet. Christ almighty. Maybe I hadn't considered the impact it had on the two of us.

"Ready?" Harry asked quietly, his voice a little hoarse, running his thumb over my knuckles.

"The truth?" I asked.

He nodded. "No. I want to keep stalling, even though I know that's ridiculous. It's not like I don't know who you are. I've known that for years. I guess it's just..."

I shook my head a bit. "Being vulnerable. Scares me to death. Sometimes ignorance really is bliss."

"Don't I know it," he said, almost smiling. "If you need more time..."

"No. I don't. I think we've both waited long enough. Too long, even."

"Okay," he whispered. "Karrin, I love you. No matter what happens."

"I know," I said softly, smiling in spite of how damned hard my heart was beating. "I love you too, Harry. No matter what happens."

He squeezed my fingers. "Deep breath. On three."

I nodded. "One...two...three."

I lifted my gaze. I took in Harry's face with my old "fresh eyes" trick I'd used as a cop for so many years. I took in the five o'clock shadow, the perpetually windswept tousled hair, the strong jaw line, the scar over his eyebrow, the tone and texture of his skin, the determined line set in his mouth.

Then I met his eyes and for the first time in my life, I didn't look away after a few seconds.

I fell into the Soulgaze with my eyes wide open.

Harry's living room disappeared. I tumbled down a long tunnel in a free fall, spinning, picking up speed. I flung my arms out in panic, the wind too harsh for me to see where I'd land, to see what lay at the bottom of this pit I'd fallen into. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up and intuition told me I'd reached the end of the line. I threw my forearms up and tried to brace myself.

I didn't hit the ground; some invisible force caught me, cushioned me, and I could finally see again. My tennis shoes settled into mud and as soon as they did, ice cold rain pelted me on all sides. As I regained my balance, I stared up in awe at the sky above me.

A thunderstorm of titanic proportions raged in the heavens. Lightning flashed between clouds that had to be hundreds of feet high, angry and terrible, so full of power that even down here on the ground I felt the static. Thunder roared every so often, igniting some primal fear of destruction inside me, but I forced myself to calm down and remember my purpose here.

I swept my soaked hair away from my face so I could see what lay in front of me. Whenever the lightning struck, it lit up the clearing enough to allow me to see that I stood several feet away from the edge of a cliff. I caught a glimpse of the other side of the canyon, and it had to be hundreds of feet deep, maybe endless. The mud beneath my feet was as dark and thick as tar, as if it were sodden ashes instead of dirt.

Harry stood at the edge of the cliff.

And he wasn't alone.

He stood with his back to the open abyss, both arms outstretched. He was dressed the same way he always had been--leather duster, t-shirt, jeans, and boots. I spotted his mother's pendant, his blasting rod clipped to his belt, and his shield bracelet around his wrist. But he didn't look the same. As I stepped closer, I could see open wounds in his chest, his arms, his legs. He was bleeding, badly, from cuts that would no doubt kill a normal person in minutes. His teeth were gritted and his eyes were closed in concentration. His right hand had its fingers spread, and from the wrist down, fire blazed out in an enormous spray that had to be twelve feet high. I followed where the fire spread out to and that was when I saw Mab.

She stood there, regal and terrifying, dressed in a pure white dress with brilliant opalescence that cut through the darkness. Not a drop of water touched her; it just dispersed around her feet into snow as it touched an invisible barrier that formed a dome around her from head to toe. A blanket of frost lay beneath her feet. She had one arm extended, those pale fingers pointed at Harry, and she met the fire with her own column of wintry ice magic. It clashed against the fire and sent up a sizzling tower of vapor against the rain. Her eyes were completely black like a shark's and the cold emptiness in her expression made my stomach twist in revulsion. She was a force of nature, so inhuman in her terror and beauty that I understood why Harry feared her so much. There was no doubt in my mind why he fought her control so vehemently. Something in me knew if he faltered for even a millisecond, Mab's touch would infect him like a virus and destroy everything that had once been Harry Dresden.

I guided my gaze away from Mab and looked to my right. Harry's other arm was extended, and a brilliant silvery-blue light spread from his open hand out into another enormous funnel of magic. His other opponent had no real form. My eyes couldn't make sense of it at first. I saw a figure in a writhing mass of darkness that somehow seemed deeper and more impenetrable than the darkness surrounding me from the thunderstorm. It reached out with tendrils of black and pushed against the silver light that Harry held it back with, and every so often one tendril would slip through his defense and nearly touch him, but then the light flared brighter and the tendril dissolved.

I peered deeper into the writhing mass of darkness and I could see that the creature didn’t have just one form. It shifted constantly between different shapes; a man, a demon, a monster, a woman, over and over again, never staying the same for more than several seconds. Mab’s expression had been emotionless, but the look on the faces of Harry’s adversaries were of deep, angry hunger. Something in that darkness wanted him more than anything, and it would stop at nothing to conquer him. Mab’s cold magic reached out to him for possession, for want, and these dark forms reached out to him for destruction. It wanted to swallow him whole and destroy him from the inside. It would settle for nothing less.

I shivered and dragged my eyes away from that horrid void back to Harry.

That was when I saw the boy.

A small boy was on his knees in front of Harry, clutching something to his chest, shaking violently with fear. Before I even knew it, I had rushed over to him. I didn’t even realized I’d crossed over a circle of power until I felt it flush across my skin and raise goosebumps all over me in an electric rush. Somehow, I hadn’t broken the circle. It was almost as if it had been constructed that way, just for me, as if it knew I was an ally. It was dry inside the circle, and I didn’t recognize the symbols he’d drawn into the dirt, but I felt warm nonetheless. My clothing and hair instantly returned to what they’d been before I hit the rainstorm. The fear I’d felt from seeing Mab and the adversary evaporated as quickly as the moisture had. Somehow, I knew I was safe.

“Hey,” I murmured to the little boy, stroking his hair. “Look at me, sweetie. Are you alright?”

The boy jumped when I touched him, blinking large brown eyes at me, tears running down his cheeks. He couldn’t have been more than maybe eight years old, if that. There was a desperation in his eyes that made me want to hold him tight and promise that everything would be alright.

“Protect,” he whispered hoarsely. “I have to protect them.”

“Protect who?”

Slowly, he lowered his arms to let me see that there was a large, thick photo album in his hands. He gave me a hesitant, searching look, and then offered it to me. I took the album and opened it to find hundreds of pictures, and they were of things that no one ever would have had a camera for. Harry as an infant, nestled in the arms of a weakened but beautiful dark-haired woman. Harry as a child riding a bike for the first time with his father, Malcolm. Harry flying through the air over a grassy field, using magic for the first time. Harry lying in bed next to Elaine Mallory, his young face lit up with laughter. Harry as a teenager sitting next to Ebenezar on a front porch somewhere, whittling a new blasting rod. Harry in his early twenties signing the lease to his private investigator office. Harry driving the Blue Beetle home for the first time. Harry shaking hands with Michael Carpenter outside his house, with Charity and Molly and the rest of the Carpenters smiling in the background. Harry handing me back my policeman’s hat on the bridge where we’d met. Harry fast asleep next to Susan in his bedroom. Harry clasping Thomas’ hand as he helped his brother up from the floor. Harry holding Maggie in his arms for the first time.

“I have to protect them,” the boy whispered. “Without them, I’m not me.”

My heart wrenched at the conviction, at the sadness, at the resolution in the boy’s voice. I knew that tone instantly. The boy was Harry too, just young and innocent, the last bit of purity left in him after all this time.

“You will,” I said, touching his cheek. “You will protect them. I know you can do it.”

I handed the album back to him and kissed his forehead with all the gentle reassurance that I could. I wiped his tears away and then stood, walking over to the adult version of Harry.

He opened his eyes when he heard me approach. His arms never wavered, but he was breathing hard, his hair plastered to his forehead with sweat from the strain of holding off the other forces tearing at him.

“Tired,” he muttered. “So tired, Karrin.”

“I know,” I whispered back. “I know you’re tired, Harry. But you can do this. You can beat them. You can protect what’s precious to you.”

“What if they win?”

I touched his cheek. “They won’t.”

“How do you know for sure?”

I slid my hand down from his cheek until it rested over his heart. “This is how. As long as your heart still beats, they’ll never win.”

He bowed his head slightly, and tears dripped down his cheeks. “Thank you.”

I kissed him seconds before the Soulgaze ended.

I crashed back into my own body so abruptly I toppled backwards for a second. Harry caught my hands on reflex and steadied me, drawn out of his own Soulgaze once I’d broken the connection. We both stared at each other, breathing hard, pupils dilated, a bit flushed as the images settled into place in our minds.

“You okay?” Harry asked.

I nodded tightly. “You?”

“Yeah.” He pushed his long fingers through his hair. “That was...intense.”

“Tell me about it.”

He drew his hands away from mine, and something guarded slid into his features. He looked like he was trying not to wince, a look that was remarkably similar to a puppy expecting to get kicked. I realized how afraid he’d been of what I would see, that obviously other people who had done the Soulgaze with him came out of it scared or repulsed. No wonder the man had so many trust issues.

“What did you see?” he asked quietly.

I took a deep breath. “Power. Struggle. Despair. Hope. Hate. Love.”

I smiled at him. “Basically exactly what I expected would be inside of you.”

Harry blinked a few times. “Really?”

“Yes, really, you numbskull.” I reached out and held his hand. “I told you I know you, Harry. There are dark things inside of you. There are things that scared me, for very good reason. But you’re still fighting them. They haven’t gotten you. And they never will.”

He squeezed my hand and let out the breath he’d been holding, and those brown eyes were wet with grateful tears. “Karrin, I...thank you.”

“Always.” I nibbled my lower lip and forced myself to continue. “What about me? What did you see?”

He smiled softly, and the knot in my stomach began to unravel. “That you’re a hell of a lot stronger than I even thought possible. It was...honestly, it was maybe the most beautiful Soulgaze I’ve ever seen before. Complex. I feel like I’m a better man just having witnessed it. Knowing what you’re capable of and what’s most important to you.”

“And what’s that?”

“You’re a protector, Karrin. Everything that is good in this world is exactly what you’re fighting to protect. Even at great cost. I’m honored having seen it.”

He kissed me. “Thank you for doing this. For trusting me. For believing in me.”

“You’ve never given me a reason not to, Harry.”

He smiled warmly down at me and lifted an eyebrow. “So...set course for the iceberg?”

I grinned and drew him to his feet to head towards the bedroom. “Goddamn right, Dresden.”