Unconventionality

Summary: Separated from their family after a caravan attack, Fíli and Kíli are found by a nomadic elf in the dangerous wilds of Middle Earth. Gaeldúath is not a conventional elf by any means, as most elves would never take in lost dwarrowlings as their own, but his strangeness goes a bit beyond what one can see at first glance.

Rating: T

Notes: Elf!Harry, Master of Death!Harry, Powerful!Harry, descriptions of violence and gore, violence towards children, dwarves raised by an elf, Gray!Harry, Kíli/Tauriel, Thorin/Bilbo, Everyone Lives AU

This is a crossover idea that wouldn't leave me alone. I've always liked Master of Death Harry fics and the possibilities behind them.

Also, sorry for any inaccuracies ahead of time, especially with the LotR lore and languages. It's still quite new to me.

…

He has suffered once at the hands of fate, back when the only person he ever remembered being was Harry Potter.

Harry Potter, once known as the Boy-Who-Lived, looks back on his first life with a mix of nostalgia, relief, and bitterness. While he suffered as fate's Chosen One, he'd known happiness, too—along with all sorts of misfortune that would bite him the moment his back was turned.

While his life had been filled with twists and turns, all sorts of ups and downs and around-agains, he hadn't registered the moment his world was changed forever until it already had.

The Hallows, whose importance at the time had not meant nearly as much to him as the Horcruxes, were what damned him in the end. In hindsight, he probably should have paid more attention, but he was never the particularly clever one of his friends.

Harry Potter had been a man of action, and act he did.

He and his friends merely sought the Hallows to keep them from a power-hungry, immortality-obsessed Voldemort, without any desire for them of their own. However, when Harry held the allegiance of the Resurrection Stone, the Invisibility Cloak, and the Elder Wand for the first and only time, he never imagined that he would succeed where Voldemort failed.

Immortality. In those few days that he was the true owner of all three Hallows, he became the Master of Death, and he hadn't realized anything was wrong it until it was already too late.

Harry had wanted to both laugh and cry when several years passed after the Second Wizarding War, and he looked exactly the same as he did at seventeen.

Confirmation of his fears arrived one day in the form of attempted murder. One of the leftover, persistent followers of the deceased Dark Lord shot an Avada Kedavra at him in the middle of Diagon Alley, where he'd been accompanying Ron, Hermione, and their kids for school shopping. There was a familiar flash of green light and screams in the air, but Harry Potter did not die to the Killing Curse for the third time.

That day, there had been no protection from his mother, no foreign soul shard imbedded within him that would perish in his stead. The spell that was created for instant death simply hit him, and nothing happened.

In the chaos that ensued afterwards, Ron and Hermione managed to smuggle both he and their children from the Alley without anyone seeing and gently shoo Rose and Hugo to their rooms. Harry had then looked at the concerned, alarmed, ever-aging faces of his best friends and broke down before them, his terrified theories spilling from his mouth without restriction.

He was immortal—he could not age, he could not die. Not even to the Killing Curse.

After weeks of speculation and research, Hermione came to him with that fateful, damning title on her lips: the Keeper of the Hallows, the Master of Death. Even though the Invisibility Cloak was the only one in his possession at the time, that time Harry had all three Hallows must have been enough, as he was the only one to have ever done so.

But what being the Master of Death truly meant, however, none of them knew. All they could do was wait and see.

With that knowledge constantly gnawing at the back of his thoughts, Harry tried living his life as normally as he could, although he'd resigned from his position in the Auror department soon after the fiasco at Diagon Alley. He distracted himself with learning subjects he was unfamiliar with—arithmancy, runes, healing magic—anything that he could immerse himself into and forget how everyone he knew and loved grew older while he did not. He visited his friends and their families, glad that they had the happiness they deserved but simultaneously wondered if he could have had it, too, if fate did not have its own personal vendetta against him.

As he did every year, Harry stood with his friends at Platform 9 ¾ and waved their children goodbye. Wistfully, he imagined having children of his own on that great red train, grinning back at him with excitement in their eyes as they headed off to the school he once called home. He thought of Ginny, who was a star Quidditch player for the Holyhead Harpies and whom he barely ever saw anymore, and what they could have had. He thought of how everyone else had moved on with their lives, but he could not, frozen in time with an unwanted freedom from aging and eventual death.

While Voldemort threw everything he had into achieving immortality, the one who ended up having it wished more than anything that he did not. At the time, Harry's age was still well within the years of a normal wizard's lifespan—hell, still within a muggle one—and he already hated it.

All he could do was watch as everyone he ever loved succumbed to the flow of time. His friends, their children, their children's children, and so on… He could only watch as their bright, youthful faces grew wrinkled and grey and hold on to the bitter happiness that they died not in war and sprays of blood, but after living a long and peaceful life, surrounded by loved ones who would remember them.

Five generations after his own was all Harry could take. The descendants of his friends knew of him, of course, but they were distant and spoke very little to him. He understood why, though; there was only so many ways to explain to family and friends the presence of a seventeen-year-old Harry Potter who, by all means, should have been dead centuries ago, even with the support of the story of the Hallows.

Because the Hallows, like Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived and the Man-Who-Just-Refused-to-Die, became only a story. As the survivors of the Second Wizarding War disappeared, the struggle against the Dark Lord became a tale told for children before they went to sleep; the memories that haunted an entire generation faded away with time, spoken of in history lessons to bored students and in books chronicling the events with clinical detachment.

For Harry, living in Grimmauld Place without even a long-dead Kreacher to keep him company, the fact that the world had moved on was a difficult but expected realization. Over the years, he'd mastered his self-studied subjects and even the ones he'd already taken at school; he'd traveled the planet and seen whatever there was to see, both magic and muggle. He'd lived and experienced, but he could not think of anything the world had left to offer him.

At least, with his friends, he could pretend that everything was alright. But now that they were gone, now that time had swallowed up their precious years together and spit it back out on chocolate frog cards and notes of textbook script, what reason did he have to stay?

He could think of none, and the wish for something else, something new, took root in his heart.

Harry went to sleep one night and woke up in another world the very next morning. Astonished, he'd meandered about in that new, alien setting with no particular direction in mind, marveling at the new sights and speculating about just what he'd done—and if he could do it again.

When he tired of that world, he made a second attempt, and Harry successfully awoke in another time and place ready to be explored. After a few trials of repeating the experience several times with the sole force of his will, he soon realized that being the Master of Death did not only mean that he could not die.

…

These days, Harry wanders.

There is not much to do—or, rather, nothing occurs that concerns him personally.

Destiny, it seems, has decided at last to leave him be. He skips through different worlds, one universe after another, and absorbs their histories and experiences without being pulled into any prophecies of doom and salvation, and that is fine with him.

One life of being the Chosen One, he decides, is quite enough.

This time, his eyes flutter open to a moonless night sky dotted with glittering stars, the dull roar of ocean waves in his ears and the feel of fine sand cradling his body. Harry slowly finds his bearings and carefully stands, and he realizes that he is not alone: there are others on the beach with him, six tall and willowy figures with flowing hair and pointed ears, who look at each other and their surroundings with a curious mix of confusion and wonder on their fair faces.

Harry reaches up and experimentally touches his own ears. His, too, slope gently upwards into pointed tips.

It isn't the first time he's woken up as a different species. He is calm as he breathes in the salty ocean air as it breezes around him and his companions, sending their long, fine hair fluttering in the gentle wind.

The others, meanwhile, laugh in delight at the sensation, twirling about in the white sand with arms stretched open and letting out wordless exclamations of joy. Harry watches them curiously, seeing how the wind, sky, and sea seem to be completely new to them and how no semblance of organized language emerges from their lips, and he wonders distantly if he has been born into some kind of creation story.

Again, it isn't the first time, although he usually awakens in a period where a world is already thriving and rich with history. This time, it seems, he will be a part of it.

It is an exciting prospect.

As he muses to himself, his companions have drifted together in pairs, and he is the only one without a partner. The six look at him with puzzlement and hints of pity, although not in a way that makes him feel unwelcome, and Harry only gives them a slight smile and an unconcerned tilt of the head. He motions them to lead on to wherever they are to go.

With a few lingering looks, they turn and head away from the shore towards the line of trees in the distance. Harry gladly trails behind them, immersed in his own thoughts about this new world and what it has the potential to be.

…

Many millennia after that starry night, Gaeldúath—the Fourth and last of the Minnónar, the Firstborn of all elvenkind, remaining in Arda—wanders the lands of Rhudaur, along the northernmost end of the Misty Mountains. Being so near the Ettenmoors is a gamble, as the area has since become infested with orcs and goblins and other unpleasant creatures ever since the Angmar War, but Gaeldúath is unconcerned about anyone finding him, let alone attacking him.

A Notice-Me-Not spell and a couple sound-muting charms make travelling through hostile territory quite easy. Some might consider it cheating, but magic has been a part of Gaeldúath's skillset from the very beginning, from the first world to surely the last. Thusly, he considers it fair game.

He's not looking for a fight, anyway. Currently, the elf is heading to Bree; there is no particular reason as to why, only that he is in the mood to do so.

It is how he usually decides on his destinations these days. Gaeldúath has trekked across Middle Earth what must be hundreds of times; he has visited its cities and peoples several times over the thousands of years he has lived and is known and beloved by many. He never stays in one place for very long, wandering as he pleases, teaching medicinal remedies and sharing his countless stories as he goes.

That is who Gaeldúath is, that is how legends describe the last of the ancient elves—the pale shadow who waxes and wanes with the turns of the sun.

Picking through the foliage, he hums to himself an old travelling song he and the first of his kin had sung so long ago, voyaging through Arda under the gleaming light of the stars overhead, their voices joyous and yet without words.

Currently, it is night. Gaeldúath glances up and spots the moon through the boughs of the trees, and he pauses in his walking to simply stare for a moment, something stilling within him.

Usually, the sight of the moon fills him with nostalgia and wistful elation. Tonight, though, a feeling of dark foreboding seizes his heart and sends chills down his spine.

Something is coming.

As if on cue, he detects a great rustling and sounds of clanging armor heard a league or so away, and he once again finds himself endlessly amazed by the capabilities of the elven body. Keeping his stealth spells in place, he darts off in the direction of the disturbance on light feet.

Although he is not looking for trouble, he never said he wouldn't confront it if it crossed his path.

As he comes closer, Gaeldúath can hear the distressed moaning of the trees and the pained screeching of ruined plant life directly ahead. He frowns at the sound, and it only deepens when the guttural growling of Black Speech reaches his ears.

Orcs it is, then. Their appearance isn't exactly unexpected, being so close to their territory after all, but their presence repulses him all the same.

He briefly considers letting them be, as they grow ever nearer to their base and there seems to be quite a few of them to begin with, but then he hears something else that makes his blood run cold.

He hears children—the wailing of an infant, and the sobbing voice of a young child.

"Damn these beasts," Gaeldúath snarls beneath his breath, rapidly quickening his pace.

Orc raids are not uncommon these days. Regardless of whom this particular band of orcs has besieged, Gaeldúath feels heartache blooming in his chest when he thinks of later finding the bloody remains of an innocent travelling party on the road or a small village razed to the ground.

Even so, he can hear the pleas of children who are still very much alive for whatever reason, and he will not abandon them to the cruelty of Morgoth's creatures.

Gaeldúath comes upon the band at last and halts atop a low ledge above them. He makes swift observations of the group, his keen eyes searching firstly for the endangered children.

He spots them quickly enough. Amongst the assembly of twenty or so orcs, a pair towards the front of the group has them. One is just a babe, crying uproariously from where he is crudely strapped to an orc's travelling pack, while the other seems to be just barely out of his toddling years.

The older boy's golden hair is in disarray and his face is ruddy as he screams in garbled Westron at the orc who dangles him upside-down by his slender ankle.

"Quiet, welp!" an orc roars at the wailing baby, roughly shaking the pack and only making the babe cry louder.

"Stop!" the other child cries out, struggling in his captor's unrelenting grip. He then begins yelling in another language that sounds like numerous strikes against hard stone.

Khuzdul. The children are dwarrowlings, Gaeldúath is startled to discover.

"Just eat that one already," another orc growls. "It's more trouble than it's worth."

The one holding the older child grunts and looks down at the dangling boy with a dark glint in its eye.

"Merlin," Gaeldúath breaths with alarm, jumping down from the ledge just as the orc suddenly lurches down and sinks its teeth into the child's leg, ripping right through his trousers to pierce the flesh beneath it.

The dwarfling screams, and Gaeldúath curses, running towards them whilst throwing off his concealment spells to make himself a distraction.

"Gurth an Glamhoth!" he roars, making all the orcs turn towards him.

"Elf scum," one hisses. At his sudden appearance, the orc holding the boy, its mouth bloody, casts the child carelessly aside. The boy is silent as he hits the ground, a noticeable chunk of his calf missing, and he whimpers quietly as blood rapidly escapes his wound and sinks into the crying earth beneath him.

Gaeldúath has a time limit, now. If he is going to save both children, he must do it before the elder of the two dies of blood loss.

He steels himself, his magic eagerly jumping to his fingertips as the orcs unsheathe their weapons and start towards him, leering menacingly with promises of pain and torture in their yellowed eyes.

Gaeldúath is not feeling particularly merciful tonight, either.

Without a word, he swiftly raises his arm and makes a sweeping, horizontal slash, and the heads of the orcs nearest to him fall from their shoulders and tumble pitifully to the ground. Their bodies crumble, revealing the bewildered orcs just behind them. Their surprise rapidly morphs into rage as they rush towards Gaeldúath with grating snarls and raised weapons.

It is in no way a challenge for the one who has faced so many armies before, all greater in number and much more daunting than a simple band of orcs. One by one—and, sometimes, several at a time—they fall with each silent Sectumsempra and occasional Reducto spell Gaeldúath casts.

Once upon a time, it would have sickened him to kill other living beings in such a violent way. However, as the elf acutely keeps the injured child and the orc still bearing the wailing infant upon its back within his sights as he tears down orc after orc, the vicious, unforgiving part of him finds it rather satisfying.

He makes the death of the one who bit the child particularly gruesome, unrepentantly slicing open its torso and leaving it to die with its entrails spilling out from its twitching body.

In a span of a few moments, the entire band is dead and only the orc with the babe is left standing. The dwarrowling lying on the ground has already passed out, and Gaeldúath knows that there is not much time left.

The orc removes its pack and holds it tightly, raising its sword threateningly to the sobbing babe strapped tightly to it.

"It's this runt you want, eh?" it snarls in Westron. "Should'a ate it earlier—"

Gaeldúath scowls impatiently and casts an Imperio. The orc, who falls under his thrall the instant the curse hits, has likely been planning on stalling out its inevitable death, and the elf has no time for such things.

"Give me the child," he orders, and the orc obediently approaches and hands him its pack.

Gaeldúath quickly cuts away the bindings and gently holds the distressed infant to his chest, dropping the filthy pack with a grimace as he passes a number of scanning spells over the babe.

Mercifully, the infant has no broken bones or other injuries, and has only suffered from malnourishment. How long it has been since the child's last meal, however, remains to go unseen.

"It's alright," he murmurs against the little one's forehead. "I've got you. I am going to go check on your brother, now."

Ignoring the dazed orc, Gaeldúath rushes over to the fallen child and immediately places a stasis charm on his gaping wound. The boy still breathes, thank Eru, although shallowly; his sallow face is deathly white, and his skin is clammy. The elf carefully levitates the boy in order to safely transport him away from the carnage around them.

"Where is the children's family?" he demands from the enchanted orc.

"Dwarf scum pass through the mountains," it replies in monotone Black Speech. "We killed them…"

Gaeldúath squeezes his eyes shut for a moment, murmuring a quick prayer for the dwarrow souls who have passed on to Aulë's Halls before their time.

He stiffly inquires, "Why did you keep the children alive?"

It responds, "Fresh meat."

Disgust wells within him. "Stab yourself until death comes upon you. Avoid lethal areas," he orders coldly, and he takes the dwarflings with him into the shade of the forest as the orc raises its sword to make the first thrust.

…

Gaeldúath strides into his tent before it has even finished putting itself together, holding the now-dozing babe to his chest while the injured boy floats along behind them.

Various cloths, furniture, and other odds and ends fly around them towards their established places as their master swiftly makes his way towards the medical wing of the magically-enlarged travelling tent, his new charges in tow. Racks of ready-made potions pop up neatly atop long tables against the wall, as do incenses, potions equipment, and numerous medicinal plants.

Gaeldúath wordlessly transfigures a nearby stool into a cradle, and a number of soft blankets and pillows fly in from other rooms to line the bottom. He gently places the slumbering infant into the cradle, careful not to jostle and wake the little one, before turning to the older child.

"Let's get you fixed up now, shall we?" he murmurs, promptly readying one of the cots for him.

He levitates the unconscious boy into the cot and then heads to his supplies, gathering a number of potions that the child will need for the short but unpleasant recovery ahead—blood replenishing, antibacterial, and flesh regrowth potions amongst them, some originating from his original world and others of his own make.

After a moment's thought, he also grabs a Draught of Dreamless Sleep, sensing that it will likely be necessary after such a traumatizing ordeal for one so young.

"I am sorry to say that you'll have to be awake for this first part," Gaeldúath apologizes to the child, summoning a bedside table on which he places the collection of potions. "You have been very, very brave, but I must ask you to hang on just a little while longer."

The elf casts a silencing charm around them, mindful of the sleeping babe nearby. He then undoes the stasis spell and casts a Rennervate, and the child's blue eyes flutter open just as he opens his mouth and lets out a pained scream.

"Drink," Gaeldúath urges, holding a regrowth potion to the boy's lips.

The dwarrowling's teary eyes are unfocused and frightened, but he obeys and gulps down the potion without thought. His small, shaking hands reach down towards his still-open wound, but Gaeldúath quickly takes them in one of his own, squeezing tightly.

"Your ordeal is not over just yet," he informs in a soft voice, taking up another bottle with his free hand. "Keep fighting, little lion. Come, you must drink…"

The following potions are thankfully well-received, given how terrible they taste, but the child swallows them with a bleary, far-away expression. The only indication that he is even aware of Gaeldúath's presence is his tight and desperate grip on the elf's slender fingers.

The flesh within the gaping wound in the boy's calf has already begun to bubble and regrow, and the dwarrowling lets out a pained sob.

"Last one, and you may sleep," Gaeldúath assures gently, administering the Draught of Dreamless Sleep at last.

With a few lingering whimpers, the child swallows and almost instantly succumbs to the Draught's properties. He settles back into the cot, unconscious once more, and his face is finally peaceful and not contorted in pain.

Gaeldúath sighs, holding the boy's hand for a moment longer before uncurling the tiny fingers from his own and laying the small hand back at his side. The elf brushes a few sweaty strands of blond hair from the child's forehead.

"Well done, my lad," he whispers. "Well done, indeed."

He casts a gentle Scourgify to clean the boy, getting rid of the awful stench of orc that stubbornly still clings to him, before raising his hand to catch a summoned container of infection-fighting paste. The elf spreads the paste around the slowly-closing bite wound and murmurs a spell, and the minty green concoction gradually melts into the flesh until it completely disappears.

His tasks finished for now, Gaeldúath casts another spell to place a glowing, quarantined bubble that kills and keeps out bacteria around the healing wound. He leaves a few alert charms around the cot to let him know if the child awakens—or, Eru forbid, if his condition worsens—and with one last lingering look, the elf glances to the side and sees that the crib holding the child's sibling has disappeared.

The elf sighs again, resigned, and he leaves the healing quarters to see where his tent has decided to spirit the babe off to.

While he has been working, the semi-sentient tent seems to have created a new room for the children—a nursery, Gaeldúath sees when he pushes aside the curtains in a doorway near his own sleeping quarters that certainly hadn't been there before—and to his relief, the crib and baby are there.

"I know I was busy, but at least give me a nudge the next time you do something like this," he mutters as he enters the room, and the curtains flutter amusedly at him.

Just then, crying erupts from the crib, and the elf hastens forward.

"Ai, you must be very hungry," he says to the wailing babe, scooping the little one into his arms and noting the tell-tale stench of soiled swaddling clothes in the air. "I very much doubt those orcs ever bothered changing you. Let's get you cleaned up first, and then we'll ease you back into eating, hm?"

He is very glad, then, that he has served as a minder for a great many children, both in this world and in others—and having magic doesn't hurt, either. The elf conjures some clean swaddling clothes, and after banishing the dirtied ones and casting another Scourgify on the babe, he at last discovers that the child is male.

"Well, my lad," he says conversationally to the little dwarfling, who looks up at Gaeldúath with teary yet curious eyes as the elf wraps him in the clean cloth. "You and your brother have made it, despite the terrible things you've been through. You two are a hardy pair, isn't that right?"

The infant doesn't reply, only reaching up to tug insistently on Gaeldúath's long, dark hair the moment the elf lifts and settles him into his arms.

"Ai," he says again with a wince. "Yes, yes, we'll get you something to eat now, Master Dwarf."

He could easily pry the babe's tiny fingers from his hair, but the little one has ceased crying and even looks rather amused as he pulls at the fine locks, so Gaeldúath will gladly tolerate it for a while more.

"I am glad that you, at least, seem unaffected by your time with those nasty orcs," he comments as they leave the nursery. "Once you have something to fill your belly, we'll go sit with your brother. I'm sure he would like to know that you are alright."

He performs a quick mental check of the older child, and the wards in the medical wing are calm and inform him of a steady recovery. The elf makes a pleased hum.

At the musical sound, the dwarrowling in his arms gazes up at him with wide blue eyes, locks of black hair still held tightly in his little fists. His suddenly wondrous expression makes Gaeldúath huff a soft laugh.

He says, "You haven't ever encountered an elf before, have you? Well, I would hold off on making any judgments just yet: I will inform you right now that I am a bit odd compared to my kin. I hope you won't mind."

The babe blinks up at him for a moment before going back to playing with his hair, an entertained smile on his little face.

"No," Gaeldúath murmurs, more to himself than to the child. "No, I did not think you would."

As he makes his way to the dining area with his young charge, the elf is glad that fate has deigned to deliver him to these poor dwarrowlings. He does not know if they would have lasted the night otherwise.

He calls a silent truce with destiny for the time being. Right now, he has a hungry babe to feed.

…

…

Gurth an Glamhoth: Death to the orcs.