Harry Potter Breaking Free

One thing was becoming obvious. This woman was going well out of her way to convey that she hadn't taken any offense from Harry's knee jerk reaction. While he wasn't thrilled that he was being treated like he was made of glass, he still appreciated the woman's kindness, so he returned her smile to the best of his ability. When the bubble popped and their odd moment came to an end, time seemed to resume and Harry finally realized that he hadn't said a single word since he first emerged from the Floo.

Ugh... Harry wondered why oh why he was always such an awkward guy... Pull up Harry P, use your words!

After taking a deep and calming breath, Harry addressed the woman who was still staring at him expectantly. "Ahem. Hello and thank you for welcoming me into your home. My name is Harry Potter... Pardon me, I'm sorry but... Who are you?..."

At Harry's question, the beautiful blonde gasped in surprise, and then gave Dumbledore a look of long suffering frustration. "Eet seems I must apologize again, 'Arry. Appoline Delacour ees my name. I would 'ave eentroduced myself to you earlier, but I thought you already knew hoo I was. You see, I would 'ave expected our esteemed 'eadmaster 'ere to per-aps share where eet ees you are visiting zis afternoon... 'Ow seelly of me..." Appoline gave Dumbledore one last rather pointed look before turning her attention back towards 'Arry. "Ze man ees eneegmatic ees ee not? Eevasive even..."

While Harry couldn't have agreed with Appoline more, he'd long ago realized that there was nothing to be done about it. Dumbledore would never be candid or forthcoming about anything at all, and Harry had given up on changing that a long, long time ago.

Well, no matter.

Harry currently had several other concerns to focus his attention on, with Appoline being one of them. Appoline Delacour was beautiful, yes, but she was also more than that. Despite the fact that she was at least a dozen years his senior, he found his eyes following her every move around the room and her very presence was enough to give him goosebumps. It was noticeable enough that Harry was having to force himself to remain on task, when what he really wanted to do was stare at her in fascination. Words Harry, use your words...

"I understand your dilemma Appoline, and I see no problem with your introduction. I was only told that your family might have some experience with what I'm currently unable to control." Harry gestured around the room that he was currently flooding with his magical shroud. "I admit I'd have liked to get to know you better before we became so... intimately close, magically speaking."

When Appoline broke out into a second bout of very musical laughter, her entire face lit up with childlike enthusiasm. "Oui, Yes, I will admit eet ees like nozzing I 'ave ever felt before Monsieur. You are eemitting so much power. Eef I were to do ze same, I would render myself unconscious wizzin just ten meenutes."

Harry was extremely intrigued by what he'd just heard. "You emit an aura shroud like I do?"

"Not like you do 'Arry... Oh! Can I call you 'Arry?" Appoline gave 'Arry an eager look as if she desperately wanted to be casual acquaintances.

Harry could only nod. He wouldn't have been able to say no to much at all with her giving him such a plaintive expression.

"I and my daughters, hoo you will be meeting soon eenough, are what's called Veela. We 'ave a similar ability to yours zat develops around puberty and we also struggle to control eet fully especially at first. Your aura ees eentense, no? Eet feels like we are..." Appoline stopped there and changed tack into a more useful direction. "Our auras, Veela auras I mean, are altogether different zan yours 'Arry. Eef you felt ze full power of our shroud eet would not make you feel close to us, but razzer... eet would make you want to be..."

With that rather mysterious hook, Appoline gestured for Harry to follow her towards their main study, so that they could further discuss his situation.

In the end Appoline's words were the clues that Harry had needed to finally understand his abnormal fixation with her. Using his magical senses Harry focused on any magic being emitted from within Appoline's body. While she wasn't projecting a shroud of any kind at the moment, Appoline did seem to have some kind of nearly invisible passive attraction field and Harry was being affected by it.

Interesting...

The knowledge that Appoline's body was affecting her surroundings using extremely subtle magic actually made the solution rather simple. By straining his mental muscles a bit, Harry managed to start manipulating some of his magical shroud. While he wasn't very accomplished at controlling his aura shroud for any length of time, pulling a little extra magic around his body to act as a shield or a buffer didn't seem to be a problem. The point of his barrier wasn't to stop physical objects from reaching him, which would've been extremely difficult to pull off, but rather to interfere with any passive magics that entered into his personal space.

As he followed Appoline out of the Entry Hall and through the hallways of her home, Harry nodded in satisfaction, because he'd successfully negated her effect upon his body. All that was left at that point was the fact that Appoline was a graceful and beautiful woman, and magic had nothing to do with it...

....

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